On the Warpath

The new Secretary of State for Defence Gavin Williamson took his first session of Parliamentary questions on 27 November. It is a reminder of his swift rise to power that his first session at the dispatch box ever came as the most senior Minister in one of the most senior Departments of State.

Over the weekend the whispers by backbench MPs about disquiet on potential defence cuts gained full voice, with hints that at least one Minister was prepared to resign if the Army was cut, while other Ministerial sources darkly blamed a civil servant for the likely outcome of the current SDSR.

In Parliament today the SofS was left in no doubt of the strength of feeling by his backbench colleagues about this issue, which has become a lightning conductor for Tory MPs angry at the state of the Party, and furious that the Labour Party, led by a life long pacifist is able to go on the offensive about defence cuts made by a Tory government.

‘Deny Everything’

There was frustration among many social media users and Parliamentarians that no assurances were given on the future of the LPDs by Ministers. This makes perfect sense though -with a review underway, and every planning option still under consideration, to prejudge the outcome would disrupt this work and the wider review.

Ministers cannot prejudge a review when the work is ongoing – building force packages is finely balanced, and to rule something in or out can cause a ripple series of events that could throw the entire structure out of balance and cost.

At the same time though SofS was clear that he saw the desire to spend 2% of GDP on defence as a floor not a ceiling. These words seemed intended to buy support from backbenchers keen to see him take on the Treasury and win a deal involving more funding for Defence. With a reported deficit of nearly £2bn a year (nearly 3% of the Defence budget) there is a need to either tighten belts or find new money.

Image by Ministry of Defence; © Crown copyright

The problem for the SofS is that there probably isn’t any new money to be found. Defence is not an inherent vote winner as the people who vote Tory on defence are likely to be in rock solid constituencies, not places where it would win seats.

The usual answer from fans of Defence is to do something like say ‘scrap DFID’ or other such words. In reality to do this would mean reopening the 5yearly comprehensive spending review to look at all departmental settlements, including MODs, with the combined outcome of it not only being equally unpalatable for MOD next time round, but also it would enrage a wide number of other Tory MP’s with similar vested interests in different departments. Does a minority government really want to risk the wrath of its backbenches and loss of public support on a spending review that isn’t needed?

The options open to HMT and MOD are limited – there may be some scope to defer or reduce the scale of required in year efficiency savings, or maybe some limited contingency funding may be found for niche capabilities  that support other departments work. There may be scope to increase the level of charging that MOD does to other departments to provide capabilities (for example resilience work).

To make really big savings, or to free up cash for reinvestment requires either major equipment cuts or manpower cuts. The Army is seen inside parts of MOD as ripe for cutting, with many inside wanting to slip it to 60-65000 – the original goal of the 2015 SDSR before Armed Forces manpower levels became politically sacrosanct.

It may be possible to eke savings out of major changes such as to the Future Accommodation Model (e.g. reduce accommodation and education support), or look at major changes to the allowances model (significant cuts to X factor perhaps?). Given that service manpower costs account for over 25% of the Departments budget, cutting them is an easy way to save money.

The real danger is if backbench politicians, keen to maintain the ‘shop window’ mentality put sufficient pressure on SofS that various force structure options like ‘delete LPD’ are taken off the table. There may be a sense by the SPADs and Ministers that if they can preserve the Front Line (memories of ‘Front Line First’ here) that this will be sufficient to halt the rebellion in its tracks.

Such a move would be a disaster for the Armed Forces as any savings would instead fall on the far less glamorous but vitally important support areas. No MP will ever say ‘thank you for saving the future deployable IT capability’ but spending money in this sort of capability is the enabler that makes the UK deployable globally and be seen as an ally of value.

Its easy to issue direction to take a larger wedge of savings out of support costs, or to reduce the buy of various bits of kit that people don’t understand in order to keep an LPD or frigate going. To do so though risks the ability of the military to deploy, and could put Service Personnel’s lives in danger if they no longer have the battle winning equipment that they currently have.

Paradoxically if you speak to many serving personnel, some would welcome the option to scrap the LPD force. It would free up manpower that could be used to put existing ships in reserve back to sea, and would solve a lot of headaches in pinch point manpower areas. It would be a brave move, but one that would make a real difference. It is also ironic that much of this manpower crisis in the RN is a direct result of the failure of the last 1SL at the SDSR to make an effective case for a substantial manpower uplift to the RN, which it needs far more than it does extra ships right now.

Blame the Civil Servant

One worrying trend was the emerging news this weekend that efforts are being made to blame Mark Sedwill for the findings of the review, with defence Ministerial sources allegedly stating that he is out to shaft the MOD to pay for more cyber capability.

Public servants are not the people who sign off on reviews – they present them to Ministers, having considered the evidence submitted to them and put together a range of options on what could be done. This sort of review considers all the threats to the UK today, not just the ones the MOD can tackle. It is likely that the biggest direct threat to UK national security isn’t an armoured division of Russian T90s charging down the M20 in Kent, but cyber hacktivists exploiting national financial systems or power grids to reap untold havoc.

The loss of power stations, disruption to savings or other nefarious attacks could pose a serious existential risk to the UK way of life. Preventing this from happening is vital, and warrants heavy expenditure to get right. This money isn’t new money – it has to come from inside the spending limits the Treasury puts in place.

It feels as if Defence Ministers (or their SPADs) are pushing a narrative trying  to blame the Civil Service for Defence Cuts – putting the blame on their advisors for evidence based policy making, rather than supporting emotion based backbench mollifying measures. Such a move is disturbing as it reflects a desire to not take full responsibility for decisions, nor accept that in the UK Ministers, not public servants take those decisions.

The battle lines are drawn – Ministers are now in no doubt of the depth of anger on Tory backbenches about defence cuts, and will desperately be looking for a way out of this crisis that is as much about saving face as it is money.

There is no new money to be found, and Phillip Hammond is unlikely to be sympathetic for demands for more cash – he will be well aware of the MODs profligacy at times, and the fact that the SDSR has taken a wider view on defence than just the traditional force structures.

Any deal will need to calm the back benches -possibly by clawing money back from DFID and also preserve the illusion of front line capability. In reality this will harm the UK, as it will damage enablers and prevent investment where it is required to keep the UK genuinely safe. In the medium term the emotional need to ‘own’ a technically deployable (in about 10-20 years) armoured division may trump the objective need to protect from cyber hackers now. Only time will tell if this was a wise move or not.