2nd Battalion the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers

James Gray Excerpts

Thursday 18th October 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)]

I also begin by congratulating the hon. Member for Basildon and Billericay (Mr Baron) and the Backbench Business Committee on securing this debate. I also pay tribute to the Royal Fusiliers. As a Newcastle city councillor, I was always conscious of the tremendous contribution that they made, and I remember the well-turned-out serving and former members of the Fusiliers who attended the Remembrance Sunday events. As a Defence Minister, I also saw the tremendous work that they did on the ground in theatres such as Afghanistan. The hon. Gentleman mentioned their history of bravery, sacrifice and courage, and I concur with his comments on that. The Fusiliers remain a constant source of pride in the north-east, as the right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Sir Alan Beith) has said, as well as in Manchester, London and Birmingham. The local communities in those areas have great pride in the Fusiliers.

Our concern is that the decision to disband the 2nd Battalion the Royal Fusiliers derives from a rushed defence review and an inadequate Army reform plan, known as Army 2020. The basis of any review should be sustainability and value for money.

[Mr James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con)]

I entirely agree with the hon. Gentleman about the way in which these matters should be decided. Will he cast his mind back to 2004, when he was a Defence Minister? A total of 19 battalions were closed or amalgamated at that time, and there was no defence review then.

[Mr Jones]

The hon. Gentleman will remember that the decisions to make those changes were made by the Army during its restructuring. They were not made for political reasons; such decisions have been made for many reasons over many decades.

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[Mr Crispin Blunt (Reigate) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Basildon and Billericay (Mr Baron) on securing this debate. He and my right hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Sir Alan Beith) have made the case for the 2RRF in the context of the current review extremely powerfully. I am not entirely sure that they were wholly served by the arguments of my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Newark (Patrick Mercer), whose assault on the supporting arms could be described only as unfortunate. I would have thought that he among others would understand that the armed services, the Army, depend on team work between the different armed services and between the teeth arms and all the supporting arms. They all have an extremely important role to play.

When on coming into office the Government were faced with financial stringency, decisions about the number of infantry battalions as opposed to arm or core regiments, as opposed to engineers, were among the wretched decisions that Defence Ministers then had to take. The point I am about to make is beautifully illustrated by the Public Gallery, which I have never seen looking more impressive. The Officers of the House deserve congratulation on imposing a little bit of discipline up there. If I were the Defence Minister, I might find it quite intimidating, but the view presented in the Gallery makes one think about the wonderful institution that we are discussing today.

Anyone such as me who has had the privilege of serving in the Army understands the essential element of regimental identity. I was lucky enough to serve during the 1980s when I was only training to fight and die alongside my colleagues. Tragically, since 1990, far too many times that training has had to be turned into reality. That is what the deliberate creation of identity within Army fighting units is about. When Ministers are faced with wretchedly uncomfortable decisions about how to reshape the Army as times change and as warfare and the balance between the arms changes, we run straight into the political difficulty surrounding issues of identity.

The Ministry of Defence and the chiefs of staff have attempted to put in place some basis for making choices, but the toxin in the issue has already been alluded to. As my hon. Friend the Member for Basildon and Billericay has explained, this decision has been about political calculation, not about military logic. I believe that these decisions have not been taken by the chiefs. I know from my own experience just how painful it is when one’s regiment is amalgamated. For those who have ceased serving—they, of course, will have spent 20 to 30 years in service—these issues will be at everyone’s heart. For those who are currently serving—their service is likely to be shorter—they will be concerned but they will turn to the right and get on with whatever organisation they are placed in, in order to do their duty for Queen and country.

Issues of identity, graphically represented here today, are incredibly important. I think that my hon. Friend has made his case when it comes to explaining how the decisions have been taken in this particular round. These are incredibly difficult decisions for the Minister for the Armed Forces and his colleagues, although the point has been made that we cannot be entirely sure that it was he who took them.

