Trident nuclear submarine replacement plan attacked as 'an obscenity'

Trident missile launchCrown Copyright

Pressing ahead with plans to replace Trident with a new generation of nuclear submarines would be an "obscenity", Scottish ministers have warned.

The UK Government insisted on Sunday that a final decision had not yet been made - but that came as Defence Secretary Philip Hammond confirmed a £1billion contract for reactors to power the new submarines.

However, the Scottish Government's Strategy Secretary Bruce Crawford said Scotland did not want a new nuclear weapons system on the Clyde.

"I think it's an obscenity that we're going to be pressing ahead at this time with this particular system," he told the BBC's Sunday Politics.

The deal that was announced on Sunday is part of plans to replace the Clyde-based Vanguard fleet, which carries the Trident nuclear deterrent.

Under the Trident programme, the Royal Navy operates 58 nuclear-armed submarine-launched ballistic missiles and about 200 nuclear warheads on four Vanguard-class ballistic missile submarines from Clyde Naval Base at Faslane.

The Tories are committed to a full renewal by 2028 - but the Liberal Democrats are opposed to a like-for-like replacement.

Angus Robertson, the SNP's defence spokesman, said Scotland's opposition to Trident was "overwhelming". He added: "Despite this, the UK Government is prepared to send £1bnn of taxpayers' money on a needless programme and then expect the people of Scotland to accept weapons of mass destruction being dumped here."

Mr Hammond will formally announce the contract for two reactor cores on Monday. One of them will be used for the seventh Astute Class attack submarine and one for the first of the next-generation nuclear deterrent submarines.

Mr Hammond said the final "main gate" decision on Trident renewal would still not be made until 2016, but long lead times meant the reactor contracts needed to be signed now.

"We have already done a review of options and value for money of the Trident programme, and that concluded that replacing the Vanguard submarines and continuing with Trident was the best-value solution to maintaining a nuclear deterrent," he said.

"But the Liberal Democrats wanted to have another look at some emerging technologies and Nick Harvey, the Armed Forces minister, is leading a review to look at whether there are any."

Removal plans

Mr Crawford welcomed a report published by the Scottish Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND), which contained a plan for removing Trident from Scotland within two years.

He said: "We are firmly committed to the earliest possible withdrawal of Trident from Scotland, to the pursuit of a world which is free from nuclear weapons and to the development and diversification of HMNB Clyde as a vibrant and sustainable conventional naval base in an independent Scotland.

"The suggested timetable is a welcome indication of how quickly Trident could be removed once Scotland has the powers to decide its own defence and security policy, and we note that various international experts have highlighted a credible timetable."

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