12:43 The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence (Peter Luff)

On my hon. Friend’s points on air defence radars and wind farms, I must stress that the provision of up to three proven wind farm-tolerant radars by the wind farm developers, removing the objections of the Ministry of Defence to those wind farms and releasing significant renewable energy potential, is seen across Government as very encouraging. My ministerial colleagues have worked hard to achieve that. Indeed, the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change has acknowledged that work, which has been achieved by co-operating across Government, and with industry, to reach an outcome that is beneficial to our national security, energy security and decarbonisation goals. Furthermore, it is not the case that the UK’s air defence radar network will be made up of a foreign fleet in the future. I am assured that UK industry is developing a wind farm-tolerant air defence radar, and I welcome that.

Given the financial climate, taking an incremental approach to Project Vigilance will ensure that existing sensors are utilised to full effect, the whole air defence network is coherent and each reaps maximum benefit from other interlinked projects. That applies not only to MOD projects, but to other Departments’ initiatives and requirements, including the need, whenever possible, to enable the use of renewable energy; I say “whenever” to emphasise the great importance that we attach to that.

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