This brings us to the issue of national sentiment. I shall now do the strategic equivalent of invading Russia and China, and take aim at Joanna Lumley and the Gurkha lobby. I think it is a particular pity that we are talking about the disbandment of a British line infantry battalion when there are battalions of, frankly, foreign mercenaries still in our Army. The national sentiment attached to the Gurkhas is, of course, entirely proper. Their century-plus service to our country is beyond compare, but it is many senses now an historic anachronism. There in 100 years-plus of sentiment associated with them, which led to the then Government being defeated on a measure dealing with the Gurkhas in the last days of the last Administration.

[Mr Gray]

I strongly support the campaign and the debate, but I think it will be extremely unfortunate if we allow the failure of the Government to do their first duty to defend the realm by preserving our armed forces to descend into a battle between whether we prefer the Gurkhas, the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers, the Loamshires or whatever. We should be saying that the Army will be too small at 82,000 and that these cuts are unacceptable, as we cannot defend the realm as a result of them. We must not allow ourselves to set one regiment against another.

[Mr Blunt]

It becomes an issue about identity in the end. With parts of the United Kingdom such as South Yorkshire providing the recruits for the Fusiliers or the north-east providing recruits for the Light Dragoons and so forth, there is an important issue of identity and then of wider public policy in relation to having a recruiting regime in another country, bringing Nepalese soldiers into the British Army. That was fine when, frankly, the Gurkhas were cheap. They were paid less than their equivalents—their pensions cost less, too—and there was a deal. It meant that these soldiers went back to Nepal, highly trained to be really good citizens of enormous value to Nepal. We have changed the rules through sentiment. In my judgment, we now have the most expensive infantry in the British Army supporting a training organisation in Nepal, which is quite limited in what it can do in comparison with British line infantry whose future we are debating today. That poses real public policy problems that we should be brave enough to address; we need to be brave enough to work through the sentiment. Of course there is enormous sentimental attachment to the Gurkhas.

Afghanistan (Force Protection)

James Gray Excerpts

Monday 17th September 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hammond]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his question and for the measured way in which he has made his point. I remind him that we went into Afghanistan to protect our own national security and ensure that the territory of Afghanistan could not be used by international terrorists to mount attacks on our towns and cities and those of our allies and partner nations. We have announced our intention to end our combat role in Afghanistan at the end of 2014, but to protect our legacy and ensure the continued achievement of our goal of denying the territory of Afghanistan to international terrorists, it is essential that we complete the task of training the Afghan national security forces and increasing their capability so that they can take over the burden of combat as we withdraw. That is what we intend to do, and we will not be deterred from it by these attacks.

[Mr James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con)]

It has been a terrible weekend indeed, and all our hearts go out to the families and comrades of the people who have been killed. None the less, I stood in mourning as 300 bodies were carried down the high street of Royal Wootton Bassett in my constituency, and it seems to me that we would dishonour their memory if we were simply to say that because of this terrible weekend, we must now pull out somehow or other. We have been sent there to do a job, and we must do that job and leave with our heads held high.

[Mr Hammond]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend. I think none of us disagrees with the proposition that we now need to extract ourselves from the combat role in Afghanistan. We have set out a timetable for doing that and a clear strategy for replacing the role that our forces play with ever more competent and capable Afghan national security forces. That is the strategy, and we will continue to deliver it.

Army 2020

James Gray Excerpts

Thursday 5th July 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hammond]

Yes, she has. The statement is not about individuals losing their jobs but about the structures within which individuals will serve. The disbandment or withdrawal of a regiment or battalion does not mean that the individuals in it will lose their jobs. As the Army works on its manning plan over the next couple of years—there will be further tranches of redundancy—people will be able to move across the Army to fit the newer structure. The hon. Lady asked me how I arrived at the decision. I did not arrive at the decision: the Army arrived at it. The Army has done the modelling work, and the Army has come to the conclusions. [Interruption.] Opposition Members do not like a Government who listen to the professionals running our military, our health service or our schools. They are used to a model based on political interference from the top down. That is not the view of this Government.

[Mr James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con)]

Most of us understand, while deeply regretting, the financial imperative that has resulted in the reduction to 82,000 soldiers. Central to the Secretary of State’s announcement today is the importance of the TA in coming years. I might have missed this, but I would like his assurance on a couple of details. First, timing is central. Will the TA be built up before the regular forces are reduced? Secondly, is there room for transfers from the regular forces into the Territorials?

