THE Scottish CND has defended a Labour MP after he suggested he would be “happy” if Russian hackers sabotaged Trident.

In footage unearthed by the Mail on Sunday, Sir Keir Starmer’s Shadow Minister for Peace and Disarmament Fabian Hamilton said at a CND rally in 2019 that “Russian hackers can already hack into the software” controlling the UK’s nuclear deterrent at Faslane, adding “I’d be quite happy about that”.

His comments have sparked anger across many circles, with Defence Secretary Ben Wallace insisting Starmer should sack him.

But the Scottish CND insist his remarks have been taken “out of context”.

Vice chair Janet Fenton said: “Mr Hamilton’s quote is being taken out of context in an absurd and irresponsible game of taunting the Labour leader.

“It is perfectly clear from the clip that its is the idea of someone rendering the UK’s nuclear weapons inoperable that Fabian Hamilton is welcoming, although the scenario suggested is tortuously inconceivable as an approach to the disarmament he is advocating.

READ MORE: Blair McDougall urges SNP to take tougher action over death threats

“Much simpler would be to welcome the first meeting of the States Parties to the United Nations Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW). These are the states that have already joined the straightforward path to nuclear weapons elimination by outlawing the things everywhere.

“Fabian Hamilton has some difficulty in pursuing nuclear disarmament as a member of a political party that put Trident on the Clyde and then voted for its renewal. Given the political choices available south of the border, one can see why the Labour party may seem like the best hope for nuclear disarmament, but I am glad in Scotland there are more wholesome and straightforward choices that supporters of the TPNW and those of us who are appalled and alarmed at the nuclear threat escalating in Ukraine can make.”

In the footage, Mr Hamilton, who at the time was both a Shadow Defence Minister and Shadow Foreign Office Minister under Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership, said he was quoting a “former senior Labour colleague who was in Tony Blair’s cabinet”, who had said nuclear weapons were “utterly useless” because “Russian hackers can already hack into the software systems that control these weapons”.

“Now, I don’t know enough about this to know whether that’s true or not,” Mr Hamilton said.

‘But imagine for a minute that it is true. Not that they could actually set the weapons off, but that they could render them entirely useless. 

“Well, I’d be quite happy about that, as long as we could do the same to theirs.”