David Cameron blamed for cover-up of failed Trident nuclear test by top Tory MP as pressure piles on Defence Secretary Michael Fallon
Theresa May facing demands to give honest answers about the misfire by the submarine-based missile deterrent
DAVID Cameron is to blame for the cover-up of the failed Trident nuclear test, according to a senior Tory MP.
It comes as pressure piles on Defence Secretary Michael Fallon to explain why the submarine-based missile deterrent misfired last summer, and why MPs were not told about it.
After the incident was revealed yesterday the Prime Minister has also faced growing demands to give honest answers in Parliament, after refusing to answer questions yesterday on her knowledge of the test.
But Julian Lewis, chairman of the Commons defence committee, said Theresa May was not to blame, and attacked her predecessor.
He told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “In fairness to the present Prime Minister one has to accept that she has been dealt a rotten hand because this matter, the decision to cover it up, if there was such a decision, as appears to be the case, was taken in the dying days of the Cameron administration when spin doctors were the rule in Number 10 Downing Street.”
Mr Lewis also said that whoever had made the decision to hide the fact an unarmed Trident missile had reportedly malfunctioned off the coast of Florida last June “should have been sacked”.
And in another dig at Mr Cameron he called his decision to delay the vote in renewing Trident until after the 2015 election as “outrageous” and a “love gift to the Liberal Democrats”.
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Mr Fallon is now likely to be forced into making a statement in the House of Commons on the incident, which saw a Trident II D5 missile veer off course after being launched from the British submarine HMS Vengeance.
Appearing on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show yesterday Mrs May refused four times to say whether she knew about the malfunction before urging MPs to renew the £40billion system.
Asked if knowledge of the failed test could have influenced the MPs' decision, shadow defence secretary Nia Griffith told BBC Breakfast: "We don't know because we don't know exactly what happened, so we can't speculate on that until we have a full report, and that's what we're calling for today.
"The incident itself speaks for itself, if the reports are true, that a missile veering off course is something to be extremely concerned about.
"But we need to have the full detail of exactly what did happen and why this occurred."
Labour peer and former senior Royal Navy officer Admiral Lord West said it was "bizarre and stupid" not to tell anyone about the test, suggesting the Government had acted like North Korea in covering up the news.
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn called the failed test "a pretty catastrophic error", while the SNP's Nicola Sturgeon has called for "full disclosure" about who knew what and when.