“A national conversation on resilience”: new inquiry to hear from Lord Robertson, Taiwan and the Netherlands
On Monday, MPs and members of the House of Lords will hold the first session of a new inquiry on ‘Societal resilience: a national conversation’.
The inquiry will explore how well the UK is prepared to respond to crises affecting national security, understand the public’s perception of resilience, and suggest ways the Government can enhance national resilience.
In a future session, MPs will hear from Lord Robertson, former Secretary-General of NATO and leader of the Government’s Strategic Defence Review, published last year.
In Monday’s session, senior diplomats from Taiwan and the Netherlands will give evidence on their respective approaches to building national resilience, preparing their populations for civil defence and protecting their information environments and supply chains from disruption.
Meeting details
Chair of the Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy, Matt Western MP, said:
“Threats to energy security from the Iran war. Russian surveillance on our undersea infrastructure. Ongoing debates about our defence spending. The last few weeks have demonstrated just how important it is that we have a genuine national conversation about the UK’s resilience to major shocks.
The Committee’s new inquiry will consider how we can build national resilience in the UK and help the public to understand the threats we face. We will begin by seeing what lessons we can learn from other countries, as we hear evidence from ambassadors from Taiwan and the Netherlands.
This is an incredibly important issue; building resilience to tackle national security threats is one of the biggest challenges facing government. I look forward to kicking off the Committee’s inquiry.”