§ Q3. Mr. Trippierasked the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for 3 February.
§ The Prime MinisterI refer my hon. Friend to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
§ Mr. TrippierDoes my right hon. Friend agree that it is now becoming clear that the major difference between the unilateralists and the multilateralists is that the unilateralists want peace at any price, whereas the remainder of us would view the sacrifice of freedom as too high a price to pay?
§ The Prime MinisterI entirely agree with my hon. Friend. Unilateral disarmament would put peace at risk 416 and it would put peace with freedom and justice at risk. We in this country do not want peace at any price. We want peace to retain freedom and justice, which is a part of our way of life. That peace has been kept by the possession of nuclear weapons. If there is to be disarmament, as most of us desire, it must be all-sided disarmament, not just one-sided disarmament.
§ Mr. Christopher PriceThe Prime Minister referred recently to the spur of competition. What spur of competition existed when her right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport handed out to Travers Morgan and Peat, Marwick, Mitchell, without going out to tender in any way, over £600,000 of public money as an interim payment?
§ The Prime MinisterThe hiring of those consultants was fully in accordance with published codes of practice and precedents.
§ Mr. WallerWill my right hon. Friend remind the women camping out at Greenham Common that the only country that has suffered a nuclear attack in war was one without a deterrent and the means of delivering it? Is it not an ironic but tragic fact that the only effect of demonstrations of this nature is to put off genuine multilateral disarmament because the Soviets may doubt our determination to defend ourselves?
§ The Prime MinisterMy hon. Friend is correct. The purpose of nuclear weapons is to deter any form of war across the NATO border. It has succeeded in that very well, because the risks of going to war for either side would be too great. I believe that what is happening now is that the Soviet Union, having no public opinion and denying its people any public opinion, is relying on some elements of our public opinion to enable it to keep all its SS20s, while denying us the necessary deterrent to prevent the Soviet Union from using them.
§ The Prime MinisterI refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
§ Mr. CryerDoes the right hon. Lady accept that the women at Greenham Common, along with the vast majority of the population, are concerned that the installation of cruise missiles under American control will represent an escalation of nuclear weaponry which is not subject to any form of verification throughout the whole of Europe? Is not the £1 million campaign on which the Prime Minister and her cronies are about to embark a public relations exercise to hide the fact that she is a warmonger, in a year that is likely to be an election year?
§ The Prime MinisterThe hon. Gentleman is talking his usual rubbish. The cruise and Pershing missiles are a modernisation of existing nuclear forces, a modernisation that has already taken place in the Soviet Union. When the missiles come here, their use and the use of the bases will be a matter of joint decision. It would be far better if the hon. Gentleman addressed his remarks to the Soviet Union to try to get it to take down its missiles.