My Lords, almost exactly 12 months ago, we debated Ukraine here in this Chamber. Let us once again proudly say that, in that time, there has been no weakening of our resolve or that of the British people to support Ukraine; no stepping back from our determination to stand up with our NATO allies and beyond for democracy and freedom; and, so importantly, no division among us—virtually unanimously, this party, all parties and none, as I look across this Chamber, and both this Government and the last Government stood up against Russian aggression. And we will see it through, as will the British people. NATO has been strengthened, not weakened, and Europe stands ready to do what it takes. Let that message resound from this Chamber today.
Twelve months ago, Ukrainians were approaching their third winter of courageous resistance, defending their homes and homelands against Putin’s full-scale invasion, including many women on the front line. Let me start by paying tribute to the Ukrainian people, their resolve, their determination and their bravery. They humble us all, bringing tears to our eyes, including mine, when you see this at first hand. Whatever our words today, let that always be at the forefront of our thoughts, and we look forward to the noble Lord, Lord Barrow, the former Ukrainian ambassador, making his maiden speech today.
Today, as they approach their fourth winter, on a macro level, depressingly, the picture remains broadly unchanged. While, thanks to Ukrainian courage, determination and ingenuity, and support from allies, Putin has still not achieved any of his overall strategic war aims, Russian forces continue to ruthlessly wage his illegal war, continuing to inch forward in a full-frontal assault on Ukrainian sovereignty and international laws and norms.
Let us remember, as we debate this here in the beauty of this Chamber, proud of our democracy, that Putin is increasingly hitting and killing Ukrainian civilians, with, according to the UN, a 40% increase in the number of civilians harmed this year compared with last. He continues to send Russians to their death in horrifying numbers, coupled with the targeting of Ukraine’s civilian energy infrastructure. These are sickening and cynical tactics that expose Putin’s comparative failures on the battlefield, where a long and increasingly blurred line of contact, and Ukrainian courage and ingenuity, have turned an invasion that Russian planners thought would be measured in days and kilometres into a quagmire, measured in years and metres. A special military operation to remove President Zelensky, take Ukraine and weaken Europe in days was the original intention—a puppet Government in Kyiv. A protracted war for four regions that Russia has proved itself incapable of taking has galvanised President Zelensky and, indeed, galvanised Europe.
Yet, behind this familiar big picture, much has changed over the last 12 months. The Government, with the overwhelming support of Parliament and the British public, have massively increased the scale of UK support for Ukraine as, together with partners, we have ramped up our sanctions to constrain Putin’s war machine, and after three and a half years of brutal and deadly war, the strength of Ukraine’s resistance and European resolve, coupled with the election of President Trump, have finally put peace talks on the agenda.
My Lords, I thank the Government for tabling this debate and the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, for his powerful, passionate and clear introduction to it. This debate is timely for three reasons. It enables the political presence in the United Kingdom, so articulately described by the Minister, to show a continuing united front against President Putin’s illegal war in Ukraine. That powerful unity of purpose and resolve is very important. The debate facilitates an informed discussion among Members across this Chamber, with the wealth of experience that they reflect, to offer thoughts, opinions and ideas. Prominent among them is the noble Lord, Lord Barrow, to whose maiden speech we eagerly look forward. We will certainly be very interested to hear his contribution.
Perhaps most importantly, this debate is our opportunity to send a clear and uncompromising message to President Putin that the United Kingdom stands against bullies, has always stood against bullies and will always do so. We know the peril of appeasement; the facile delusion that you can do business with a bully; the fatal misapprehension that the bully is well intentioned towards his enemy, when the bully’s only interest is himself and the clinical and ruthless advancement of his illegal and brutal agenda. The United Kingdom sees that clearly, and I pay tribute to the Government for their steadfast support of Ukraine.
It is clear from the coalescence of support around Ukraine, whether from European neighbours who see President Putin for what he is, the coalition of the willing being progressed by the Prime Minister, or the more formal activity being pursued through NATO, that this continuing threat posed by President Putin to Europe must be primarily addressed by Europe. Of course, we welcome the continuing and vital support of the United States, but the responsibility falls on us and our European friends to demonstrate that we can step up to the plate and pay our way. European and western Atlantic security is our joint responsibility. We have to guard it, we have to fight off any challenge to it, and we have to be visibly determined in our resolve to do that.
My Lords, I too thank the Government for initiating this debate today and very much look forward to hearing the maiden speech of the noble Lord, Lord Barrow.
It is nearly four years since the full-scale and unprovoked invasion in February 2022. Ukraine faces a fourth harsh winter, with constant drone attacks, concerns about energy supplies, power cuts and, for many women and men, continued gruelling life on the front line, in the trenches. The huge psychological impact and disruption to family life, most particularly for children, is hard for us to imagine.
