Defence Committee
15 July 2026
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Defence Committee House of Commons
00:12 - 01:31
Speaker 3
Order, order. I call to order today's House of Commons Defence Committee evidence session. It is our last session on our High North inquiry, and indeed is a ministerial session. So I'm very, very pleased that we've got with us again for her second outing in front of the committee after the regular Women in the Armed Forces session, a very warm welcome to Louise Sandher-Jones MP, who is the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State and the Minister for the Armed Forces. Also we have with us again Brigadier Jeremy Lamb.
He is the Head of Euro-Atlantic Security at the Ministry of Defence. And for the first time in front of the committee, Mr. Chris Keay, who is the Deputy Director, Euro-Atlantic Security at the Ministry of Defence. And without further ado, let's get straight into the questioning. Minister, obviously you'll be aware that we've been undertaking a deep dive into defence in the High North. I think I know the answer to this, but just to set the scene, can you explain to us that given the rising tensions across various parts of the globe and in particular across the whole of Europe, why should the UK focus particularly on defence and security of the High North?
01:31 - 03:06
Speaker 4
Yes, thank you very much and thank you very much for inviting me to come here today. And I think this is a really important topic. So I think there's lots that we need to get into on this. So to, yeah, help set the scene, and I don't, this won't be news to people here, but the role that the High North plays is really fundamental to our homeland security, to European security and indeed across the globe. I think it's important to look at how that's applicable in sort of four different ways.
One is how the High North interacts with homeland security, so for example making sure that we are able to maintain our sea lines of communication, to look at how we can operate with our allies, so interoperability, the resilience of our country and wider Europe when we talk about things like subsea infrastructure, and then how we talk about deterrence, so the role the High North has in supporting our deterrence, both in terms of continuous at sea deterrence, but also wider deterrence of other actors in the activity that we can do there. The High North plays therefore a really critical enabling role in security, whether we're talking about security in Eastern Europe, whether we're talking about in the Middle East or wider. The capabilities and the deterrence we're able to provide send crucial messages in a more competitive and contested world to make sure that the UK is able to influence geopolitical affairs as we would wish in defence of our interests. I think it's important to be clear, I'd add about the challenges that we face in the High North. Some of those challenges I think are very well known when we talk about the threats from Russia.
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