 On the next item of business today is a member's business debate on motion 1489, in the name of Christina McKelvie, on extra spending on home of nuclear submarines. This debate will be concluded without any questions being put. I invite those members who wish to speak in the debate to please press the request-to-speak buttons now or as soon as possible. I also invite members who are leaving the chamber to do so quickly and quietly, and I would further invite members of the public who are leaving the chamber also to please leave quickly and quietly. I now call on Christina McKelvie. Ms McKelvie, you have seven minutes, please. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer. Presiding Officer, there are some issues in this world that are far too big for party politics. Immigration and the protections of refugees is one, world poverty is another, international terrorism, religious extremism, and I'm sure my colleagues could cite many, many more. Nuclear weapons, trident renewal, £100 billion wasted on having the capacity to wipe out half the world at the press of a button. Why? Presiding Officer, by taking a stand on these immoral, destructive and abhorrent weapons of mass destruction, we in Scotland are making a global statement. There is only one political party that I see that is clearly, unequivocally dedicated to stopping that renewal. That is the SNP and my friends in the Greens. Of course, being part of the UK family of nations, we are not allowed the right to say no renewal. All of this weaponry is sitting in the estuary at the back of our largest city, and we can hardly be surprised that 80 per cent of the Scottish people don't want it replaced. In this place, members have repeatedly and conclusively voiced their opposition. Two members, and I believe now three members of the Opposition benches, Neil Findlay, Elaine Smith and Malcolm Chisholm have signed this motion because they too want to see investment in people instead of in weapons of mass destruction. I have to commend them all for their integrity and their willingness to rise above the political mudslinging that remains at the background of this debate. Meanwhile, Westminster's welfare cuts risk putting up to 100,000 more children in poverty in 2020. The child poverty action group has estimated that Scotland's child poverty rate will increase by between 50,000 and 100,000 people by 2020 as a result of the UK Government's tax and benefits policy. Within the UK, Scotland is part of an increasingly unequal society, far too many people trapped in poverty and prevented from releasing their full potential. The UK ranks 28th out of 34 nations and the ORCF on a measure of overall inequality. Academic studies, according to Darling, suggest that comparing the airmans of the worst off and the best off has found that the UK was around the fourth most unequal nation among the world's richest countries. As a lifelong supporter of nuclear disarmament, I do not want to see Trident reinvented or reinstalled anywhere else in the UK or beyond. I firmly believe that people living in the area closest to such a weapon of mass destruction should have some voice over whether they are happy to have it there, to have its mammoth vehicles driving around Glasgow's main roads under the cover of darkness with attached wrists that are terrifying. We heard from William McNeill, who got himself into serious trouble. The Royal Navy Submariner said in May that the nuclear deterrent was, and I quote, a disaster waiting to happen. He cited 70 safety lapses in the transportation of nuclear warheads between June and July 2007 and December 2012. They included trucks getting lost, suddenly losing power and suffering break failures and breakdowns, as well as driving the wrong way up a motorway and losing communications. This week, we have heard George Osborne style himself as Bob the Builder. He is the kind of builder that he is likely to see on television programmes such as Rogue Traders or Cowboy Builders. He knows the ones who promise you the best, but what you get is shoddy workmanship and an overinflated price. Let us look at what £500 million would build in Scotland. It would build around 63 primary schools, or how about 20 secondary schools, or how would you feel about 20 community hospitals being built in Scotland? The subsequent jobs created from the planners and architects, to the builders and labourers, to the local cafe in the Sandwich shops feeding the workforce and, of course, the increased tax take from those jobs and the boost that that gives not just to local economies but to national economies. There could be the extra 1,350 teachers that we could have, or maybe 1,650 newly trained nurses in our hospitals. What do we get for £500 million for Mr Bob the Builder Osborne? We get some tarmac and maybe a higher fence not to protect jobs or people but to protect an immoral arsenal of weapons of mass murder. How can anybody justify having the power to wipe out half the world? Why is that a useful attribute to have? The real threat to the world peace comes from extremist terrorists, as in 9-11, or through the apparently irreconcilable divide between Israel and Palestine that has left to so many tragic deaths of civilian women and children in Gaza? Or in the devastation that is wreaked by ISIS and Syria, or in the millions of refugees that are now seeking sanctuary on Europe's