It is hugely important, as through the debate today, that the Ukrainian people know that there is no wavering in the UK’s support for Ukraine. There is strength too, as other noble Lords have said, in the continued cross-party consensus in this country on Ukraine. With the notable exception of some in Reform UK, Ukraine and Ukrainians can feel secure that they continue to have the support of all mainstream political parties in the UK.
It was very welcome that both the Prime Minister and the King continued to give public demonstrations of support during President Zelensky’s visit to London last week. Such things are symbolic but none the less remain incredibly important. For that reason, I profoundly disagreed with the leader of Kent County Council, from Reform UK, when she said in May that flying the Ukrainian flag was a “distraction” and removed it from County Hall. Flying Ukrainian flags on public buildings is a powerful symbol, and one that I know all my Ukrainian friends hugely appreciate when they come to London and see their flag flying all over Whitehall.
Ahead of the debate today, I was in contact with former colleagues and friends in Kyiv. Their messages to me this week have been characteristically determined, but they have made for sober reading. They fear that, once again, we will do too little, too late, and will not take the brave decisions that need to be taken now. One of their greatest fears is the rise of the populist right in Europe. Disinformation, political interference and manipulation are now very real threats across Europe and beyond. As President Zelensky has said on many occasions—and the Minister repeated—the war in Ukraine is our war too. Ukraine is fighting for our values of freedom, democracy and the rule of law. For this to be more than just words, we have to find ways to continue to take the people in this country with us.
My Lords, I am grateful for this debate on Ukraine and the opportunity that it presents. Mine will be an uncomfortable but honest contribution. I start by observing that it is difficult to draw any comfort from an analysis of the tactical situation on the ground, and it is even more difficult to derive any moral satisfaction for what we are continuing to ask Ukraine to do.
I say this primarily because the Russia-Ukraine conflict continues to be a limited war—limited by both the means and the geography. These limitations are ones imposed by the United States and by NATO more widely. They almost exclusively constrain Ukrainian activity to Ukrainian soil and deny Ukraine the capabilities required to carry the fight to Russia. They do so, arguably, and understandably, to avoid provoking Russian escalation—hence a preference for financial sanctions as opposed to Tomahawk missiles. But such choices limit Ukraine’s ability to hurt Russia in ways that might bring the war to a conclusion on acceptable terms.
In short, therefore, we continue to accept that Ukraine is fighting a proxy war on behalf of NATO that we are denying it the means to win. Reflecting on this, I worry that we forget that war is not ultimately a battle of physical exchange but a battle of human will. Sadly, the trajectory of this war increasingly looks like one that is hurting Ukraine more than Russia. More specifically, it is hurting Ukrainian society more than Vladimir Putin. Putin appears content to incrementally grind this war towards a ceasefire that will be humiliating to Ukraine and embarrassing to western Governments.
To set alongside and to help balance this gloomy prediction is the potential reality that, even with a ceasefire that rewards Russia, Russia will finish this war in strategic deficit. Finland and Sweden will have joined NATO, the Baltic will have become a NATO lake, NATO’s European members will be en route to spending 5% of GDP on defence and Russia’s war economy may be starting to exhaust it domestically.
My Lords, it is good that we are having this debate, and I hope that we have similar debates quite regularly. We all look forward to the maiden speech by the noble Lord, Lord Barrow, who brings special expertise and knowledge to our considerations today.
Anyone who still holds doubts about the kind of threat that the West faces need only look at the pictures from just a few weeks ago of the meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation in Beijing. The sight of President Xi, President Putin and President Kim Jong Un watching the robotic military parade in Tiananmen Square should have sent a shiver down the back of all western leaders. Those leaders that day were not on holiday or on some weekend break in China’s capital; they had been there with Prime Minister Modi the previous day and, remotely, with the mullahs in Tehran. They were there mobilising for a world order that reduces the power and the values of the West. The Shanghai group was assembled at that time to show support for Putin’s assault on Ukraine and as a signal that traditional foes were now demonstrably united and conspiring against us.
The stakes in eastern Ukraine, as has already been said, are high, and they go well beyond the geography of the Donbass. If the invasion of a sovereign state such as Ukraine is successful, then make no mistake about the consequences for us and for our way of life. The Ukrainians are fighting tenaciously and resolutely for their lives and their land, but they are fighting and dying for us too, because the inviolability of existing borders is part of the post-Second World War settlement and, if it unravels, we will pay a huge price in the cascade of disruption that will follow.
Today in the grey zone, Putin deploys cyberattacks, disinformation campaigns and election interference. Sabotage has been contracted out to organised criminals, attacks across Europe are systematic and our critical national infrastructure is on a knife edge. The Kremlin strategists intimately know all our vulnerabilities. Undersea cables carry 98% of all the data that we use, and 77% of all the gas supplies to this country come in one pipeline from Norway. Homeland defence was a key aspect of the Government’s strategic defence review. UK national resilience has to be as serious a priority as it is in Scandinavia.