[Mr Hammond]

I think I mentioned that one of the units being withdrawn will become a TA unit. Of course, people leaving the regular forces are always most welcome to join the reserves. My hon. Friend’s point about timing is important, and the process of building up the reserves has already begun. A recruiting campaign was launched over the Christmas-new year period, and further campaigns are in hand. We expect there to be a steady build-up in the reserves between now and 2018.

Defence Reform

James Gray Excerpts

Tuesday 26th June 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con)]

The motion calls for a reassessment of the “assumptions” on which the SDSR was based. Which assumptions does the shadow Minister not agree with?

[Mr Jones]

I know the hon. Gentleman takes a close interest in defence issues, but if he had read the Green Paper he would have seen that it takes a strategic look at the world. The SDSR was very rushed, and did not have the long public consultation and engagement with stakeholders that the 1998 review had. It was basically a Treasury-led review, which has resulted in some strange decisions that I shall describe later, which have affected the capability and capacity of our armed forces.

[Mr Gray]

I am simply focusing on the word “assumptions”. In the motion, the Labour party criticises the assumptions that lay behind the SDSR. My opinion is that those assumptions are absolutely fine—although I agree with the hon. Gentleman that some of the other detail was not so good. Which of the assumptions behind the SDSR does he not like?

[Mr Jones]

I would talk about the developing situation in the middle east, some of the decisions made post-SDSR in taking away maritime capability, and the whole issue of the deployability of our armed forces. All those decisions were taken within a financial straitjacket, instead of addressing questions such as where we need to deploy in the world and what our priorities are. That has overridden the security needs that are so vital and that were outlined so well in the Green Paper.

As a former Ministry of Defence Minister, I know only too well that the easiest ways to make the kind of in-year savings in the defence budget that are being demanded by the Treasury are to scrap capability or to make personnel cuts. However, the Government have scrapped important capabilities—Nimrod and the Harrier fleet—without any plans as to how they will be replaced. It appears that Ministers have been inflexible in their pursuit of short-term savings at the expense of our long-term security. Too often we are given the impression that the Government are presiding over decline, rather than planning for the future. The Government must reassess the security and spending assumptions on which the review was based.

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[Mr Gray]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Gemma Doyle]

I am afraid that I really do not think I have time, but if I have time later I will.

The service community can face indirect discrimination, creating difficulty with day-to-day matters that we take for granted such as getting credit, mortgages or even a mobile phone contract because they have moved around so often. We should not accept that as inevitable. The principles of the armed forces covenant should apply throughout society, and where those principles are routinely or blatantly breached, it may be necessary to consider introducing measures to deal with the matter. Routine disadvantage or discrimination should never go hand in hand with serving one’s country.

[Mr Gray]

The hon. Lady claims credit for having forced the Government to bring the covenant into law. Perhaps she can remind me of any step taken by any Labour Government in 13 years to bring the armed forces covenant into law?

[Gemma Doyle]

Great strides were made under the previous Government through the Green Paper and the service personnel Command Paper, which set up the provisions we now have.

Legal protections are in place for other groups in society and we believe that consideration should be given to whether they should be extended to our armed forces. I thought the Minister agreed to cross-party talks in our Westminster Hall debate last week, but that does not appear to be what is on the record. I hope that he is willing to take part in such talks and I would welcome confirmation of that today.

When referring to the wider service community, we must of course mention forces’ families. They put up with an awful lot and we do not do enough for them. We have to make many improvements, particularly in housing, on which the hon. Member for Tamworth made some welcome comments. The Minister has side-stepped concerns about the missing £41 million for forces’ housing, so I urge him to take cognisance of today’s report from the Select Committee on Defence, which sets out the concerns about housing very well. In last week’s Westminster Hall debate, I urged him to think carefully before making any changes to the rules on service accommodation. As he knows, leaked plans to change the entitlement to married quarters were not well received earlier this year. Perhaps he will tell us tonight whether those changes are still being considered.

