David Cameron seeks apology over Labour defence 'slurs'

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David Cameron challenges Gordon Brown over MPs' remarks

A furious David Cameron demanded an apology from Prime Minister Gordon Brown over alleged "slurs" by Labour MPs against defence chiefs.

The Labour MPs shouted "because they are Tories" as the Tory leader said the ex-military leaders had questioned Mr Brown's evidence to the Iraq inquiry.

Mr Brown hit back with a jibe about Tory "non dom" Lord Ashcroft.

The two men clashed during an unusually stormy prime minister's questions, one of a handful left before the election.

Mr Cameron said Labour MPs had "questioned the integrity of people who served this country, fought for this country" and called on Mr Brown to dissociate himself from their "disgraceful slurs".

Ex-Chief of the Defence Staff Lord Guthrie, one of those to criticise Labour's record on defence in recent months, later called the MPs' comments a "rather cheap trick", telling Channel 4 News they showed "how little they know about generals".

He said he did not support any particular party and would be "willing to praise or criticise" any government over the subject of military resources.

'Integrity'

Mr Brown said he had never "criticised the patriotism" of members of Britain's defence establishment before repeating his assertion, made at the Iraq inquiry, that he had never turned down a request for equipment from commanders in the field.

He said he would take "no lectures on integrity from the man who won't even answer one question about Lord Ashcroft", a reference to the Conservative deputy chairman and donor who has been under pressure over his tax status.

With noise levels rising in the Commons, Mr Cameron said Mr Brown had "tried to fight two wars on a peacetime budget" and claimed the PM had underestimated the cost of the war in Afghanistan.

Mr Cameron then provoked further uproar by saying "the reason the defence budget fell in the 1990s was because we won the Cold War," adding that Mr Brown was "wearing a CND badge" at the time.

Mr Brown hit back that the Tory leader was "at school at the time" and accused him of undermining what he claimed was a broad cross-party consensus on defence policy.

'Disingenuous'

According to material obtained by the Tories in a Freedom of Information request, Treasury briefing notes drawn up in September and October 2001 for Mr Brown, then the Chancellor, warn that the cost to the UK of the war in Afghanistan "could well be in the hundreds of millions".

During his appearance before the Iraq inquiry on Friday, Mr Brown revealed the total bill for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan had been £18bn, but his evidence was challenged by former senior officers.

Lord Boyce, head of the armed forces at the time of the Iraq war, said Mr Brown had been "disingenuous" but Number 10 rejected the criticisms.

Another former defence chief, General Sir Richard Dannatt, who advises the Conservatives on defence matters, told the BBC that while the prime minister may have been "narrowly and precisely correct" on his evidence on military spending, he had not addressed the issue of "underlying underfunding" going back to 1997.