My Lords, as we look to the future of what is happening in Ukraine, it is important to bear in mind, as the noble Lord, Lord Robertson, has just done, the extent of the Ukrainian achievement so far. We talk about victory and defeat but, when one thinks of what Putin was setting out to do and what he has achieved, there is no doubt that, so far, Ukraine has achieved a considerable victory. It has withstood the Russian invasion; Russia has acquired only some 20% of the territory; it has banished the Black Sea fleet from the Black Sea; and it has made the Russian economy largely dependent on China, a very humiliating situation for Mr Putin. It has done extremely well, and we must pay tribute to that.
However, to put it mildly, the outlook is not so good. Like World War I after the first battle of the Marne, the war has settled down into a war of attrition but, unlike the two sides on the Western Front, Russia and Ukraine are far from equally matched. They are much more like the rivals in another great war of attrition, the American Civil War, when the resources of the north were so much greater than those of the south.
If war, short of some devastating Napoleonic coup, is largely a matter of resources, the outlook for Ukraine is becoming increasingly difficult and it is important to be realistic about that, as indeed are many Ukrainians. A Gallup poll in July showed 69% in favour of a negotiated peace as soon as possible, versus 24% for continuing to fight until victory. The Economist recently reported that the independent Ukrainian polling organisation the Rating Group found that 59% of Ukranians would accept a loss of territory if that brought about peace.
More eloquent than these figures is the number of Ukrainians who have fled their country. In September this year—not so long ago—the UNHCR estimated that to be 5.7 million. We have heard about the problems facing Russia and people leaving Russia, but that is a very substantial drain of the Ukrainian population. Many of those people, I realise, went in the early months, but the drain has continued, and it has continued of men of military age as well as other people. Not many have returned. This exodus and its implications must be borne in mind as we admire the guts, resourcefulness and stamina of the Ukrainian front-line troops and the heroism of the civilians who put up with bombing and bombardment of every sort.
My Lords, I too am much looking forward to the maiden speech of my friend and long-time colleague, the noble Lord, Lord Barrow. The House is about to discover that, unlike the present speaker, the noble Lord really knows what he is talking about, having been ambassador in Ukraine and Russia, as well as many other senior posts.
I too warmly welcome the fact that this Government are showing staunch support for Ukraine, in seamless continuity with the approach of the previous Government. That bipartisanship in politics is really important in giving Britain the authority to lead the European response to Russia’s aggression in Ukraine, which is now approaching its fourth anniversary. The coalition of the willing that is taking shape under British leadership is growing, in my view, into the European pillar of NATO, which I think could be of long-term strategic significance, given the evolution of the US approach to Europe.
It is playing a crucial role in co-ordinating support for Ukraine but also in planning, as the Minister said, for the post-conflict period. We are seeing in Gaza the risks of getting to a ceasefire without arrangements in place to avoid a security vacuum. Ukraine is of course different, but it is encouraging that plans are in place for a multinational force Ukraine. Of course, we will want to scrutinise at the right time the tasks and rules of engagement of the force.
In the meantime, we have to get to a ceasefire. The Prime Minister deserves great credit for his deft handling of President Trump. He and other European leaders have repeatedly shown they can be very effective in countering Putin’s efforts to tempt Trump into selling out Ukraine’s vital interests. For all President Trump’s efforts to get a ceasefire deal, it is crystal clear that Putin does not want one; he thinks he is still winning, as many noble Lords have said. He thinks that we in Europe will tire, and that we will find that he has driven a wedge between us and the United States. So my main point this morning is that the only way to get Putin to accept a ceasefire is to ratchet up the pressure on Russia to the point where he feels his grip on power is in jeopardy.
My Lords, while noting in the Lords register the interests in relation to my advice to PricewaterhouseCoopers and RIDNE, I strongly welcome this debate and the excellent opening speech by my noble friend Lord Coaker, bringing this debate to life—as he did 12 months ago, too. It is a real pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Ricketts, and I strongly endorse his final point about the need to ensure that the British public understand the importance of the defence of Ukraine and the skills that they are developing in our own defence and development. I strongly support and welcome the Government’s commitment to the defence of Ukraine and to combating Russian aggression. I add to the long list that my noble friend provided in his opening speech particular praise for the training of Ukrainian recruits, in which this country has played a significant role. I am sure that has saved many lives on the front line and has helped in other ways too.