Our motion makes specific reference to pensions. There are concerns that some individuals have been made redundant with only a few weeks to go before being entitled to a full pension. It has been suggested that that was done deliberately to cut cost. The Minister has the opportunity to say today that that is not the case and that getting rid of people from the forces before they qualified for a full pension was not a deliberate policy. Will he also comment on media reports last week that the Government may be considering raising by five years the age at which forces personnel can receive a full pension?

Many Members, including my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Diana Johnson), have highlighted the importance of the defence industry in the UK. That includes a range of industries—shipbuilding, manufacturing, maintenance, aerospace, technical support, clothing and optics. Let me say to the hon. Member for Portsmouth North (Penny Mordaunt), who raised some specific issues, that reports about Portsmouth dockyard have appeared in the media and the shadow Defence team has responded to those reports. I assure her that we share her concerns and we are on the side of her constituents and the people of Portsmouth. My hon. Friend the Member for Barrow and Furness (John Woodcock) made some excellent points about defence procurement and in particular about the successor deterrent programme.

The hon. Member for Milton Keynes North (Mark Lancaster) asked us to explain some of the savings that we have identified. He will be pleased to hear that details of a full £5 billion have been published on The Guardian website, if nowhere else, and I refer him to that site.

I want to say a little about defence in Scotland. This week saw the launch of the “Better Together” campaign—Scotland’s cross-party campaign making the positive case for staying part of the UK. It is a shame that the nationalist spokesperson for defence has chosen not to be present tonight. For more than 300 years, service men and women from Scotland have served alongside their countrymen and women from the rest of the UK, with a shared identity and goal—protecting the people of the UK and defending those unable to defend themselves around the world. The defence sector is extremely important across the whole of Scotland, supporting around 50,000 jobs and in the west of Scotland pumping about £270 million a year into the local economy.

On the “Better Together” website, Members can hear Craig and Tanya, both from Dumbarton, and Robert from Cumbernauld, who all work in the shipyards on the Clyde, talking about why they want to stay part of the UK. If any Members are in any doubt about the importance of MOD contracts to the people of Scotland, I suggest they listen to those whose jobs depend on them. Although breaking Scotland off from the UK is a reform too far for me and for the majority of Scots, we have had a good debate this evening on many aspects of defence reform.

Armed Forces Day

James Gray Excerpts

Tuesday 19th June 2012 Westminster Hall

[Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)]

I am pleased to have this opportunity to serve under your chairmanship for the first time, Mr Gray, and to have the privilege of opening this debate in tribute to the people who protect our country and the world and who often pay the ultimate price by losing their lives in the process.

I have found it extremely heartening to see greater support for our armed forces in recent years. It was always there, but now we see real evidence of the pride our people take in the men and women who serve, lining the streets for freedom ceremonies, paying tribute to those who have lost their lives and committing to activities to give those who serve a better deal. The fourth annual Armed Forces day will be held on Saturday 30 June. While it is a time of celebration, it is an opportunity to do two particularly important things: first, to raise even more public awareness of the contribution made to our country by those who serve and have served in the armed forces; and, secondly, to give our nation an opportunity to show our support for the men and women who make up the armed forces community, from currently serving troops to service families, and from veterans to cadets.

The armed forces defend the UK and its interests and play a crucial role in making our world as safe as possible. Through centuries of service to the nation, they have established a record unequalled in the world. They work selflessly with honour and distinction in the most challenging circumstances imaginable. Every day the world becomes more and more interconnected, and instability in one corner of the earth can have far-reaching consequences for the rest of us. Our armed forces are therefore busy working around that world, promoting peace, delivering aid, tackling drug smugglers, providing security and countering terrorism, whether in the fight against the drugs trade in the Caribbean, in working to prevent and deter conflict in places such as Cyprus and the Falkland Islands or, of course, in continuing to fight for a safer Afghanistan, a safer Britain and a safer world.

It is because our values and interests do not stop at our shores that we are a country that cherishes our forces, who have the power to persuade and the ability to act. Since the second world war, more than 16,000 servicemen and women have lost their lives in a score of campaigns. That is why we should never take the incredible bravery and service of the British armed forces for granted. Everyone needs to understand the sacrifice that they make on our behalf. Their contribution to our safety and security is immense, and we owe them all a huge debt.