shores, is anybody seriously suggesting that nuclear weapons will act as a deterrent to dish? I do not think so. Mr Osborne always talked about investment. Trident is just a big investment in global murder, a bigger investment in some of the warring factions that we have heard of in the Middle East. How about Mr Osborne investing in infrastructure? What about investing in a social security system that supports and protects vulnerable people? How about ending the need for children to go to food banks? Some of the children I've seen when I spent time at the food bank in Hamilton on Saturday. Mr Osborne, the builder, how about building peace in our world by taking the brave step to say that we will not spend one more hard-earned taxpayers' penny on weapons of mass murder? How about building a consensus around the world on the 17th anniversary of the UN? How about building a consensus around the world that peace and diplomacy is the only way to make our world safer for us all? How about building a reputation of a fairer, greener nation that has the guts to step away from nuclear bombs and steps towards disarmament? How about putting berns before bombs? I believe in multilateral nuclear disarmament, and I don't think that anybody in this chamber would want to see nuclear weapons used. I want all nations to give up nuclear weapons, and my ambition—I know that it's one that's shed across this chamber—is to achieve global zero. Although I absolutely respect the position of unilateralists, I don't believe that that action alone will trigger other nations to reduce their weapons. Let me return to the detail of the motion and the announcement by the Chancellor of the Exchequer of £500 million of investment for Faslain. Let's be clear that this is £150 million every year for 10 years, so it's not upfront money. It's to build ship lifts, seawalls and jetties. It's a direct consequence of the decision taken by the last Labour Government to make Faslain the submarine base for the whole of the United Kingdom. The money is for important infrastructure to allow that to happen, and something, frankly, I thought the SNP would welcome. After all, in an attempt to answer the pressing question about jobs and the local economy, the SNP's position is to come up with the notion of having the headquarters for all of the forces based at Faslain. Surely infrastructure for that purpose is welcome because it enhances the base and creates construction jobs in the local economy. Let me talk about jobs for a minute and then I'll take an intervention from the cabinet secretary because there's much contention about numbers with the SNP, in my view, deliberately downplaying the figures, claiming that something like 500 people are affected. Let me share with the chamber a recent FOI made to the Ministry of Defence in September 2014. Here's what it said. 6,800 people working at Faslain at the end of August 2014. Let me just point out that's 300 more than I thought were there, so that is welcome indeed. 4,500 extra on top of that in the supply chain and according to standard income multipliers. That comes from an e-cost study, so we have 11,300 people employed at Faslain. Do you know what? They expect 2,000 more as a result of the changes, so we're talking 13,300 jobs. I'm happy to give way to the cabinet secretary who's going to explain how he's going to replace them. Cabinet secretary, I well understand that for many years Jackie Baillie has justified spending billions of pounds on nuclear weapons in terms of the jobs that she believes it sustains, but is she aware of the April 2015 report by the STUC and Scottish CND, not the Tory Government, but by the STUC and Scottish CND Trident and Jobs, which found that many more jobs would be created if the same amounts of money that was spent on Trident were instead spent on public infrastructure? Jackie Baillie, what's interesting is that I kind of expected that because that is the default position. If you were actually serious, actually understood what the workforce knows, what the dogs in the street in my community know, there are far many more jobs there than the figure quoted. If you want to be responsible for your actions, as I believe mature politics is all about, let's start with at least admitting the true scale of the job losses in that area. It is the biggest single-site employer, probably in the west of Scotland, more than a quarter of the western bunch of workforce employed at Faslane are employed in good-quality, well-paid jobs. Christina McKelvie's speech touched on jobs briefly. I will grant that. She talked about teachers, schools and hospitals. She talked about using the £500 million to do that. It must be a very elastic sum of money because, if you look at the New South and General hospital, that cost, I believe, in excess of £900 million to build. That money is not going to go very far. What is inherently dishonest about that is that the SNP will take that money and will use it on teachers, nurses, schools and hospitals, but the reality is that its policy position is to invest it in conventional weapons. Not one new penny would be diverted into the kind of social projects that Christina McKelvie talks about. The SNP is guilty of spending the money not just once, not just twice, but even perhaps ten times over. It is dishonest to have a position where simply you would be happy for the