I strongly support the coalition of the willing and that development, not just for this conflict but in general terms, as we need to take a global stance against aggression and authoritarianism. In particular, it is important that we remember that that coalition is wider than just our European allies; it includes Japan, for example, and other countries that are as strongly committed to the defence of Ukraine and combating Russia as we are. I would like some indication from the Government, towards the end of this debate, that that understanding of the importance of a global coalition of the willing, not just a European one, will be something that we maintain.
As part of that effort, I hope that the Government, while building up our hard power—long overdue and definitely essential—recognise the importance of soft power too. At times over the past 12 months, it has been suggested that we would perhaps replace our efforts at soft power by more efforts on hard power. They have to go hand in hand, as we need to ensure that we have global support for this effort and are building a strengthening of democracy and the rule of law around the world, not just in this particular conflict on the eastern border of Europe.
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Earlier this month, the Foreign Secretary outlined the latest tranche of UK sanctions designed to weaken Putin’s war machine and ensure that his thirst for war comes with a clear cost. She set out measures that outlawed 19 new Russia-related individuals and entities, including Russia’s two largest producers of oil—Rosneft and Lukoil. We warmly welcome President Trump’s decision to mirror those sanctions.
The latest UK sanctions package also targeted refineries around the world that import Russian oil, suppliers of drones and missile components, and 44 additional shadow fleet vessels, taking the total number of Russia-related individuals and entities sanctioned by the UK to over 2,900, including more than 500 shadow fleet vessels—more than any other country. That uptick in our Russia sanctions mirrors the uptick in our support for Ukraine.
To help get bomb-damaged power supplies back up and running, and help Ukraine through the winter, the Foreign Secretary announced £142 million in UK aid during her visit to Kyiv last month. To help protect Ukrainian civilians from Russia’s urban bombing campaign, ensure Ukraine can stay in the fight and secure a just and lasting peace from a position of strength on the battlefield, we have used interest from immobilised Russian sovereign assets to step up UK military support, with this year’s military package hitting £4.5 billion—the largest ever level 4 UK support for Ukraine.
We have invested £600 million this year to arm Ukraine’s forces with a variety of drones, which is on track to boost the number delivered by the UK from 10,000 in 2024 to 100,000 drones this year. The Defence Secretary’s 50-day delivery drive over the summer provided nearly 5 million rounds of small-arms ammunition and around 60,000 artillery shells, rockets and missiles, along with drones, counterdrones and air defence equipment. Last week, the Prime Minister announced that we would continue to provide Ukraine with long-range capabilities and confirmed that the expansion of a UK missile-building programme will enable us to deliver 140 air defence missiles ahead of schedule—part of the £1.6 billion deal for more than 5,000 lightweight, multirole missiles that are being made by workers at Thales in Northern Ireland.
Over the last 12 months, we have also extended Operation Interflex, the multinational training operation that has now trained more than 60,000 Ukrainian personnel here in the UK, until at least the end of 2026. As a demonstration that the whole of Europe has stepped up military support for Ukraine, in the eight months since the Defence Secretary took on the role as co-chair of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group, we have raised pledges of military aid totalling over £50 billion. Of course, we also continue to work with the United States.
Because Ukrainian resistance has turned a war that Russia thought it would win on the battlefield into a war of production, let us never again read of Ukraine retreating because of a lack of equipment. We are greatly intensifying our support for and collaboration with Ukraine’s defence industries, which are at the cutting edge of drone development and are building increasingly effective long-range strike capability. We have entered a new technology sharing agreement with the Ukrainian Government, an industrial partnership, to develop and advance a new air defence interceptor drone—co-operation that will boost our respective capabilities and also boost British jobs. That builds on the recent £200 million investment in the UK by Ukrspecsystems—one of Ukraine’s biggest drone-manufacturing companies—which will see the latest drone technologies being developed and manufactured in and around East Anglia, creating 500 jobs.
The intensification of our military support and co-operation should not be necessary, because, this month, President Trump again opened a door and invited President Putin to stop the fighting and pursue peace. President Zelensky is ready to order a ceasefire and step through that door. The UK and Ukraine’s other allies are ready to support negotiations and have advanced plans to support peace. But Putin stubbornly refuses, choosing instead to instruct Lavrov to shun President Trump’s call for meaningful negotiations towards a lasting peace and, just a day later, fire another barrage of hundreds of cruise missiles and drones into Ukrainian cities, killing at least seven people, including a mother and her 12 year-old and six month-old daughters in Kyiv, and hitting a kindergarten full of children in Kharkiv, where one person was killed. Putin, again, chose war and civilian deaths over negotiations and peace.
Our Prime Minister, together with President Zelensky and 11 other prominent European leaders, issued an unequivocal joint statement in response to Putin’s latest rejection of President Trump’s diplomacy, insisting that Ukraine must be in the strongest possible position before, during and after any ceasefire, and that we must ramp up the pressure on Russia’s economy and defence industry until Putin is ready to make peace. That is why we so warmly welcome the new US and EU sanctions and why the UK and France continue to lead more than 30 nations in a coalition of the willing that will, in the event of a ceasefire, strengthen Ukraine’s path to peace and stability by deploying a multinational force for Ukraine, to secure Ukraine’s skies, secure safer seas and regenerate Ukraine’s forces.
