§ Mr. Charles Irvingasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will put forward proposals at the United Nations special session on disarmament and thereafter to reduce arms to levels internationally and multilaterally agreed and supervised; and if he will direct the resources saved to purposes of world development.
§ Mr. HurdThe Government give full support to the range of fresh proposals for reductions in arms and force levels to which Western countries have committed themselves in recent months. We shall seek the endorsement of the special session for the view that the first priority is progress in those negotiations.
A successful outcome to the negotiations would free resources for other purposes. There would be many claims on the freed resources, and world development would certainly be one of them.