nuclear weapon to be moved south of the border and not to try and achieve global zero. My bottom line is that, as politicians, we have to be mature and responsible in our politics. If you are going to take something away, then at least have the courtesy to tell that local workforce where the jobs for the future are going to come from. I am pleased to contribute to the debate, but I might make a passing observation that addressing such a significant issue as defence in any meaningful fashion within the four minutes that is permitted in the member's debate is impossible. Let me in abbreviate form and I would not propose to take intervention and set out my observations. I do this as a west of Scotland member and my area includes the communities of Dumbarton, Cardross, Vale of Leven, Helensborough, Rew, Faslain and the Garelock. I have previously asked the Scottish Government about its response to the additional investment that was recently announced by the chancellor at the Faslain base. I am a firm supporter of the UK Government's proposals to turn Faslain into the UK's submarine centre of specialisation, planning ahead to secure the base's future until at least 2067. Strangely, lost in the motion is what was actually announced by the chancellor. The money, £500 million of it over 10 years, will as Jackie Baillie indicated, be spent in a number of major projects at the base, including the construction of ship lifts, seawalls and jetties, to allow the base to serve not only Trident and its successor, but Britain's fleet of conventional submarines I am aware that the SNP opposes nuclear weapons, but in this case we are seeing that opposition turn into something quite different. It has now become opposition to equipping our armed forces. Opposition to having the best quality facilities available for our submariners, entirely regardless of whether they are serving with nuclear or conventional weapons, and its opposition is to hundreds of millions of pounds-worth of investments securing thousands of highly skilled jobs in the Clyde, supporting numerous businesses and providing enormous boost to the local economy in the west of Scotland. Faslain is already Scotland's largest single-site employer, and this money will see the staff of 6,700 expanded to 8,200. This is an asset for Scotland. It's one that I'm sure other parts of the UK look at with envy. I'm surprised that Mrs McKelvie seems to regret that the UK Government will meet our NATO commitment to spend 2 per cent of our national income on defence. A strange opinion you might suppose from a party that just over a year ago was singing the praises of NATO membership, or is it a case of the SNP once again cynically suggesting money can be spent several times over in countless different things? I know during the referendum campaign that was certainly where they stood on Trident. A cost of the submarines, which is around 5 per cent of our defence budget, was earmarked by the SNP in the event of independence for additional spending on conventional forces, childcare, to combat youth unemployment, to invest in colleges, to provide additional social security payments, to spend in hospital schools, personal care, pensions, infrastructure and diplomatic missions overseas. Those aspirations may be laudable, but there is nothing laudable in inflating the cost of our nuclear deterrent and pretending that getting rid of it will give access to a bottomless pit of public money. I'm pleased that the Conservative Government is meeting its targets not just in defence but in international development aid too, because that is the sort of investment that a strong economy enables. It is positive not only for the UK's interests but also for the global reach of our armed forces and international development programmes. The motion also points to the supposed unpopularity of the nuclear deterrent among the Scottish public. Now, this may well be a matter of faith for Ms McElvie in our party, but it is at odds with the evidence with several polls finding support for the deterrent. However, that aside, this £500 million announcement is not about Trident. It is about equipping a key base for the future for both the conventional and nuclear submarines that it will serve. We should applaud that announcement, not condemn it. Thank you very much, Malcolm. Christiaan Allard, to be followed by Neil Findlay. Thank you. You are probably familiar with those men who are worried about their own virility and by large sports cars. I don't know if you are one of them, but this is a case in point when talking about the people wanting to renew the UK nuclear weapon system. One of those men said, our independent nuclear deterrent is not independent and doesn't constitute a deterrent against anybody but to regard as an enemy. It's a waste of money. This was from former UK defence secretary Michael Portillo. He is right on that point. He would prefer the £500 million to be spent on conventional weapons and troops. Was Michael Portillo cynical, I ask Annabel Goldie? I don't think he was. Another man and another former UK defence minister, Nick Harvey, also dismissed the argument of wider economic benefits of replacing trident. His words, the idea that you should produce weapons of mass destruction in order to keep 1,500 jobs within the battleship yard is simply ludicrous and yet it. Frankly, you could give them all a