Multinational force planning was discussed by the Prime Minister at the recent coalition meeting in London attended by President Zelensky. Command structures have long been agreed. Reconnaissance missions to Ukraine have been completed and the Defence Secretary has accelerated funding to ensure the UK force contingent is ready to go when called upon. UK and European partners are also working up options to use the full value of the immobilised Russian sovereign assets to support Ukraine.
Today, we will debate battlefield tactics and strategies for peace. We will debate our support for Ukraine’s defence and how to ratchet up pressure on Putin’s war machine. We will debate how we stop Russia bombing civilians and—let us remember—how to reunite the thousands of abducted Ukrainian children with their parents, for which the First Lady of Ukraine deserves huge credit, as indeed does the First Lady of the United States. In 2025, children are being used as a weapon of war—what a disgrace, and what a shocking indictment of Putin and Russia.
It is beyond debate that Putin’s war remains illegal, immoral, unjust and unjustifiable. He could stop it today. In fact, he should stop it today, because rather than weakening Ukrainian statehood, Putin is galvanising it. Instead of turning a peaceful neighbour into a vassal state as he planned, he has turned Ukraine into one of Europe’s most capable military forces, which, after three and a half years of a brutal invasion, will never accept Russian rule or a Russian puppet Government. Each day that this war continues, Putin not only strengthens Ukrainian resolve but he also strengthens our resolve and the resolve of our allies and of our people. The last Government, this Government, all parties across this Chamber, and our European allies, remain in no doubt that democracy and the rules based international order matter, and that is what is at stake in Ukraine today.
Ukraine’s security is our security and Ukraine’s fight is our fight. The front line of European security runs through Ukraine. I am proud, as a UK Defence Minister, to say at the beginning of this debate that, as we approach Remembrance Sunday, this country has always stood up for freedom, democracy and human rights. We will never forget that, or the sacrifice of so many; a sacrifice that continues to inspire us today as those values are once again threatened by Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine. Let it ring out from this Chamber today—however hard, however challenging, we can, we will, and we must prevail. Democracy, human rights and freedom demand it.
For that strategy to be delivered, I suggest that in relation to Ukraine we need three things: greater clarity, perhaps, about the shape of the short term; the planning and resource necessary to sustain the medium term; and an outline of the longer term, in relation to both the rebuilding of Ukraine and the broader construct of Euro-Atlantic security.
Taking the short term first, we—the United Kingdom and our allies—must continue to supply Ukraine with what she needs to defend herself, and that includes training, so I was very encouraged to hear the Minister’s comments on that. On the broader front, when she responds, will the Minister, the noble Baroness, Lady Chapman, say whether there is clarity across the piece about who is supplying what, how this is being co-ordinated and whether we can have, perhaps in written form, an update on what UK military assets are currently being provided—although I accept the noble Lord has been very explicit about part of that supply? In her response, can the Minister confirm that in the supply of weaponry there is clarity that for Ukraine to respond proportionately to this illegal invasion, she must be free to target the locations within Russia being used for hostile attacks on Ukraine? Implicit within this is the political will to fund in a stable and predictable manner our UK defence capability. When dealing with such an overt threat to our security, the Prime Minister must provide that leadership, supporting his Chancellor and requiring the Treasury to fund to the levels necessary. It is so axiomatic that I do not expect the Minister to comment, other than to observe that if there is any hesitancy in providing such leadership, the only person clapping his hands with glee will be President Putin.
Moving to the medium term, if President Putin is recalcitrant, the supply of military assets must continue. We also need to audit, both as a country and with allies, the effect of sanctions on Russia. After this length of time, it must be possible to have a reasonably accurate measurement of the consequences of these sanctions. I appreciate that the Minister may not have detailed information to hand, and I am very happy for her to confirm that by letter. If, as is widely understood, sanctions are having a savage effect on the Russian economy, there needs to be a concerted coms strategy by us and our allies to get that message through to the Russian people. This has been discussed before— I remember the matter arising when I was a Defence Minister—but if the Minister can update the House on any progress, that would be helpful.
