UNTHINKABLE AND INDEFENSIBLE is the description being tagged by Moray’s MP on the bill the UK will face if they are to continue down the patch of upgrading Trident.
Angus Robertson insists that rather than spending the estimated £167billion they should invest more on the military bases at Kinloss and Lossiemouth.
The MP and leader of the SNP at Westminster says the “astronomical” sum should not be allowed to be spent on nuclear weapons that can never be used – in particular at a time when a fraction of that sum would cover the cost of welfare and tax credit changes hitting low-income families.
The Moray MP said: “This is truly an unthinkable and indefensible sum of money to spend on the renewal of an unwanted and unusable nuclear weapons system while thousands of people in Moray alone are set to lose thousands of pounds every year as a result of tax credit and welfare changes.
“The UK Government is facing a United Nations probe over its cuts to support for disabled people and yet the Government’s own figures reveal that they are prepared to spend an astronomical £167 billion dumping four new Trident submarines on the Clyde.
“Nuclear weapons are obscene and we should be leading the way in disarmament not re-igniting a nuclear arms race.”
The MP added that working families in Moray and throughout the rest of the UK should not be pushed to the edges – while £165billion is spent on weapons of mass destruction.
He added: “Not only that, but at a time when Scotland’s conventional defence capabilities have shrunk dramatically with base closures and less than 10,000 personnel it is all the more alarming that there seems to be an endless amounts of money available for abhorrent nuclear weapons.
“This almost incomprehensible amount of money could be used to invest more in conventional forces such as at our local Lossiemouth and Kinloss bases and cover the cost of tax credits and welfare and still have change.
“This is about choice and to choose nuclear weapons over people is not a choice that the SNP will ever support in Westminster.”