§ Mr. BakerTo ask the Secretary of State for Defence what stockpiles exist in the United Kingdom of(a) biological weapons and (b) chemical weapons; in how many locations these are kept; and what total volume of each existed within the United Kingdom in (i) 1996 and (ii) 1986, [10693]
§ Dr. ReidThe United Kingdom has not possessed an offensive biological weapons capability since shortly after the second world war. The UK gave up its offensive chemical weapons capability in the 1950s and had disposed of its stocks of such weapons by 1960. Indeed, we are party to the 1972 biological and toxin weapons convention and the 1993 chemical weapons convention, which explicitly ban the stockpiling of biological and chemical weapons.