Looking to the longer term, that projection must embrace what is necessary to rebuild Ukrainian infrastructure. What is required to reinstate a functioning economy, and what political reforms are necessary to facilitate these objectives? It is clear that some excellent work is already being done, and the noble Lord the Minister referred to the contribution from the United Kingdom. Elsewhere, Hope for Ukraine, based in the United States, has a comprehensive programme to assist. The EU, through the EBRD, the European Investment Bank and the European Commission, has provided a total of €30 million to help Ukraine prepare large-scale infrastructure projects and, apparently, more funding is due from EU countries and donors. Can the Minister give us a more detailed update on what the UK is doing on this front? In aggregate across the overall contribution of support, we are not sure what that map looks like. How is macroeconomic support being given to Ukraine? Is it international loans and international financial guarantees? Is there, for example, a workable basis for the operation of commercial insurance indemnity across a range of commercial activity? I look forward to the Minister’s response on these specific issues.
Turning to what political reforms may be required within Ukraine, corruption in that country is sadly unarguable. Everything that the allies and friends of Ukraine are prepared to do to help carries a reciprocal obligation by Ukraine to fix what is bad. Without that explicit recognition from Ukraine, there can be no confidence among the international community that it is worthwhile providing help. This is serious. It gets to the heart of what we want a post-conflict Ukraine to look like. I suggest that Ukraine has to tackle judicial corruption. There are ongoing issues with judicial appointments and a lack of trust in the courts. There is war-related corruption. The ongoing conflict has apparently created new avenues, such as, we understand, officials demanding bribes for leave or diverting foreign aid meant for the front lines. There appears to be top-level and systemic corruption. That includes issues with state contracts and the influence of oligarchs, who, we understand, remain a problem that hinders foreign investment and economic growth.
It would appear thatsqueeze-col3 any progress in addressing this is glacial, particularly where large interests and big players are involved, such as natural resource extraction and large infrastructure projects. Will the Minister confirm what the United Kingdom is doing, either alone or with partners, to provide advice and support to Ukraine to try to help tackle these serious problems? Is it possible to provide any in-country support and advice? If there is any update she can provide to the House about progress on these essential reforms, that would be very welcome.
I conclude, as I started, with appreciation that this debate is taking place. I have endeavoured to encourage thinking across a time period about what is required as this conflict progresses. I have tried to be constructive and, I hope, conciliatory in suggesting positive proposals, but not shying away from what, under no circumstances, this Government should shy away from: the paramount obligation, for the safety of us all, to secure stable and predictable funding for defence. I look forward to hearing contributions from Members. I very much look forward to listening to the noble Baroness the Minister’s response. I end with the most important observation: His Majesty’s Opposition will support the Government’s continuing support for Ukraine.
Last month, I had the privilege of attending the Sarajevo Security Conference; I refer noble Lords to my entry in the register of interests. I was struck by the conversations I had with military representatives from some of the Nordic and Baltic states. Clearly, those countries that have borders with Russia feel and fear the consequences of the war in Ukraine much more directly. It is not surprising that they are rapidly changing their approaches to defence spending, military service and civil defence. The head of the Norwegian Civil Defence talked to me of their all-society approach to defence and security in Norway, an approach very much embraced in Finland and other Baltic states. It is an approach that puts trust, building resilience and public engagement at its centre. As people face an increasing number of hybrid threats, from power outages to disinformation campaigns and electoral interference, it is incredibly important that people understand that this is now the reality of hybrid war in the 21st century. It is directly connected to the war in Ukraine, and combatting it is all part of our wider defence and security policy. Developing such an all-society approach to defence is contained in the Government’s recent strategic defence review by the noble Lord, Lord Robertson. I would be grateful if, in her closing remarks, the Minister could say a little more about the plans to implement this in practice, as well as about the Government’s wider approach to implementing Article 3 of NATO.
Although people in the UK remain firmly supportive of Ukraine, as all recent opinion polls show, I think that, for many people, it is regarded as something that is happening far away that is not directly relevant to their lives. I genuinely worry that, if the conflict were to escalate, we have not yet built up the resilience or capacity in this country to deal with such a situation. As we substantially increase our defence spending, we have to take people with us. We need to do this through public engagement, as well as through education. We have much to learn about resilience, as well as about technologies and the realities of hybrid war, from Ukraine. In that, I very much agree with what the Minister said.
As the fourth winter of this war approaches, the backdrop remains bleak. President Trump continues to constantly change his mind about his relations with President Putin. The sanctions on Rosneft and Lukoil are welcome, if late in the day. We must hope that the reality will one day finally dawn on President Trump that he has been humiliatingly played by the Kremlin.
With the exception of Hungary and Slovakia, it is welcome that the European allies remain united. The principle that only Ukraine should be able to decide Ukraine’s future remains the dominant view in Europe. It is welcome too that a move to increase European defence spending is agreed in principle. This will inevitably mean strengthening Europe’s military industrial capacity and streamlining procurement, but progress is slow and the processes cumbersome.
