Skip to main content
Logo icon

Main navigation

  • Home
  • News
  • Meet your MP
  • Government Support - Cost of Living
  • In Parliament
  • Campaign Responses
  • Contact
Logo icon

AUKUS

  • Tweet

Thank you for contacting me about AUKUS, the recently announced security deal between the US, UK, and Australia.

I warmly welcome the Prime Minister’s announcement that he, President Biden and Prime Minister Morrison have come to an agreement to create a new trilateral defence partnership and that Australia has taken the decision to acquire a fleet of nuclear-powered submarines.

Under the AUKUS alliance, the UK will enhance the development of joint capabilities and technology sharing, ensuring the UK’s people are kept safe from harm and reinforcing shared goals. It will foster deeper integration of security and defence-related science, technology, industrial bases, and supply chains, and represents a concrete articulation of the UK’s ambition made in the Government’s Integrated Review, namely, to strengthen defence, security, and foreign policy ties with like-minded allies across the globe and deepen ties in the Indo-Pacific.

As you might be aware, the first task of AUKUS will be to help Australia acquire a fleet of nuclear-powered submarines. Over the last 60 years, the UK has built and operated world-class nuclear-powered submarines and this project will draw on the expertise developed, creating hundreds of highly skilled jobs across the UK, including in Scotland, the north of England and the midlands, reinforcing our industrial base and our national scientific proficiency. It is important to emphasise that the submarines in question will be powered by nuclear reactors, not armed with nuclear weapons, and the UK’s work will be fully in line with the nuclear non-proliferation treaty.

One of the great prizes of this enterprise is that Australia, the UK, and the US will become inseparable partners in a project that will last for decades, creating opportunities for still greater defence and industrial co-operation.

EDM

As a Government Whip, I do not, by convention, sign any Early Day Motions, as doing so is likely to breach the Ministerial Code’s rules on collective responsibility. 

Thank you again for taking the time to contact me.