couple of million quid and send them to the Bahamas for the rest of their lives and you would have saved an awful lot of money. That should answer some of the Jackie Bell's claim. Here you are, president officer. Ideas from two men to former UK defence minister are now not to spend the £5 million on fast lane. I wish we had thought about that when we were in charge. I like the idea of making sure that our boys and girls serving at home and abroad are well looked after. The idea of spending the rest of your life in the Bahamas is also appealing. Thank you to Christina McKelvie for bringing this debate to the chamber. It is clear that we need to keep the pressure on the UK government to stop spending our money when Westminster has yet to take the decision to renew trident or not. Last week, after Bill Skid's debate, we met Austrian ambassador Alexander Chemnett, who was instrumental in initiating the humanitarian pledge to call for the prohibition and elimination of nuclear weapons, a pledge supported by 117 countries. That's the kind of consensus across the world that Christina McKelvie was talking about. We must listen to voices from the majorities of countries in the world calling for the complete prohibition and elimination of nuclear weapons. At the meeting, we heard from Dr Clare Dencanson, lecturer in international relations of the University of Edinburgh, explaining that women being sidelined from decision making is one of the most obvious way in which gender affects this issue. Building on Carol Cohn's work on the subject, she highlighted how in international security debates certain dichotomies prevail with the masculine associated side of terms used being valued higher. Clare Dencanson is to do work with his story from a male physicist, a member of a group of nuclear physicists. Several colleagues and I were working on modelling counter-force nuclear attacks trying to get realistic estimates of the number of immediate fatalities that would result from different deployments. At what point, he said, we removed a particular attack using slightly different assumptions and found that instead of there being 36 million immediate fatalities, there will only be 30 million. The male physicist's presenting officer had it that everybody who was sitting around table was nodding and saying, oh yeah, that's great, only 30 million. When all of a sudden he realised what they were saying and he blurted out, wait, I've just heard how we are talking, only 30 million, only 30 million human being killed instantly. Silence fell upon the room, nobody said a word, they didn't even looked at him. The physicist said later how he felt at the time, it's so full, I feel like a woman. He was careful not to blurt out anything like that again. The story of the words from two former UK defence minister illustrates the role and meaning of gender discourse in the defence community. Again, I would like to thank Christina McKelvie to bring this debate to the chamber. Neil Findlay, to be followed by John Wilson. I want to speak briefly in this debate on this motion. Apparently, the newspapers and some in the social media were surprised that I had signed this motion despite having spoken at dozens of meetings over the years and debates in this chamber and having been opposed to nuclear weapons all my political life. Somehow this came as a surprise in news to people. To get rid of any further doubt whatsoever, I oppose nuclear weapons and I oppose the renewal of tried and I hope that that puts that to bed, but I don't want to present my case in the crude party political terms that Christina McKelvie has done. Her speech was thoroughly depressing. That is not how you build alliances and to bring people to your campaign. That is how you ostracise people from your campaign. I will certainly take an intervention. I do not know if the member listened what I said. We had last week a meeting with the ambassadors, the Austrian ambassador, really about these consistencies across the world. I did not see the member there. You need really to listen and make sure that you invest groups. Is Mr Allard to need to listen because I was not referring to him. I was referring to Ms McKelvie, but I will come to you. I will come to you, Mr Allard. I am in it because I thought that you actually made a much better speech than Ms McKelvie. Some think that you win people over in this debate by saying that we are right and that you are wrong. If you do not want to get rid of nuclear weapons unilaterally, then somehow you are morally inferior to me, you are less humane than me and therefore your opinion and views are less worthy. Will I appeal to anyone who takes that tone to think again? Moral superiority does not provide an engineer with a new job, nor does it keep a local shop open, nor does spending the trident money dozens and dozens of times over in a crude attempt to make party political points during a referendum on an election campaign keep a community alive. Mr Allard was right to reference Portillo and Harvey and others, some of the former generals, Nick Brown, a former chief whip for the Labour Government, have all come to the conclusion that we should not renew trident. He is right to reference him because that is what you do. You build alliances of people who are not normally in the same camp to argue against this. That is the way to win people over. If we