The captain of one of Britain’s nuclear-armed submarines has stepped back from his role this week after being investigated over his relationship with Joani Reid, the Labour MP whose husband has been arrested on suspicion of spying for China.
The Royal Navy launched an investigation last year in response to allegations that the senior military officer — who is married — had conducted an inappropriate relationship with Reid, according to people familiar with the matter. The probe was necessary from a “due diligence perspective” to examine any potential blackmail risk, one of the people added.
Fresh security checks were carried out this month after Reid’s husband was arrested under the UK National Security Act on suspicion of assisting China’s foreign intelligence service, the people said. The Ministry of Defence was satisfied by the checks and remains confident that there was no breach of security.
This week, after the MoD was approached about the matter by the FT, the officer decided to step back from his position for personal reasons. He has not left the Royal Navy.
People familiar with the case said that the allegations of an inappropriate relationship were thoroughly investigated last year and the captain was not subjected to disciplinary action. The officer has not broken any military rules.
However, the captain and Reid were found to have exchanged flirtatious messages and action was taken to mitigate any blackmail risk, one of the people said. Reid rejects that the messages were flirtatious, a person close to her said.
The officer and Reid, MP for East Kilbride and Strathaven, first met as young adults, according to the people familiar with the matter.
Reid’s constituency is about 50km from His Majesty’s naval base, Clyde at Faslane, the site that is home to the UK’s strategic nuclear deterrent.
In January 2025 she visited the base as part of a visit organised by the armed forces parliamentary scheme, which provides UK legislators with insight into the operations of the British military. The captain was not on the base at the time, but the pair were in contact following her visit.
The pair are thought to have met once as well as exchanged messages, but have had no contact since September, the people said. There was no physical relationship between the pair.
A Royal Navy spokesperson told the FT: “The security of the nuclear deterrent is our highest priority, and we have robust processes in place to protect the security of our people and capabilities. We will not comment on individual cases.”
Reid’s spokesperson declined to comment. The FT sought to approach the officer via the MoD, which declined the request. UK military personnel are not permitted to speak with the media without authorisation from the ministry.
Reid’s husband, David Taylor, was one of three men connected to the Labour Party who were arrested in an operation led by counterterror police. The police investigation relates to “foreign interference targeting UK democracy”, security minister Dan Jarvis has said.
Taylor is named in Reid’s parliamentary register of interests as a family member engaged in third-party lobbying with regard to his role as director of the company Earthcott Ltd.
On the day of her husband’s arrest on March 4, Reid said: “I have never seen anything to make me suspect my husband has broken any law. I am not part of my husband’s business activities and neither I nor my children are part of this investigation.”
The following day she announced she had “voluntarily” suspended herself from the Labour whip “until internal investigations are concluded”.
The Royal Navy has been beset by scandals in recent years. In 2024, the commander of a Vanguard-class submarine was sacked after filming a sex video, according to reports.
It came after another commander of a Vanguard-class submarine was removed from his vessel in 2017 amid claims of an inappropriate relationship with a subordinate.
Last year Admiral Sir Ben Key, then head of the navy, was sacked after an MoD investigation into his relationship with a female subordinate, as first reported by the FT. Key had made clear his intention to step down from the post.
The UK government has previously confirmed that if the actions or behaviour of service personnel “adversely impact, or are likely to impact, on the efficiency or operational effectiveness of the service then a range of sanctions may be applied, up to and including dismissal” and that “misconduct involving abuse of position, trust or rank . . . will be viewed as being particularly serious”.
Britain’s nuclear deterrent — its most sensitive weapons system — is provided by four Vanguard-class ballistic missile submarines, which carry Trident II D5A missiles and associated Mk4A/Holbrook warheads.
The programme’s total acquisition cost was about £23bn in 2024-25 prices. The estimated cost of the design and manufacture of the successor Dreadnought-class submarines, which are set to come into service in the early 2030s, is £31bn, according to the House of Commons library.
In their role providing a continuous-at-sea deterrent, one of the four boats is always at sea. Details of their operating patterns and location when at sea are among the MoD’s most closely guarded secrets.
The ageing fleet of Vanguard-class submarines requires increasingly complex maintenance, which in turn means seaworthy boats are forced to undertake arduously long missions.
Last year HMS Vanguard, one of the four boats, spent 204 days underwater before returning to the Clyde — a record patrol. It has become the norm for the nuclear-armed submarines to spend five months at sea.