Armed Forces Commissioner Bill

Debate between Baroness Smith of Newnham and Lord Lancaster of Kimbolton

Committee stage
Wednesday 19th March 2025 Grand Committee

[Baroness Smith of Newnham (LD)]

My Lords, both the amendments in this group are in my name, and Amendment 10 is also in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle.

Amendment 2 relates to a matter of particular concern to my honourable friend in the other place: that we need to be very mindful of those who are going through the recruitment process. The legislation is obviously about those subject to service law, but one of the concerns is that, as people go through the recruitment process, they are potentially vulnerable. Clearly, that would not apply to somebody just walking into an Army recruitment office, but if somebody has got to the point of applying, going through the medical process and then going through various assessments to see whether they are suitable to be recruited—apparently there is sometimes a requirement to stay overnight, for example—there is a real concern that we need to make sure that they are not put in any difficulty, particularly when it comes to young people.

If there is no Service Complaints Commissioner because the role is being taken over by the Armed Forces commissioner, will it be possible for those going through the recruitment process to be part of that? I know that the Minister is not minded to accept this amendment, but it would be helpful if he would at least explain to the Grand Committee how the interests of those going through the recruitment process, particularly the very young, will be maintained and if he would confirm that safeguarding will be in place.

Amendment 10 is to some extent related to the draft regulations that have just appeared. At Second Reading the Minister said that he would make sure that the draft regulations would be out in good time before Grand Committee—I think he may have said that it would be not just half an hour before. They arrived a good two hours before Grand Committee, so we are probably winning. The draft regulations talk about deceased service personnel’s family, so that bit of our amendment has already been covered, but I have two questions, one of which is linked to the amendment as initially tabled, which is about kinship carers and whether the language used in the draft regulations is intended to cover that or whether we still need to think about a more specific amendment on kinship carers coming back on Report.

At the moment, the various clauses in the draft regulations talk about “relevant family members”, including those for whom someone

“has assumed regular and substantial caring responsibilities”,

but there is very little definition of what is meant by that. It may be that there is other, not necessarily Armed Forces legislation, where there are very clear definitions, but it would be helpful for Grand Committee to understand how His Majesty’s Government understand that.

As the draft regulations happen to be in front of us, I wonder whether this is the right place to ask the Minister my second question relating to them, regarding Regulation 2(3)(b) about

“a former spouse or civil partner or a person whose relationship with A was formerly akin to a relationship between spouses or civil partners”.

I am just wondering how far the remit of “relevant family members” is intended to extend. If we are talking about someone at the time of a bereavement, it is usually clear who is the spouse or civil partner. Where we are dealing with people who have previously held those roles, is it anyone who has previously been in the role of something similar to a spouse or civil partner? How do His Majesty’s Government intend to define that? Is the Armed Forces commissioner supposed to deal with all those relationships, or will we be looking at a narrower definition? I beg to move.

[Lord Lancaster of Kimbolton (Con)]

My Lords, with the greatest respect to the noble Baroness, I will speak against Amendment 2. I declare my interest as a member of the Army Board.

I understand the intent, but my objection to Amendment 2 is based on practicality. The recruitment process has changed dramatically in recent years. Indeed, you can start your recruitment process not by going into an Army recruitment centre but simply by going online and clicking a button. Last year alone, we had over 100,000 applicants to the Regular Army and over 30,000 applicants to the Army Reserve. That was just for a single service, so I think it is fair to say that probably in excess of 200,000 people will have applied to join the Armed Forces over the past year. If we were to allow these people to access this system, I think the system would simply be overwhelmed and goodness knows what the cost would be.

The principle is that those who are subject to service law are subject to the Bill, and service law does not kick in until the point of attestation, when you actually join the Army. I was privileged to be in Nepal only three weeks ago to witness our next 372 Gurkhas being attested into the British Army. I understand the sentiment, but, with the greatest of respect, I think it is simply impractical. We would open the aperture of the system to so many people that we would run the risk of the system simply not working because it would be overwhelmed.

[Baroness Smith of Newnham (LD)]

That is a very helpful intervention, and we are probably all delighted to hear that there were so many applications for the Army last year, given that recruitment has been an issue. Could the noble Lord continue with some of that exposition? Obviously, it is possible to apply by going online and clicking a button and, clearly, the applicant should not have recourse to the Armed Forces commissioner at that stage. But at the stage where somebody is going through a medical or being assessed, could there be concerns that we need to think about, even if that is not through the Armed Forces commissioner?

[Lord Lancaster of Kimbolton (Con)]

The noble Baroness makes a reasonable point, which is why I said at the start of my remarks that I understood the intent behind what she is trying to achieve. Without getting distracted, the challenge that we face at the moment is a crisis not of recruitment but of conversion. One of our biggest challenges is that we have a conversion rate—forgive me if this figure is not quite right—of about 13 or 14 to one in the Army and about 20 to one in the Army Reserve. The challenge is in the process of recruitment and the time that it takes. I am straying beyond my role here today, but I can assure the noble Baroness that the Armed Forces are seeking to address that. Those who are frustrated in that process probably should have the ability to have redress, but I am not sure that this process is the right one.