HC Deb 03 February 1959 vol 599 cc38-9W
76. Mr. Lewis

asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will give the total estimated cost to Great Britain of the recent Suez War, taking into account the actual cost of military operations, the loss of the arms and equipment at the Suez Base, the loss of the Suez Canal; and, using as the basis the total revenue received by Great Britain in the year preceding the Suez War as a result of imports and exports between Great Britain and Egypt, what has been the estimated loss to British trade, to date, due to the severance of trade with Egypt.

Mr. Amory

The net extra expenditure incurred by the Service Departments on special measures taken in connection with the Suez Emergency was estimated in their Appropriation Accounts as some £25 million. The value of the Suez Base installations and the stores contained in it was estimated at some £60 million, though this was in no sense a realisable value in conditions of a forced sale. It is not possible to draw up any balance sheet of the cost of the Suez operations to the United Kingdom in the absence of knowledge of what would otherwise have happened.