are going to take the worst workforce with us, whose jobs are threatened by this, and if we are going to convince people in the supply chain that this is the right move and I believe that it is, then we need to put in place those replacement jobs and services to support the people who are losing them and the people in those communities. That is our duty and it is our responsibility in this debate. I appeal to all those who want to see the world rid of nuclear weapons, whether they are multilateralists or unilateralists. After all, we are all on the same side and we simply disagree on tactics. I appeal to them to work together to further develop a credible and serious defence diversification plan and strategy, not based on any imaginary jobs or fantasy jobs or on throw-away lines in a debate like this but on real and genuine opportunities for the people involved. If we do that, then we can take forward this agreement and win it. I am absolutely convinced that we will win it but we need to build that alliance to take the argument across society and across the political divide in order to eradicate those weapons from the world. I want them eradicated from Scotland, the UK and across the world. I do not want to see them sail from the Clyde to the Tyne or the Mersey or anywhere else. I want the world to be a much safer place. Finally, I at times despair of our politics. In recent weak sections of the media have decried Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn for saying that he would not be willing to press the button to launch a nuclear attack that could kill millions and pollute the earth for centuries to come. Apparently not being willing to wipe out millions of our fellow human beings is something to be knocked, yet someone who is willing to press that button and wipe out millions of human beings is to be admired as a strong leader. Does not that expose the madness of our world at times? I support someone who works for peace and justice and human rights any day. That is real leadership. I commend Christine McElvie for bringing this debate to the chamber today. The debate is timely in more ways than one. It is timely to highlight the expenditure that the UK Government is prepared to put into refitting Flas Lane, but it is also timely to look at the events leading up to today. Three weeks ago, the Daily Record reported on 19 September that the US defence sent warning to Putin as tried and sub-docs on Clyde and with ballistic missiles. That wasn't a UK submarine. That was the USS submarine that docked in Flas Lane, a submarine capable of launching 24 nuclear ballistic missiles. It is estimated by the Daily Record that this is the first time that a US nuclear submarine has been in British waters in 10 years, but it cannot give any guarantees that it is the first time that a US ballistic nuclear submarine has been in UK waters because those submarines operate in secret. It is quite surprising that the Daily Record could cite that the submarine was in Flas Lane. It is not about refitting Flas Lane to make it the nuclear submarine base for the UK. It is also about making Flas Lane capable of bringing in other nuclear submarines from around other nations, including the US. When we look at the situation this week, the NATO exercises are, as we are told, by NATO themselves. It is not an official NATO exercise, but we had Prince Charles visited Flas Lane last week to speak to those countries and services that are participating in Joint Warrior, an exercise that is taking place off the west coast of Scotland this week that brings together a number of forces. As a warning, many have said in the armed forces to put in to the Russians to show the military might that can be commanded by NATO if Russia decides to get out of line. The reality is that nuclear weapons are being cited in Flas Lane, nuclear weapons are being sailed into the base in Flas Lane from other countries. If we are serious about getting rid of nuclear weapons, it is not the Jackie Baillie line of multilateralism, because it is big boys' toys that people want to play with and want to own and control. The reality is that we are facing a situation in Britain today and in Scotland where people are facing benefit cuts on a daily basis. More families are finding themselves in poverty, and at the same time that is happening, we have a UK Government that is deciding to spend £50 million a year on refitting a base that is essentially designed to house the nuclear arsenal for the UK and potentially the nuclear arsenal for other countries in this world. The reality is that we have got to be as a society mindful of what we are trying to achieve. If it is one small step for a nation like Scotland or the UK to remove themselves from the nuclear arms race, that is a step that I am prepared to take. It is a step that I am prepared to support if we can eradicate nuclear weapons from this world and safeguard the world from future destruction and use that resource, use that money to tackle the real need of the people in the world. That is to tackle poverty and injustice. So I commend the motion that is before us today and ask everybody to campaign for the eradication of nuclear weapons and ensure that we have a safer, fairer world. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. I now move the closing speech from the cabinet secretary. Keith Brown, up to seven minutes please, cabinet secretary. