Defence Select Committee Hearings House of Commons

Defence Select Committee Hearings House of Commons
Tuesday 21 November 2006

Trade Unions leaders gave evidence on Tuesday to the Defence committee inquiry into the Future of the UK's nuclear weapons on the skills and manufacturing base.
Bernie Hamilton from Amicus, Keith Hazlewood,GMB and Terry Waiting from the Keep Our Future Afloat Campaign argued that their members needed nuclear weapons production
in order to keep their jobs.

In the afternoon Dominick Jenkins,Greenpeace and Kate Hudson,CND put the opposite case:
that jobs should not rely on nuclear weapons and it was the government's job to make
defence decisions and that support was given to manufacturing industry to ensure that it
prospered without relying on nuclear weapons as a 'product'. read more……….

The morning session was very business-like but when it came to the anti-nuclear witnesses, conspiracy theory accusations were made by some committee MPs, when told that it
appeared a decision had already been taken to develop new warheads in the light of the evidence of significant developments at AWE. Although the Chair gave all the witnesses a fair hearing and that their points informed the questions to Ministers later in the day, there were some MPs who behaved discourteously towards those who disagreed with them. What does not come over in the transcripts of the proceedings  are the school-boy sniggers and loll-about body language displayed by one or two members.

 

Web address for transcript of Defence Select Committee
Text for 7th November Hearing with witnesses from nuclear contract  companies is at
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm/cmdfence.htm
Text for 21st November is not up yet.

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