Another vote on Trident?
Is Tony Blair signalling that Parliament will get another vote in the years to come on whether to proceed with a replacement for Trident?
Look carefully at what he said in Prime Minister's Questions (watch it here). "It's today we need to take the decision," he said before adding the words, "for the concept and design stage". Later he said that it was always open for Parliament to look again at what he called the "gateway stage" - i.e. the moment the order for new submarines has to be placed - in 2012 to 2014. In other words, MPs may get to vote again before the subs are ordered.
Why does this matter? Because ministers are desperate to split the large number of rebels they currently face. Already some want to vote against Trident whilst others want to vote - with the Lib Dems - to delay the decision. A third group want an assurance that today's vote does not commit Britain to spend billions on replacing our nuclear deterrent and keeping it for decades to come without the issue ever being voted on again.
That group have been given a hint by the PM today. The question is whether, before the end of this debate, there is more than a hint - namely a commitment to another vote in a few years time. Of course, that would have to come not from the PM but his likely successor, Gordon Brown. He obviously can't say anything but watch carefully for the words of his namesake, and close ally the defence secretary in the minutes before the vote.
I'm 
Comments
Hearing John Denham on the today program was very interesting. This is yet another time when he has stepped in as a senior backbencher suggesting a 3rd way - the gateway review route. This may help TB to save face, as it effectively passes the block without requiring Tory support.
Suddenly Mr Denham becomes someone to watch. I know he's done well as chair of the Home Office Select Cttee and I wonder if he's then angling for a post-Blair cabinet spot.
Sorry, that sounds rather too cynical...
As always with Blair it's vitally important to remember that he will say almost anything when cornered in order to get his way. Nothing he says is really what it appears to be on first hearing. At this late stage, being saved by the Conservatives on the issue of Trident whould be a humiliation and a signal of his weakness, and bluntly, his irrelevance. Surviving with Conservative support on such an expensive and important issue, cannot be presented as an indorsment by the Labour Party. So, post Blair, the party could reasonably contend that Trident renewal is, actually Conservative policy, not Labour policy.
Nick,
Wouldn't the 'two stages' position open him to MORE potential rebels joining the amendment to put off the decision? After all, what he's tacitly admitted is that THIS decision isn't binding...
Labour has a long history of these MPs voting against their own party affairs. I always wonder why they are repeatedly reported as such big news.
My question for a long time as been why do we need nuclear weapons? We have seen the damage that they cause. So how can any decent human being want to have the tools that can cause such complete destruction? I understand that we do unfortunately live in a world of uncertainty. But surely another country with nuclear weapons only increases that uncertainty. Its just like the fact that if you live in a house with a gun you are more likely to get shot.
I think Tony Blair should do the honourable thing and hold a public debate on this matter, it is after all the public he is supposed to be protecting.
I've heard a lot in all the coverage of the Trident debate about how it would be very bad for Blair if he wins the vote only because of support from the Tories. Why? I really don't understand why this should be embarassing any more. He still wins the vote, and surely everybody understands in this day and age that the Labour leadership are much closer politically to the Tory party than they are to left-wing labour backbenchers.
Perhaps, Nick, you could write something in your blog about why (or if) it matters if Blair gets his way only with the support of the Tories.
I propse a vote on a replacement for Nick
What about this scenario: An anti-trident candidate stands for the Labour leadership opposing Gordon Brown, who will by then be on record as having voted for trident.
Would the anti-trident platform be a powerful one? Powerful enough to stop the Brown juggernaut?
If Britain wants to be completely dependent on the US for its ultimate security from attack or invasion, getting rid of its nuclear deterrant is the best possible way. Only don't count on the US always being there, nations have interests not friends and it is not possible to know whether American and British interests will coincide decades from now. And unlike the desperate efforts to mitigate years of pacifism and failure to build arms prior to world war II, there won't be an opportunity for Britain to correct this mistake in time to turn around the misfortunes of war should unwelcome armed conflict be thrust on it. Israel certainly isn't counting on the US for its ultimate defense, it is believed to have a secret nuclear arsenal of as many as 600 or more bombs and warheads. Sir Christopher Meyer, former British ambassador to the US said on ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳'s "The Interview" that Israel is the closest nation to the US, closer even than Britain. But Israel knows that the winds of politics can change drastically and suddenly. Go ahead Britain, roll the dice, see what happens. If you get away without it, you may be a few tens of billions of pounds ahead in the coming decades. If not, well the old saying "there will always be an England" is just that, just a saying. There are no guarantees in life.
Because of the political cost, MPs always look for reasons to vote with the government whenever they can get away with it. Anything that makes the issue a more complex and muddied gives them that extra room to do so.
Of course, they know what they're doing. It's a two-step. They say this vote is necessary to keep the options open (and who could be against that), and then in a few years time, they can say it's too late to cancel it.
Winning a vote by obscuring the meaning of the it is classic Blair. Yes it's smart political manouvering which helps all stakeholders feel like they've achieved something but in doing so he's succeeded in rendering an important vote meaningless.