We face an incredibly difficult period ahead in relations with both Russia and China. New Russian weaponry, including hypersonic missiles, are a threat not just to Ukraine but to us all. When we now look back at the West’s response to Russia’s invasion of Crimea and eastern Ukraine in 2014, I would argue that the absence of a powerful and united response was a strategic error. It allowed President Putin to believe that he could carry out the full-scale invasion of 2022. He gambled on Ukraine being weak and divided, as well as on the West’s inability to unite. If he utterly misjudged the response of the Ukrainian people, he also largely misjudged the West’s response. This has, however, been made significantly more complex since President Trump returned to the White House in January this year.
It is hard to know if the current US-led discussions will lead to a ceasefire and an eventual peace. However, I very much hope that the UK will continue to play a pivotal role in ensuring that any such discussions adhere to two key principles: namely, that boundaries must never be redrawn by force and that only Ukraine should be allowed to decide upon its own future. I believe that history will harshly judge any solution that does not adhere to those principles.
However, those who draw comfort from that should remind themselves of the human nature of warfare. So long as Putin remains in power, danger lingers. He recognises the reticence of America to intervene decisively and will observe the relative sluggishness of NATO rearmament. Potentially, Putin will boil at Britain’s boasts regarding its part in inflicting such huge casualties on Russia. He will see Britain as America’s proxy. He will have a fully mobilised set of armed forces, an untouched suite of strategic capabilities, a fully mobilised war economy and a window of opportunity to act while NATO—certainly the UK at the moment—still prioritises welfare benefits over national security.
Even if such a scenario is misjudged, it presents real dilemmas for the Ministry of Defence, particularly those now engaged on the defence investment plan, the exercise that determines how the MoD will spend its money for the remainder of this Parliament. Noble Lords may recall that the Government pledged £10 billion of new investment money to prime the capability priorities of the strategic defence review, but £6 billion of that has to come from defence efficiencies, and the MoD has now discovered an in-year black hole which the service chiefs are now scrambling to fill with in-year savings. The reality of the financial situation is dire, and I suspect that uncomfortable announcements lie ahead.
I can imagine that the main decisions to be taken on defence investment will be the hard choices regarding three separate policy objectives. The first is the combination of spending on Ukraine and re-establishing deterrence through a return to warfighting readiness. The second is in making the nation more resilient to hybrid threats, not just critical national infrastructure but society itself. The third is the investment in the technology needed to give substance to the concept of the integrated force, a force capable of achieving decisive advantage from a position of significantly enhanced lethality. All three policy objectives need huge investment. Without such investment, we potentially fail both Ukraine and NATO, we expose society to hybrid threats, and we completely undermine the only real hope of credibility that the defence review offers our Armed Forces.
Hard investment choices have for ever been the challenge of peacetime planners, but we should not be engaged in peacetime planning. We face an outcome to the current conflict that leaves behind a humiliated Ukraine, a residually dangerous Russia and an impoverished Britain devoid of threat awareness with an unfunded SDR. I have worried for the last 15 years that when it comes to national security the Government of the day have consistently put their perceived duty to reassure society above their duty to respond to geopolitical realities. I hope the Minister can reassure the House otherwise, but I am lost as to what hard facts he can call upon to do so. We need to do more.
A few weeks ago, Mr Martin Jaeger, the president of Germany’s federal intelligence agency, addressed the Bundestag, and his words should chill us. He talked about a looming “hot confrontation” with Russia, and he said: “Our enemy never rests and we are already under attack”. Moscow’s goal, he said, was “to undermine NATO, destabilise European democracies, and divide Western societies in order to drive them into self-destructive paralysis”. Those are wise and sobering words but, as the strategic defence review soberly says:
“Defence’s wider ways of working remain suited to a peacetime era”.
But we no longer live in a peacetime era, and, in contrast, our adversaries are in attack mode. Sir Basil Liddell Hart, the great master of strategy, wisely said that
“the issue of battle is usually decided in the minds of the opposing commanders, not in the bodies of their men”.
The lesson from that is that we need to impress on the architect of this terrible invasion that he simply cannot win, and that we will continue to provide Ukraine with the means to get it into Putin’s mind that pursuing this war cannot and will not achieve his deluded dreams of the total subjugation of Ukraine.
Under Putin’s leadership, Russia, a land of basically good and decent people, has lost or had maimed a million and a half young Russians, the seed corn of that country’s future. At least 300,000 have died on Putin’s chosen battlefield, and another half million have left the country to escape his authoritarian claws. His economy is overheating, and this year he managed to capture only 0.4% of Ukrainian territory. He is failing, and he is failing Russia. We must not grasp defeat out of the jaws of victory.
Against that background, it is no wonder that Russia believes that it is in its interest to squeeze Ukraine like a python squeezes its prey. Russia must believe, against the background I have just outlined, that it may yet force a military collapse. Failing that, it must believe that the longer it goes on, the more Ukraine will be left in a devastated situation when peace eventually comes. That will, of course be bad for Ukraine, but it will be bad for us and our European allies too, because it is we who will have to support the recovery of Ukraine and the revival of its civic society, economy and armed forces.