The love for the armed forces among the British people is not in doubt. Opinion polls suggest that up to 95% of the public respect the role of the Army—I can speak for the whole of this Chamber and perhaps the whole of Parliament when I say that we all very much envy such approval ratings. A testament to the hard work of organisations such as the Royal British Legion is that there has been a separation in the minds of the public between the Iraq and Afghanistan issues and the soldiers fighting and risking their lives there. Although the past decade in Iraq and Afghanistan has proved contentious, public support for our veterans and their families has been unequivocal. People all over the country continue to come out on to the streets to welcome home after gruelling tours sons, brothers and daughters in uniform. We all remember the special service undertaken on our behalf in past years by the people of what is now Royal Wootton Bassett, lining the streets as the bodies of the fallen are brought home to the UK.

I am immensely proud, as we all are, that the British public have more than stepped up to the mark in support of our armed forces. Help for Heroes has raised more than £50 million in less than three years. The Royal British Legion has had its best three ever poppy appeals, and all the major service charities have felt a boost in popular support.

Armed Forces day has provided a formal focus for support. Once the British public saw the need, they simply answered that call. In my constituency of Stockton North, from where there are 71 service personnel, with a further 67 from the rest of the Stockton borough, I am delighted that a range of events has been planned to celebrate Armed Forces day, beginning with a picnic this Saturday. Along with towns and cities throughout the country, we will raise the Armed Forces day flag at our historic town hall on Monday, 25 June, and that will be followed by a small parade and a speech from Lieutenant-Colonel Heron, secretary of the Durham Light Infantry friends’ group.

Later in the week, a fair in Stockton will celebrate our armed forces, past and present. Stands and stalls set out in the local high street will host a variety of exhibits and displays, such as by civilian support associations or a range of military vehicles from the second world war to more up-to-date times. I am used to my borough of Stockton doing things differently so, while we will not see alien and earth-based forces fight it out in the skies over the high street, we will see a fun, “Star Wars”-themed element that will look forward in time and explore a possible vision of the nation’s future forces standing alongside celebrations of past and present armed forces. I am sure that children and younger people will enjoy that, helping them to appreciate a little more what happens to protect them and their families in today’s society. Other events currently planned to recognise the contributions made by our armed forces include a service of thanksgiving and a tea dance at the Baptist tabernacle. Wednesday 27 June will witness reservists and cadets from throughout the borough ditch their civilian clothes to wear their uniforms to work.

Local and national Government have their role to play not only in leading recognition and celebration of our armed forces but in ensuring that they get the support they need while serving and afterwards. Nationally, we have the armed forces covenant, which many of us would like to see have even stronger commitments to service personnel and their families, but local councils in north-east England are doing their bit, too.

In appreciation of the risks undertaken by the armed forces during the course of their duties and in recognition of the important contribution that service personnel, their families and veterans have made and continue to make, I am delighted to say that Stockton borough council is one of the eight north-east councils to have introduced an armed forces community covenant. The community covenant exists to support the national armed forces covenant introduced in May 2011, but at the local level. The principle behind the community covenant is that the armed forces community should not face disadvantage because of its military experience. In some cases, such as with the sick, injured or bereaved, that means giving special consideration to enable access to public or commercial services that civilians would not normally receive, ranging from issues such as housing and education to support after service. For Stockton borough council and partner organisations, the community covenant presents an opportunity to bring their knowledge, experience and expertise to bear on the provision of help, advice and support to members of the armed forces community, and to build on existing work such as the north-east scrutiny review of the health needs of ex-service personnel.

Although all that positive work in Stockton and up and down the country to celebrate the forces is going on, polls in recent years have, however, found that more than half of people—53%—believe that there remains a gulf between the Army and the rest of society. As the older generations who fought in the world wars or undertook national service dwindle, and as the services have reduced in size since the end of the cold war, public understanding of our armed forces has declined. The unique nature of military service, too, often goes unrecognised and misunderstood. What a life in today's armed forces is like and the impact that service life has on modern families is less widely understood. That is why Armed Forces day is so important in raising people’s awareness of the impact of service life.

