Conservative Leader of the House of Commons Penny Mordaunt said that Labour deputy leader Angela Rayner and others had “recently” voted against the UK’s nuclear deterrent.

Ms Mordaunt told the BBC’s Election Debate: “Angela Rayner voted recently, along with the guy that wants to be your foreign secretary and half the Labour front bench, to end our nuclear deterrent.”

Evaluation

Ms Rayner and other Labour MPs voted against the renewal of the Trident nuclear programme. That happened in 2016.

The facts

The vote on replacing the UK’s four Trident nuclear missile submarines was taken on July 18 2016. It passed parliament, with a majority of Labour MPs voting for the renewal.

However Ms Rayner was one of the 48 Labour MPs – and 117 MPs in total – who voted against the renewal.

So was David Lammy, who is Labour’s shadow foreign secretary.

However, last year Mr Lammy said he has an “unshakeable” commitment to the nuclear deterrent. In June 2024 he said that the events in Ukraine had helped change his mind.

Ms Rayner said this year that she has “never supported unilateral disarmament”.

Links

UK’s nuclear deterrent – Votes in Parliament (archived)

David Lammy on X, September 28 2023 (archived)

David Lammy: Why I changed my mind on the nuclear deterrent (archived)

Angela Rayner on X, June 3 2024 (archived)