Lord Ricketts (CB)

My Lords, I thank the Minister for such a comprehensive speech—delivered at pace, if I may say so—and I am glad that our report has stimulated such a wide-ranging and lively debate. Noble Lords will see that I am trying to be the eternal diplomat again. Many Members raised points that I did not have time to raise in my speech. I am left with the feeling that our title, Unfinished Business, was not that bad. It is unfinished in the sense that it will never be done, and in the sense that in British politics the issue of whether closer relations with the EU are in our interest is still live. That debate will continue in the months ahead, and one of the issues will be the legislation connected with dynamic alignment. I think the big message from our debate is that the EU-UK relationship cannot be seen in a vacuum, isolated from the wider geopolitical upheaval. Indeed, it is encouraging the Government to go faster on the reset, which I welcome. I think there was widespread support in the debate for the idea that we should get closer to the EU on defence-industrial co-operation, if we can do so in a way that is in our interest, which requires the EU to think again about its entry ticket. However, the real strategic decisions are not going to be taken in the EU, and I hope that the House will continue to discuss the issues that we touched on here. What is the right forum in the future to do that? We need to bear in mind the points made by a number of noble Lords that Britain’s leadership in a future forum for strategic decision-making in Europe depends on us having the defence resources rising at a pace to make us credible. I personally think that a close and confident relationship with the EU is part of the response to the generational upheaval that we are facing. I am surprised that our debate did not produce a consensus on that point of view, but I think it was a valuable debate and I beg to move.