By Maisie Sinclair
Glasgow North West MP Carol Monaghan has renewed her call for an inquiry about the Trident Nuclear Missile failure last year.
In June 2016, a missile test involving the UK’s Trident missile system ended in failure off the coast of Florida.
Monaghan asked the Secretary of State for Defence, Michael Fallon MP, how the UK’s nuclear deterrent can be certified for operational use when the system has catastrophically failed. Fallon claimed that the HMS Vengeance successfully concluded a demonstration and shakedown operation.
This is contrary to a US defence official with direct knowledge of the incident who has told CNN that the test ended in failure.
Monaghan has since signed EDM 877 with 59 other MP’s which calls for an urgent inquiry into both the missile incident and the decision of the Government to withhold the information from Parliament.
Commenting, Carol Monaghan MP said:
“We are pushing for an inquiry into this incident and into the subsequent cover-up which preceded the House of Commons vote on renewal of the Trident programme on 19 July 2016. We will also be pushing for a new vote on renewal in view of this information coming to light. This is a matter of the highest importance to the people of Scotland and the SNP will spare no effort in pursuit of our objective of seeing these weapons removed from Scotland.
“The longstanding position of the SNP on Trident is unequivocal. We are totally opposed to the spending of billions of pounds on new nuclear weapons and to the presence of these weapons in Scotland. We believe that the financial cost of the programme – a minimum of £179 billion with a strong likelihood of rising costs – is unacceptable and unjustifiable.
“This is especially true in a time of economic austerity and at a time when the UK government is substantially cutting defence jobs in Scotland and reducing the overall conventional capabilities of the UK armed forces to an alarming extent.”
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