Nuclear Weapons: Maintenance and Disposal (Hansard, 9 December 1997)

§ The Minister of State, Ministry of Defence (Lord Gilbert)
My Lords, the estimated cost of maintaining the capability to design, produce, maintain the safety of, store, move and dispose of nuclear weapons in the United Kingdom is around £410 million in the current financial year. A significant element of this figure is related to the decommissioning of old facilities, warheads and equipment and the management of historical waste.
The cost of providing, operating, maintaining and disposing of the Royal Navy's ballistic missile submarine fleet and its missiles is estimated to be some £530 million in the current financial year. This figure includes the operating cost of Trident, which has been estimated at £200 million a year over the 30-year lifetime of the system. It also includes some warhead-related costs and costs related to the phasing out of Polaris.
We are looking at the basis upon which cost estimates have been calculated in the light of operating experience and as part of the wider Strategic Defence Review.

§ Lord Carver
My Lords, I thank the Minister for that extremely interesting Answer. Does he agree that when people ask loose questions—for example, questions about the annual cost of Trident—the figures should be 5 quoted and not the £200 million a year, which is merely the operating costs of the ballistic missile submarine fleet?

§ Lord Gilbert
My Lords, Her Majesty's Ministers always attempt to answer the Question in the terms in which it has been phrased.

The Earl of Carlisle
My Lords, does the Minister agree that the sizeable sum of nearly £1 billion a year could be better spent elsewhere within the defence budget? Will he consider spending it on re-equipping and retraining the armies of the eastern European nations such as the Baltic States, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania? Will he also consider putting that suggestion to the Strategic Defence Review?

§ Lord Gilbert
My Lords, I must start from the premise that this Government, like their predecessors, consider that the money being spent represents good value and I have no doubt that the new constructive Opposition will take the same view. I am interested in the menu of suggestions which the noble Earl put forward, but I do not believe that at this time any of them is a practical way ahead for the Ministry of Defence.

§ Lord Chalfont
My Lords, does the Minister agree that the sum which he has mentioned, which is a small proportion of the defence budget, is a small price to pay for deterring potential aggressors in a world in which the weapons of mass destruction and the means of delivering them are in the arsenals of an increasing number of dangerous and unpredictable regimes?

§ Lord Gilbert
My Lords, I am obliged to the noble Lord for his remarks and I agree with him. It may be of interest to the House to note that, for example, the current Russian stockpile of nuclear weapons includes many weapons of the 100 to 200 kilotonne range and some as large as 1 megatonne; that is, 1 million tonnes of high explosive equivalent.

§ Lord Jenkins of Putney
My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend on the completeness of his Answer. Is he aware that the idea that the money might be better spent elsewhere is well founded? For example, if he were to discontinue the spending of so much money on our nuclear weapons he might be able to assist the Russians to get rid of some of their more dangerous weapons.

§ Lord Gilbert
My Lords, I am always happy to entertain questions from my noble friend, but I am afraid that I am never likely to persuade him to agree with me on these matters. Obviously, we would rather not be in a position where we had to spend money on any armaments, let alone nuclear armaments, but, unfortunately, we must deal with the world in which we find ourselves.

§ Lord Burnham
My Lords, perhaps I may draw the Minister's attention to that part of the noble and 6 gallant Lord's Question which refers to "maintaining the capability" of keeping nuclear weapons and to the Minister's remarks about decommissioning. Will those costs come out of the defence budget or from some other source, because they appear to have nothing to do with the maintenance of the defence of the realm?

§ Lord Gilbert
My Lords, it is always the fate of defence Ministers that their budget must accept many costs which, in my view, are not strictly defence costs. However, the decommissioning costs will be expected to come out of the defence budget.

§ Lord Lewin
My Lords, I should first declare an interest. At one time I was the operational commander of the Polaris Fleet and, as Chief of the Defence staff, I was responsible for giving military advice to the government of the day as regards the choice of the successor system. I am grateful to the Minister for his reply to my noble friend Lord Chalfont. Will the Minister confirm that the Trident missiles are still assigned to NATO because I believe that our NATO allies, in particular the United States, would view with some dismay any change in that arrangements?

§ Lord Gilbert
My Lords, I am grateful to the noble and gallant Lord, with whom I spent many happy hours at the Ministry of Defence last time I was there. I am happy to confirm that our submarine nuclear forces are still assigned to NATO. The noble and gallant Lord is absolutely right. It would present us with considerable difficulties with our allies were there to be any change in those arrangements and none is contemplated.

§ Lord Wallace of Saltaire
My Lords, will the Minister tell the House whether the Franco-British defence dialogue, which I understand has been covering nuclear weapons for some time, has identified any areas in which closer co-operation as regards positioning and stationing operations between the two independent nuclear forces could promote savings through a lower level of operation, given that there is no immediate threat to either country?

§ Lord Gilbert
My Lords, all I can say to the noble Lord is that the results of any such conversations would remain highly confidential.

§ Lord Monkswell
My Lords, bearing in mind the very large sums of money that the Minister has reported to the House as being involved in keeping nuclear weapons, will he confirm that even larger sums of money will be spent by other major nuclear powers on the maintenance of their nuclear weapons? Moreover, as the Government's long-term aim is to see the eradication of nuclear weapons worldwide, what steps are the Government taking to alert the other countries which have nuclear weapons to the large cost savings which could accrue if they were to join our Government in those long-term aims?

§ Lord Gilbert
My Lords, I am happy to confirm to my noble friend that the amount of money that the 7 United Kingdom spends on its strategic nuclear capability and sub-strategic nuclear capability is extremely modest compared with those sums spent by the other nuclear powers. I am happy to pass on my noble friend's suggestion to my right honourable friend in the other place that he draws the attention of the other nuclear powers to the sums of money which might be saved. However, I regret to say that I see no immediate progress in that field, despite the recent remarks by President Yeltsin.