A report in today's Sunday Telegraph that six out of seven nuclear-powered hunter-killer submarines are unfit for operational service raises questions about reactor safety rather than defensive readiness said a CND spokesperson today.

Apparently, an MoD spokesperson told Sunday Telegraph reporter Macer Hall: "Of the Navy's 12 hunter-killer submarines, six are operational while the others are refitting or undergoing maintenance." This is consistent with Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon's reply to Iain Duncan Smith's Parliamentary Question on 7th July.

However, on the 11th July, in reply to a question from Quentin Davies, Geoff Hoon said that three of the Royal Navy's seven Trafalgar Class submarines were operationally available and four are in refit, extended maintenance or repair.

If the Sunday Telegraph report is correct, the MoD has lost the service of a further two Trafalgar Class submarines since the beginning of July.

One of the Trafalgar Class submarines, HMS Tireless, has been tied up in Gibraltar since May awaiting maintenance work on cracked piping inside the reactor compartment which led to a loss of coolant water. The MoD has handled the problem badly and is now bogged down in safety, political and legal controversy.

"Shadow Defence Secretary Iain Duncan Smith seems more concerned with making political capital by attacking the Labour Party and making claims about Britain's reduced defensive capability rather than addressing the substantive issue of a systemic fault in nuclear reactors," said a CND spokesperson today.

Four perfectly serviceable, and inherently safer, diesel-electric submarines are being practically given away to the Canadian Navy while a wholly nuclear, and potentially hazardous, British submarine fleet is practically unserviceable.

"Given the concerns about military spending, cost overruns and MoD inefficiency, CND believes that a £2 billion expenditure on three more Trafalgar Class submarines would be folly," he concluded.

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