Craig Whittaker MP

November 2021

Campaign Responses

  • Archived Campaign Responses
  • Covid-19: Commemoration (EDM 481)
  • Covid-19: Extending Support Schemes
  • Covid-19: No 10 Christmas Parties
  • Covid-19: Provision of Tests
  • Covid-19: Public Inquiry
  • Covid-19: Removal of Restrictions
  • Covid-19: Supporting the NHS
  • Covid-19: Supporting the Night Time Economy
  • Covid-19: Vaccinating Children
  • Covid-19: Vaccines and Developing Countries
  • Abortion At Home
  • Access to Cash
  • Afghanistan and Afghan Refugees
  • Aid Spending
  • Animal Experiments (Dogs)
  • Animal Sentience: Update January 2022
  • Animal Testing
  • Animal Welfare
  • Assisted Suicide
  • Asylum Seekers: Employment
  • AUKUS
  • Australia Trade Deal
  • Badgers and Bovine TB
  • Beer and Alcohol Duty (incudes Draught Beer)
  • Bees & Pesticides
  • Business, Human Rights and Environment
  • Caged Farm Animals
  • Cambo & Oil Fields
  • Care Workers: National Living Wage
  • CatchUpWithCancer
  • Cats & Kittens
  • Channel 4 Privatisation
  • Child Poverty
  • Children & Families
  • Clean Air
  • Clean Heat: Heat Pumps
  • Clean Heat: Energy Efficiency
  • Climate and Ecological Emergency Bill
  • Climate Issues (plus COP 26)
  • Commercial Sexual Exploitation
  • Conversion Therapy
  • COP26: Global Action
  • Copyright
  • Council Workers' and Public Sector Pay
  • Cut Carbon Not Forests: Update
  • Cycling and Walking: Update
  • Dangerous Dogs Act
  • Debt and DROs
  • Decarbonisation and Economic Strategy Bill
  • Dementia Research & Brain Health
  • Dentistry
  • Deporting Foreign Criminals
  • Disability Benefits Assessments
  • Domestic Abuse Bill
  • Domestic Abuse: Migrants
  • Domestic Homicide
  • Domestic Abuse: Universal Credit
  • Early Years Funding
  • Elections Act and the Electoral Commission
  • End Child Food Poverty
  • Endometriosis and PCOS
  • Energy Price Cap
  • Environment Bill (Lords Amendments)
  • E-scooters (Guide Dogs)
  • Equal Pay
  • EU/EEA Settled Status
  • Face Coverings
  • Fire & Rehire
  • Fix Bad Housing
  • Flexible Working
  • Foie Gras and Fur
  • Food Waste
  • Fuel Duty and Prices
  • Gamebird Battery Cages
  • Gambling Review
  • Gender Recognition Act: Update
  • Global Malnutrition
  • Global Partnership for Education
  • GP Issues
  • Guards’ Bearskins
  • Hamas
  • Health & Care Bill (including Workforce)
  • Heart and Circulatory Diseases
  • Hedgehogs
  • Hedgerows
  • Holiday Tax Lets
  • HS2
  • Human Rights Act
  • Human Rights Defenders
  • Humanist Marriages
  • Hunting Act
  • Immigration and Refugees
  • Israel is not an Apartheid State
  • Israel: Stop BDS
  • Israel: UK Arms and Right to Self-defence
  • Ivory Act: Update
  • Kept Animals Bill
  • Legal Aid: Asylum and Immigration Cases
  • Levelling-up: Transport
  • Live Animal Exports
  • Local Electricity Bill
  • Medical Cannabis
  • Mental Health Research
  • Migrant Channel Crossings
  • Misogyny
  • Mobile Mast Rents
  • MP's & Second Jobs
  • Multi-sensory Impairment: Education
  • National Insurance Increase (NHS & Social Care)
  • Nationality and Borders Bill
  • NHS Funding
  • NHS Pay: Consultants, Doctors and Dentists
  • NHS Pay and Recruitment
  • Night Time Industries
  • Northern Ireland Protocol
  • Nuclear Weapons
  • Ocean Protection
  • Off-payroll Working (IR35)
  • Older People: Health and Care
  • Palestinian Human Rights Defenders
  • 'Partygate': Fixed Penalty Notices
  • Peat
  • Pension Credit
  • Pensioner Poverty
  • Persecution of Christians: Updated May 2022
  • Planning Bill
  • Plastic Waste
  • Police Corruption & Accountability
  • Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill: February 2022
  • Pregnancy and Maternity Redundancy Bill
  • Proportional Property Tax
  • Public Sector Pay (Civil Service)
  • Public Sexual Harassment: Crime not Compliment (Jan 22)
  • Rail: Fares, Privatisation & Eurostar
  • Rape and the Criminal Justice System
  • Reception Baseline Assessment (Primary Schools)
  • Renters Reform Bill: Updated
  • Retail Workers: Protection at Work
  • Royal Corruption
  • Rwanda Partnership: Tackling Illegal Immigration and People Smugglers
  • Violence against Women and Girls
  • School Breakfast Bill
  • Sentencing (Dangerous Driving)
  • Sewage Discharges
  • Small Brewers Relief
  • Snares
  • Social Care Charging Reforms
  • Social Housing
  • Speed Limits
  • Stamp Duty Land Tax
  • Syria
  • Teachers' Pay
  • Trade Bill: Anti-genocide Amendment (Updated)
  • Trade Deals: Farming and Food Standards
  • Trade Deals: Food Standards
  • Trade Deals: NHS - New Clause 17 and Lords 11
  • Trade Deals: Parliamentary Scrutiny
  • Trains and Planes
  • Triple Lock (State Pension)
  • Trophy Hunting Update
  • Trespass (Right to Roam)
  • Ukraine
  • Ukraine: Refugees
  • UN Treaty on Business and Human Rights
  • Unaccompanied Child Refugees
  • Universal Credit
  • Vagrancy Act and the PCSC Bill (Lords Amendment)
  • Vaping and E-Cigarettes
  • VAT on Electric Vehicle Charging in Public Places
  • Visa-free Work Permits for Touring Artists
  • Voting Systems
  • Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (UK Aid)
  • Wayne Couzens Inquiry
  • Young People's Mental Health
  • Youth Homelessness: Chance to Move On

Craig Whittaker MP for Calder Valley

Footer

  • About RSS
  • Accessibility
  • Cookies
  • Privacy
  • About Craig
  • Campaign Responses
  • In Parliament
This website is funded by the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (IPSA) for the purpose of assisting Craig Whittaker MP in the performance of their Parliamentary duties.
Copyright 2022 Craig Whittaker MP for Calder Valley. All rights reserved.
Powered by Bluetree