So we must continue to support Ukraine militarily and financially, as other speakers have said, and through sanctions on Russia, with the twin aims of bringing Russia to the negotiating table if possible, and certainly of preventing a Ukrainian collapse. But we must also align ourselves with those elements in the Ukrainian Government and society that want to seek ways to end the war by negotiation on terms that Russia can accept, if that is possible. That way lies the best hope of rebuilding Ukraine’s economy and society after the guns have fallen silent.
We must continue our support of Ukraine at war, but we must bear in mind that, in the long run, what we want is a prosperous, free and democratic Ukraine, and we want it to emerge from the war with the ability to create a society of that kind.
We have collectively done a lot already on weapons deliveries and on sanctions. But, as the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Houghton, said, we have always been too slow in giving Ukraine the weapons it really needs. We have got to be bolder. We have to give Ukraine the long-range weapons that it is calling for, including persuading President Trump to send Tomahawks. Could the Minister tell us when the Government expect to secure agreement with the EU on the SAFE arrangement, which would allow British defence industries to co-operate across Europe?
On sanctions, we should finalise as soon as possible the deal to use frozen Russian assets to underwrite a loan for Ukraine, of a size that will give it economic security for several years. The Government have said that the £25 billion or so in the UK will be part of that deal. I hope that the £2.5 billion that Abramovich received for the forced sale of Chelsea football club will be there before long as well. The main block, of course, is in Belgium, but this has dragged on too long. We need now to get this settled and get the money to Ukraine.
Yes, we should intensify our sanctions on Russia—again, we have done a lot. President Trump has suggested that the extra 25% tariff he put on India led Modi to say that the Indians would reduce their purchases of Russian oil. But then we see in the FT that there is a large-scale sanctions evasion operation apparently linked to ArcelorMittal. I hope we too are pressing the Indians to reduce sanctions evasion. Are we looking for other ways of applying decisive pressure to Russia economically: for example, against Russia’s central bank?
I have one final thought, adding to what other noble Lords have said. Given all the pressures on public spending, we need to take every opportunity outside this Chamber to emphasise that our partnership with Ukraine is not just about sending money and giving development aid; it provides huge benefits for this country. The Ukrainians are indeed fighting and dying for our security. They are more skilled than anyone in the world at countering Russian cyberattacks. They are world leaders in drone technology and tactics. This is transforming not just the battlefield in Ukraine but every future conflict.
We have an enormous amount to learn from Ukraine’s hard-won experience, and the agreement that Ukraine will share data for the benefit of British defence industries is excellent news. I hope that that can be widely available across the defence industry because, unless new defence equipment is taking account of how warfare now works in Ukraine, it is going to be obsolete before it comes off the production line.
In short, however the war in Ukraine finally ends, we will share a continent with a hostile Russia for the foreseeable future, and a strong partnership with a free Ukraine is in our long-term national security interest.
I welcome the commitment to increased action on sanctions generally by the Government over this past month, but I highlight the issue of the more than £2 billion raised in the sale of Chelsea Football Club over three years ago. While the Government of the day definitely made some mistakes in the speed at which that was done and the nature of the agreement with Mr Abramovich, there was definitely some action happening and momentum building, towards the end of the previous Government, to secure the use of these assets for humanitarian purposes under the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, as Foreign Secretary and Andrew Mitchell as Minister for Development. I urge the new Foreign Secretary—perhaps this is a message that both my noble friends, as Ministers, could take back to her—to put the foot back on the pedal on this issue. It is criminal that these resources are still waiting to be used, when they could make such a difference in Ukraine and have such an impact elsewhere to ensure that the humanitarian purpose, agreed back in May 2022, could be fulfilled.
Finally, I endorse the comments already made by noble Lords about the stolen children of Ukraine who still lie behind Russian borders. Organisations such as Bring Kids Back UA and others have highlighted this issue very effectively and continue to campaign and work for the release of individual children, to bring them back across the border to their homeland. In another place, Johanna Baxter MP has been at the forefront of raising this issue. She recently wrote to Minister Doughty in the Foreign Office, raising specific issues that the UK could usefully support—the tracing of these children, the data that is available and the support for rescue missions, reintegration and, crucially, the rehabilitation of these children, who have been subjected to such trauma. There are thousands, potentially tens of thousands, of children still in this position. It is a weapon of war being used by President Putin to strike fear in the heart of every Ukrainian family. We need to stand firmly with those children and not, as happens far too often in war around the world, forget about them shortly after the war comes to a conclusion with a ceasefire. We must maintain the pressure over the years to bring every child back.