Ukraine

(Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for Defence to make a statement on the war in Ukraine.

Since I last updated the House on 24 October, the situation on the ground has remained largely unchanged. The armed forces of Ukraine continue to make slow but steady progress in their fight to retake their country, while a small crossing of the Dnipro has been established. Russian forces have made small advances in the northern axis of a pincer movement with which they are attempting to surround the town of Avdiivka.

Over the weekend, Russia launched what was likely the largest wave of one-way attack drone strikes on Ukraine of the war so far, ahead of another likely winter campaign of strikes against Ukrainian energy infrastructure. Ukraine neutralised most of the incoming weapons from the latest assault, and international partners, including the UK, are working with Ukraine to further strengthen its defences.

We will continue to support priority areas for Ukraine in the coming months, including air defence and hardening critical national infrastructure sites. Our foundational supply of critical artillery ammunition continues. We also continue to develop Ukraine’s maritime capabilities, helping it to deny Russia sea control in the western Black sea. With Government help, a UK-based commercial insurance provider has developed an insurance facility for shipping using the Ukraine maritime corridor; the facility charges premiums in line with those under the Black sea grain initiative, which is crucial for re-attracting commercial shipping.

The UK has committed £4.6 billion of military support to date, as we continue to donate significant amounts of ammunition and matériel from our own stocks, as well as those purchased from across the globe. In addition, we have trained more than 52,000 soldiers since 2015. Our support for next year is being finalised, both internally within the Government and with our partners around the world, and will be announced shortly.

I call the shadow Secretary of State.

Early on Saturday morning, sirens sounded across Kyiv for six hours. Families took to shelters and fear spread across the city. That day, 75 drones were launched on Kyiv—the biggest strike on Ukraine since Putin’s brutal illegal invasion began, as the Minister said. With attention on the middle east, this is a wake-up call about Russia. Putin can still unleash fresh horrors on Ukraine, still shows contempt for international law, and still wants to redraw sovereign boundaries by force. Six hundred and forty-two days on, Ukrainians are living with fear every day, fighting every day, and dying every day. The defence of the UK starts in Ukraine, because if Putin prevails, he will not stop with Ukraine. I pay tribute to the UK troops who are training Ukrainian forces, flying out military aid and reinforcing regional security through NATO.

Last month, the Defence Secretary said:

“Let’s not forget about Ukraine.”

So why did the autumn statement do just that? There was no 2024 military funding or action plan for Ukraine. At the very time when Ukraine needs confidence that it has strong, continuing support from allies, the Prime Minister is stepping back. UK leadership on Ukraine is flagging: this year’s £2.3 billion of UK military funding runs out in March, while this month Germany announced €8 billion of military aid for next year. When will the Defence Secretary himself make a statement on Ukraine? When will Ministers announce the next delivery of UK weapons? When will the Government pledge funding for fresh military aid and publish a 2024 action plan for the military, economic and diplomatic support that Ukraine needs? When will the Prime Minister demonstrate by his decisions and actions that Britain will stand with Ukraine for as long as it takes to win?

I do not think there is any doubt in Kyiv—in fact, I know there is no doubt—about the UK’s continued support, and indeed its leadership on gifting within the international community. While I appreciate that the right hon. Gentleman is keen to make a political point, I think that deep down he knows that too, because he speaks to the Ukrainians. I know, as he does, that they continue to regard the UK as the standard bearer globally for encouraging others to donate ever more and, crucially, to donate weapons systems with ever more complexity. I have no doubt—as I think, deep down, the right hon. Gentleman has no doubt—that the Ukrainian Government maintain their confidence in us as one of their key allies, if not their key ally, and that the UK’s leadership is certainly not flagging.

The right hon. Gentleman asked about the announcement of weapons. The reality is that we are giving a very broad range of weapons. While he might think it is militarily sound to focus on always giving something new, just being resilient in our ability to keep giving what we are giving is every bit as important to the operational planning that the Ukrainian armed forces need to do. This is not a set of gimmicks—a set of announcements. This is about the resourcing of a military operational plan that UK military operational planners are key in developing with the Ukrainians. I am entirely comfortable that across a whole range of weapons systems, the pipeline that we now have in place to deliver every month, not only from our own stockpiles and manufacturing capacity but from those that we can access globally, is a reliable, dependable part of the Ukrainian plan.

As for the plan for next year, I completely accept that the right hon. Gentleman is right to say that a number could have been given in the autumn statement, but surely it is more important to give a number that reflects the discussions that the chairman of the joint chiefs, the Chief of the Defence Staff and General Zaluzhny have had, and those that senior US, UK and Ukrainian politicians have had, in order to understand the Ukrainian ambition for their operations next year, so that we can resource that properly. All the way through, what the UK has done better than anyone else in the world is understand what the Ukrainians want to do next and get there first in delivering that capability, in so doing emboldening others to follow. As soon as the plan for next year is confirmed, I am certain that the amount that it will cost will be announced to Parliament and the plan firmed up, so that the right hon. Gentleman will be satisfied.

That is an intriguing rationale for the fact that we gave £2.3 billion for the first year of the war and £2.3 billion for the second year of the war. Can the Minister convey to his colleagues in Government that Members on both sides of the House would be dismayed if we gave less than £2.3 billion for the year ahead? In his discussions with the Chancellor, might the Defence Secretary remind him that, when he stood for the leadership of the Conservative party, he recommended not 2% but 4% of GDP to be spent on defence?

I certainly can.

I call the SNP spokesperson.