The winners in this are all in politics. Blair gets to present a victory which crucial for his legacy considering the defeats his judgement have suffered over the years. And yes, he and the party get to promote the impression they agree on nukes without the indignity of needing the Tory vote.
And then there's the losers, those out side politics. The tax payer will pick up a whacking bill for concepts and designs which haven't really been commissioned but will need paying for. On top of which yet another fudged issue communicates that our PM is spineless.
I'm happy - I don't want Trident.
I'm annoyed - I might still get it.
Oh please can he leave office soon.
It will be interesting to see how many Scottish MP's supported the government on Trident. Will this be the issue which finally loses Scotland for Labour in a few weeks' time?
TB's position on this seeems prudent to me. If he is genuine when he asserts that we must start the design process immediately, then it is of course proper that the House vote today on it. Of course, by 2012/14 the world may be a somewhat friendlier place (here's hoping) and we may consider the need to have changed. It therefore proper that we discuss the issue again before entering into contracts.
However, without doing the design work now, there will be nothing to buy in 2012 and thus no debate to have. This seems to me to be one of the most sensible and thought out policies of the Labour government of late.
Come on Tony, your on your way out. Why dont you stand up as a citizen of the world you have been helping to distroy and admit that these wepons are an afront to human dignity. Set an example for once,......... it may be your last chance
Such Fools.
It is a wate of money and is going to be useless too.
But tax payers are worse to pay for it and so many poor children here in UK
Of course, they dont know it though.
Fools like they never learn from Atlantis.
I must start by saying that I have a vested interest regarding Trident, since half of my family is in the West and half of my family is in Russia. I support the idea of upgrading Trident because I understand that the nuclear deterrent has given us more than half a century of peace after two devastating world wars that divided and destroyed many families. My wife and I even named our three children using English, Russian, German and Spanish names to please every side of the family. For us the word peace has a more pressing, a more dramatic, a more transcendental dimension. I do understand the position of those well-intentioned, but perhaps excessively optimistic politicians that reject Trident. For some reason, I always end up thinking about Chamberlain and Churchill and have in my mind the image of Prime Minister Chamberlain returning from Germany with a smile and waving a sheet of paper saying that peace in Europe had been secured. We must prepare for the worst and hope for the best. We must promote peace, but we must also be ready to defend ourselves. Every eleventh of November at 11 o'clock we remember the high cost of peace.
Trident appears to be a waste of money which could be much better applied elsewhere.
There is no urgency to take a decision now
It stinks
Now that we have "voted" to update Trident does this mean that we will stop complaining about other countries moving along in a similar direction??
There is no moral argument for Trident whatsoever.
How can we show our faces at non-proliferation talks?
The fundamentals of this argument are simple. Either everyone has nuclear weapons, or no one does.
If no one does, then the threat doesn;t exist.
If everyone does, this represents the ultimate deterrent.
What cannot exist is a situation where the "haves" of this world hand down judgement from on high, shaking sabres at the "have not" regimes that don't cling onto the coat tails of the "haves".
Will I feel safer living in nuclear Britain, rather than non nuclear Portugal, Norway or Argentina? Absolutely not.
Would a situation ever arise where Britain has to unilaterally employ nuclear weapons? Absolutely not.
Am I ashamed to be British? Absolutely.
The following MPs voted with the government against the rebel amendment, but abstained on the motion: F.Mactaggart, M.Salter,A.Whitehead.
How very strange. First they vote against an amendment calling for the decision to be delayed,but then having voted for the decision to be made now, they express no view on what that decision should be.
Can we really trust Labour to govern this country? They say one thing and do another.
I have a number of objections to Trident but am not completely opposed to it. I am not entirely satisfied by the necessity of such a system, by the dependence on American companies and systems to maintain and operate it and by the cost.
I am however annoyed by comparisons between the opponents of Trident and Chamberlain on one side and Blair and Churchill on the other. It has nothing to do with appeasement since there is nobody to appease. Would those people also say that Italy, Spain, Germany or Switzerland are trying to appease by not having nukes? Appease whom please?
I was also outraged by the political posturing by David Cameron in Parliament. This was revolting. Vote with your conscience by all means. Don't try to make a fool of others who don't share your certainty.
I'm curious about whether Mr Blair is referring to a particular method when he refers to 'concept and design' or 'gateway' stages, or whether he is simply borrowing (and mis-using) Programme Management terminology.
The OGC's Gateway Process would presumably apply to such a major procurement, and it would be a fair interpretation of his words to expect that the Gateway for Investment Decision (Gateway 3) would be the point to thoroughly review the Trident Replacement Programme before a major spending commitment is made.
However, I seem to recall that Gateway Reviewers 'red-flagged' several of the current NHS IT procurements, only to have their recommendations ignored. Therefore, I have little confidence that the Government's own process, designed to stop in their tracks juggernaut procurement projects which have no longer have a justification or business case, will be effectively applied in the future.