The inquiry into the UK's Defence Needs and International Nuclear Disarmament Responsibilities was carried out for NET by Connect Communications, an award-winning, independent political communications agency. The report is based on written submissions and a series of interviews with current and past Defence Secretaries and Ministers, academics, think tanks, campaign groups and other defence policy stakeholders. The report has found:

•"For now and foreseeable future no nuclear threat to UK" (in the words of Rt Hon Sir Malcolm Rifkind MP, former Defence and Foreign Secretary).

•The relevance of keeping nuclear weapons vis-à-vis current and foreseeable future UK security threats is either non-existent or negligible.

•There is an urgent need for a wider and more informed public and Parliamentary debate on nuclear weapons – and especially whether they do or do not contribute to UK's security - but the multilateral versus unilateral nature of debate is anachronistic, inaccurate and unhelpful. (The report lists 10 "unilateral" disarmament actions by Governments since 1990.)

The report makes a number of suggestions which are outlined here  with a link to the full report.