At the weekend, the Ukrainian Government and peoples commemorated the holodomor—the genocide inspired by the Government of Joseph Stalin. During those celebrations, as the Minister rightly said, the Russian Federation launched its largest air attack on Kyiv to date, which included 75 Iranian-made Shaheds towards the capital. Part of the financing of the Iranian regime comes from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. Back in January, Ministers intimated to the House and to Members that they were considering proscribing the revolutionary guard, a financer of the Iranian regime that is feeding the Russian Federation’s military might. When will the Minister’s Government stop considering and start proscribing it?

These are not conversations to which I am directly privy, so I am loth to offer detail that I do not have. Suffice it to say that the debate is more nuanced than the hon. Gentleman implies in his question, but I suspect he knows that. When we proscribe an organisation such as the IRGC, which is so integral to the Iranian state, we can make it quite hard to have any sort of communication with the Iranian state, but those are matters for colleagues in the Foreign Office. I will bring his question to their attention, and encourage them to write to him or seek to respond in some other way.

I very much welcome my right hon. Friend’s comments about insurance for shipping in the Black sea to encourage grain exports. Can I ask him if the British Government intend to carry on doing everything they can to make sure that those exports happen? He will be aware that Lebanon relies on those grain exports, and with the current situation in that region, we must ensure that starvation does not become another factor in an already exceptionally tense situation.

There is lots in my right hon. Friend’s question—on all of which he is entirely right. First, many countries around the world are dependent on grain exports from Ukraine. It is a source of constant frustration to me and Government colleagues who go overseas on diplomatic missions to find that the Russians try to claim that somehow Ukraine is using food as a weapon of war, when it is they who are seeking to limit those crucial exports. Secondly, the more that Ukraine is able to export, the more that the Ukrainian economy survives and, potentially, grows. One consequence of the insurance initiative, alongside the military success or the naval success that the Ukrainians have had in the western Black sea, is that shipping from Odesa is growing, which is encouraging. It is a sign that the new front in the Black sea is succeeding not only militarily but economically.

In August 2022, the Defence Secretary’s predecessor, the right hon. Member for Wyre and Preston North (Mr Wallace), promised a 2023 action plan for Ukraine, but that is still nowhere to be seen with just over a month left in 2023. Surely, the UK must provide our friends in Ukraine with the long-term certainty of UK military support to repel Russia’s illegal invasion, which is so important to Ukrainian friends and family in Feltham and Heston and across the country. Will the Minister explain why this action plan has not been published, and when there will be one for 2024?

The former Defence Secretary is a great man. The Opposition Front-Bench team has rightly sought to hold the Government to account for his commitment to an action plan, but I would reflect personally, in a rare moment of slight disagreement with him, that the masterplan for Ukraine next year is the Ukrainians’ plan for next year, and we, as their key leading supporter, have a duty to resource their plan. Understanding what that plan is and resourcing it, both through straight cash in-year as well as commitment over three to five years thereafter, are all things we undoubtedly need to do; I think there is complete agreement in the House on that. I understand the disappointment that the commitment was not made in the autumn statement, but for the UK to publish Ukraine’s plan would clearly be the wrong way of doing things; we need to understand what Ukraine’s plan is and then announce how we will resource it, and we will do so.

Ukraine is holding firm against one of the biggest militaries in the world and it still rightly refuses to see the mass loss of Ukrainian life. Will my right hon. Friend reassure me on the following two points? First, as there are reports that we are already seeing a reduction in artillery deliveries to Ukraine, is enough getting through? Secondly, following Medvedev’s threat to Poland, what are we doing to make sure our allies, such as Canada, meet their 2% of GDP commitment to NATO, as we need them to stay in the fight and protect that eastern flank?

On the first point, “enough” is what there is. Part of military planning is to moderate consumption levels to meet the scale of deliveries. Ukraine’s military planning must reflect manufacturing capacity and stockpiles across the donor community. Enough is getting through, but we will not find a single Ukrainian general who would not want 10 times that amount if it were available. On the second point, my hon. Friend is absolutely right: we must ensure that the donor community remains foursquare behind Ukraine. In all probability the plans for next year will need to be more around consolidation than the plan for this year, but it is very important that those in the donor community see whatever consolidation is necessary as the right military, strategic judgment—and still worthy of maintaining donor support—rather than peeling away because it does not feel as sensational as plans in previous years.

The previous Defence Secretary the right hon. Member for Wyre and Preston North (Mr Wallace) was well thought of for the support he demonstrated for Ukraine, and in September last year he told the House that the Government had written “letters of comfort” to industry outlining the Government’s intention to place orders with manufacturers. In last year’s autumn statement the Treasury announced £560 million for the replacement of the UK stockpile, to be funded from the Treasury reserve rather than the MOD procurement budget. Where does the Minister think industry, Ukrainians and British service personnel should look for comfort given the silence in the autumn statement on the subject of continued UK support for Ukraine?

I suspect the first line of the hon. Gentleman’s question would make it into the leaflets of my right hon. Friend the Member for Wyre and Preston North (Mr Wallace) if he were standing again as that was rare, but much deserved, praise. I am not sure I understand the rest of the hon. Gentleman’s question. The Ukrainians know what they are getting this year and they have seen time and again the UK seeking to lead the world and catalyse donations. We have been the first to go through every capability threshold; they know that and they continue to know that.

UK service personnel will take comfort from the fact that in the autumn statement the Chancellor promised to maintain the 2% commitment—we are actually comfortably exceeding that—and that the complete modernisation and recapitalisation of the fighting echelon across all three services is well under way, with investment, too, in sorting out all the strategic enablers that bring credibility to our warfighting force. I do not see where any further comfort is needed, either on the Ukrainian side or for the men and women of the UK armed forces. In fact, it is quite the reverse; I think they know exactly what the Government are doing.