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I would also like to thank Christina McKelvie for securing the debate. A fortnight ago, we debated Bill Kidd's motion on the treaty on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons in the Marshall Islands and a number of speakers then made compelling arguments against the possession of nuclear weapons on strategic and on moral grounds. As has been said by Christina McKelvie and others, nuclear weapons do not make us more secure and their use would result in huge humanitarian suffering. I would say that to Jackie Baillie when she makes the argument and the moral argument to justify these nuclear weapons, it is worth thinking about the fact that these weapons can never be used in the targeted way that we see some so-called smart weapons being used. These weapons do not discriminate between huge civilian populations and armies and service personnel. They are indiscriminate and that is why they are morally wrong and cannot be justified in terms of economic expenditure on them. Today's debate has given members an opportunity to reflect on the economic consequences of the renewal of Trident, and Christina McKelvie's motion draws a powerful contrast between the vast expense of replacing the Trident nuclear weapons system and the impacts of the UK Government's welfare reforms on society's most vulnerable. While a chancellor announces £500 million for projects at Fazlain, linked in substantial part—I am happy to provide evidence to anyone that doubts the fact that they are linked to preparing for the introduction of the so-called Trident successor submarines—we also read press reports that the UN is to investigate whether the UK Government's welfare reforms have caused grave or systematic violations of disabled people's human rights. The estimated cost, as we have heard, of replacing the UK's nuclear weapons, runs to a staggering £100 billion in lifetime costs at 2012 prices. As reported last year by the Trident commission, an independent cross-party inquiry launched in the UK Parliament in 2011, when spending reaches its peak in the next decade, taxpayers will be spending nearly £4 billion a year on nuclear weapons. The commission's report spells out the impacts on other areas of defence spending. It is worth bearing in mind that the cost of Trident equates to roughly one-third of the entire capital budget of all three services. It crowds out the ability to invest properly in conventional defence. It also says that important defence projects currently in the pipeline will suffer delay or cancellation because of that. Yet, as George Osborne's announcement on 31 August, £500 million of infrastructure funding at Fazlain shows, preparation continues for the next generation of nuclear weapons carrying submarines operating from HM naval base Clyde into the second half of the century and beyond. It flies in the face of democracy that the UK Government is diverting further funds to the future of nuclear weapons before they have placed the final decision on a successor fleet before the UK Parliament. Of course, the Scottish Government welcomes investment in Fazlain as a conventional naval base. As members will be well aware, we greatly respect, we value and support all members of the armed forces in Scotland as well as their families and their veterans. Yet, alongside plans to replace Trident, the UK has seen deep cuts to its conventional forces, which have disproportionately affected Scotland. We have seen massive reductions, disproportionate reductions—I will in just a second—to the conventional forces in Scotland. What we have seen is people on the front line in Afghanistan being handed their P45s as they are serving, regiments merged together by the previous Labour Government, and cuts in the equipment to defence forces. I am happy to hear how Jackie Baillie will defend that. I have no intention of defending that, but let me pose a question to the cabinet secretary. I am curious to know what the position is. My understanding is that his party's policy position is to support conventional forces and weapons and divert the money into that. That is when I heard him start to say that that is at odds with what Christina McKelvie said. Not at all. I think that you have listened to what I have said. The expenditure, the £500 billion that has been mentioned, is being spent in order to prepare for the use of the replacement of the Trident nuclear submarines at Fazlain. That is what is objective to now. Jackie Baillie says that everybody knows the merits of her argument, including the dogs in the streets. I could be wrong on this figure. I think that the SNP Martin Docherty has around 10,000 majority in her area of the general election. I have a feeling that her area voted yes to independence. I think that the arguments about nuclear weapons were very prominent in those we know about. The arguments were prominent in that. Jackie Baillie could be quite—what is the position of the minister? Baillie, the cabinet secretary is not taking an intervention. Will you be quiet, please? Thank you, Presiding Officer. I think that what we have seen is real support for the position whereby we could spend this money much more productively and perhaps the position in which Jackie Baillie wants to see if she can get her other colleagues in the Labour Party