Theresa May has repeatedly refused to confirm whether she knew about a reported failed Trident test when she addressed parliament during a debate on the renewal of Britain’s nuclear deterrent.
An unarmed Trident II D5 missile veered in the wrong direction towards the US when it was launched from a British submarine off the coast of Florida in June last year, the Sunday Times reported.
It quoted an unnamed senior naval source as saying that the “disastrous failure” caused panic in Downing Street, which feared it would damage the credibility of Britain’s nuclear deterrent and so decided to cover it up.
In July, weeks after the test and days after May became prime minister, MPs voted overwhelmingly to spend up to £40bn on replacing Britain’s Trident programme. May drew gasps during the parliamentary debate when she made clear she would be willing to authorise a nuclear strike killing 100,000 people. However, she made no mention of the test and both Labour and the SNP have demanded to know why.
Appearing on BBC1’s Andrew Marr Show, the prime minister repeatedly declined to answer whether she knew about the test when she addressed parliament during the debate. She was asked by Marr on four separate occasions whether she knew about the alleged misfire.
She said: “There are tests that take place all the time, regularly, for our nuclear deterrents. What we were talking about in that debate that took place was about the future.”
The report says that the missile fired from HMS Vengeance was supposed to hit an intended sea target off the west coast of Africa. It states that the cause of the problem is unknown but that it suffered an in-flight malfunction after launching out of the water.
The Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn, a lifelong campaigner against nuclear weapons, said the incident should give everyone pause for thought.
“We understand the prime minister chose not to inform parliament about this and it’s come out through the media some months later,” he told Sky News’s Sophie Ridge on Sunday. “It’s a pretty catastrophic error when a missile goes in the wrong direction and whilst it wasn’t armed, goodness knows what the consequences of that could have been. I think we need a serious discussion about that.”
The shadow chancellor, John McDonnell, told Marr May was wrong not to inform MPs. “People on both sides of the argument will have expected that to be reported to parliament,” he said. “The fact that [May] didn’t is extremely worrying.”
Brendan O’Hara MP, defence spokesman for the SNP, which is opposed to Trident’s renewal, said it would be a “sickening betrayal” if the government covered up safety concerns. “We urgently need to know exactly what happened – and who knew what and when they knew. The MoD must come clean if there has been a cover-up of any kind – that would be utterly unacceptable.”
HMS Vengeance, one of the UK’s four Vanguard-class submarines designed to carry the UK’s Trident ballistic missiles, returned to sea in December 2015 after a £350m four-year refit programme, which included the installation of improved missile launch equipment and upgraded computer systems.
Tests are rare as the missiles each cost about £17m. When trials have been carried out in the past they have been publicised, in some cases with accompanying video footage, but this is the first time last year’s exercise has been reported.
Responding to the report, the Ministry of Defence did not deny that the missile had veered off course but described the test as a success. A government spokesman said: “The capability and effectiveness of the Trident missile, should we ever need to employ it, is unquestionable. In June, the Royal Navy conducted a routine unarmed Trident missile test launch from HMS Vengeance, as part of an operation which is designed to certify the submarine and its crew.
“Vengeance and her crew were successfully tested and certified, allowing Vengeance to return into service. We have absolute confidence in our independent nuclear deterrent. We do not provide further details on submarine operations for obvious national security reasons.”
