By Sir Timothy Garden
The Chancellor's pre-budget statement contained a small uplift for the Defence budget of some £100 million and a further increase of £20 million for the intelligence services. The Police received an extra £30 million specifically for counter-terrorist demands. These payments are in the light of the terror attacks of 11 September. Given the current underfunded state of the defence budget, the uplift was more symbolic than significant. There will have been a number of urgent operational requirements to meet the tasks of the UK contribution to US military action in Afghanistan. There will also have been some extra expenditure of ammunition (in particular cruise missiles) and of fuel. Whereas most of these sorts of operational costs were recovered from Saudi Arabia during the Gulf War. it is unlikely that there will be any handouts for work in Afghanistan. The defence budget runs at around £24 billion per year, and the added funding has to be seen against this.
The extra money for the Intelligence services is proportionately more significant on top of their budget of £803 million, and will allow them to recruit appropriate expertise to counter the new threat. Unfortunately, expertise takes not just money, it also needs time to train up new people. It may therefore take some time before the extra intelligence capability comes on stream.
The police have had to take on a much more intensive role since 11 September, and their budget uplift recognises this. However given their more widespread resource problems, it may not be used for the counter-terrorism task. Perhaps more thought should be given to using the Reserve forces in this role to supplement police guarding activities.
What was more surprising was the apparent absence of any funding for the non-Defence related aspects of the new campaign against terrorism. Local authorities have a daunting task if they are to provide adequately for consequence management after a major terror event. Emergency Planning, Health and Fire Services are at the frontline of this, and all are already overstretched. Perhaps the funding will be provided as needed, but it does not appear that the threat of managing a massive attack on the scale of the World Trade Center was high on the priorities of the Chancellor in his pre-Budget speech. We must hope that the preventative measures will be enough.