on-site. It has inevitably strayed into party political areas. I would not go back to a point that was made earlier. I would not condemn Jeremy Corbyn for what he said about not pressing the nuclear button. I would commend him rather than condemn him for saying that. What I would condemn—I have just finished my point—is a position where the Labour Party's current position is to say that we will spend £100 billion on nuclear weapons and then we will not use them. That is also immoral. The idea—no, I will not. The idea of spending £100 billion, the idea of spending £100 billion when we have seen the cuts that we have seen in terms of welfare, when we have seen the cuts in terms of vital services, spending £100 billion when your own position is to say that you would not use the weapons, that also, to me, is deeply immoral. On the question of whether the dogs in the street support Jackie Baillie's position, perhaps she should have a further chat with the dogs that she is talking to, because I think that they perhaps have changed her mind if that is what she is saying. I would also say that we do expect and support that we should have proper investment in our defence services. We have seen far too many cuts to the conventional forces, whether it is in terms of equipment or in terms of personnel. Perhaps we could have had a much better and more productive response to the crisis in the Mediterranean if we had some of the vessels that we could have had had we spent more money on conventional defence. I think that there are good reasons to be cautious about the UK Government's projections for future personnel numbers at Faslane as well. Given that previous promises of a major uplift in the number of army personnel based in Scotland and investment in the defence estate such as the promised new barracks at Kirk Newton, those have not materialised. As I mentioned earlier, I would also draw attention to the April 2015 report by the STUC and the Scottish CND, Trident and Jobs, which found that more jobs, if the argument is about jobs, more jobs would be created if the same amounts of money that is spent on Trident were instead spent in other areas of public spending. We can be in no doubt that we face huge cuts in terms of welfare provision in Scotland, tax credits being one of them. We know that individuals and families in Scotland are currently experiencing the adverse consequences of those welfare reforms. Our analysis shows that the impacts that are especially felt or will be felt by the most vulnerable in society. It is why we push for the full devolution of social security to this Parliament. A more humane approach can be taken—if I have time, I will take the intervention. I thank the cabinet secretary for taking the intervention, and I sincerely thank Christina McKelvie for bringing this debate to the Parliament. We heard earlier today about jobs that were being lost in areas where we look at our enterprise companies and the task force to go in and see. I think that the debate over jobs at Fastlane is a very serious one, and I think that it inhibits the argument for getting rid of Trident. Is it possible, cabinet secretary, that we could start now, rather than either having the mistake of whether we are going to spend the money on nursing and public services or improving the traditional forces? Should we not now be absolutely making that plan, just as we would if jobs were being lost in another industry for all of the members, all of the people who work at Fastlane, to know absolutely what Fastlane is going to look like as a conventional base? It is a very good point that is made by Jean Urquhart, and I have had discussions with the Scottish CND about the issue. There was the case that Jean Urquhart made a member in the 1980s, early 1990s, when the Berlin Wall fell. We were told that there was going to be a peace dividend. In fact, Labour Party used to talk about arms conversion. We have not had that conversation. We do not have access to much of the information that is required in order to do that sensibly. What we have said is that we are concerned about jobs that would safeguard the jobs that are currently at Fastlane by making it Scotland's defence base if we were to have that control. We do not have that control, and you are right that we should have discussions around that. However, what is very important in relation to that is that overriding that, in my view, is the morality or otherwise of nuclear weapons. I feel very sorry that Neil Findlay felt the best thing that he could do was launch a personal and purile and predictable attack on an SNP member. That is his first instinct to respond to this debate. The true costs of the UK Government's plans for a new generation of nuclear weapons are not taking interventions. Any more interventions, and I am the decider of that. He is not taking any more interventions. Cabinet Secretary, please. Plans for a new generation of nuclear weapons are all too apparent. Therefore, we would call again on the UK Government to abandon those plans and instead focus efforts and resources on strengthening our conventional defence forces and to re-resing the impacts of their welfare reforms on the most vulnerable society. The Scottish Government supports this motion. Thank you all for taking part in this important debate. I now suspend this meeting of Parliament until 2.30 this afternoon.