I am sure that all of us who have met and know service personnel agree that one finds that a fantastic variety of people makes up our armed forces, with an amazing range of skills. For British servicemen and women, it is not only a question of fighting the enemy with an array of armoury and the latest hi-tech weaponry, but about what happens when the fighting is done, when they take their helmet off, put the beret on and start to engage with people, building trust to make a lasting peace. They do all that in the most difficult circumstances, in the 40° heat of Afghanistan and Iraq, seeing violence and suffering on an imaginable scale and while separated from their loved ones. Yet, through all that, they retain their courage, their professionalism and, let us not forget, their sense of humour.

While we celebrate those accomplishments, in all parts of the political spectrum we must also acknowledge the difficulties faced by the armed forces and their families and work harder to improve their quality of life. Our veterans deserve the best equipment, services and support we can offer. Those who have selflessly defended our country and interests for no personal gain or glory must never be abandoned or forgotten. I am sure that all hon. Members who are here from both sides of the House agree that it is important that on occasions such as this we speak with one voice in support of our veterans and servicemen and women. This is not a time for party political point scoring.

It is important that, to ensure the armed forces are given the support they so deserve and need, we constantly scrutinise the Government of the day’s policies, encouraging a healthy debate on the issues and speaking up when we believe the interests of the armed forces are not being put first. That is why Labour is calling for urgent cross-party talks to end discrimination against our armed forces. Greater legal protection for the armed forces and their families must be examined as we seek to end abuse of the service community. It is shocking to hear that more than one in five members of the forces have said they had experienced strangers shouting abuse at them while wearing their uniform in public in the UK in the last five years. Nearly one in 20 said they had experienced violence or attempted violence, and 18% have been refused service in hotels, pubs or elsewhere. The Government must bring all parties together, including the military and service charities, to discuss how to end that appalling abuse of the service community.

The previous Labour Government changed the way in which the armed services, their families and veterans are supported by Departments. For example, they introduced the armed forces compensation scheme, the doubling of welfare payments to those on operations, the advancement of education services for service leavers who have served for six years, increased access to the NHS, and improvements in accommodation through joint working between the Government and voluntary organisations. Studies have shown that that has led to a fall in homelessness among former service people from about 22% to 6%. I pay tribute to the work of charities such as the Royal British Legion, the Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Families Association, Help for Heroes, and many others, all of which contribute so much to supporting our armed forces.

This debate is about not just servicemen and women, but their families, some of whom have lost loved ones, and we must do all we can to support them. Quite simply, supporting families is supporting the front line. Their contribution to our country is enormous, and the support they receive should reflect our country’s values and character. Last year, more than 1,000 service personnel suffered major injury. The care provided by the services and our health professionals is first class, but the impact of injury, whether physical or mental, may be lasting and demand long-term care, and it is often family members who take up the responsibility for loved ones hurt in the line of duty.

The UK currently has no specific working leave rights for carers of service personnel or veterans, so it is vital that military families have the support they need to provide a caring role, something that Labour is strongly campaigning for. Service personnel have consistently stressed how important community support is for their families—things as simple as ensuring that teachers are aware if children in their class have fathers away on operations.

Defence issues transcend partisan politics, and that should include welfare. My right hon. Friend the Member for East Renfrewshire (Mr Murphy), the shadow defence spokesman, has consistently argued that the three main parties must agree on issues involving military action, and far more so on support for veterans and families.

The sacrifice that service families make is huge. Families miss out on special moments with those they love, whether birthdays or anniversaries or just sharing a simple family day, not to mention the sacrifice of those who move around the country and who live with fear for those who fight in our name. Families often deal with the long-term consequences of conflicts that protect us and others around the world. We should repay them by ensuring that they have the ability to care for our forces.

I am grateful for the opportunity of this debate today. I know that many right hon. and hon. Members are sorry that they cannot be with us because of other activities. They include my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent South (Robert Flello), who was Parliamentary Private Secretary to the former Defence Secretary, my right hon. Friend the Member for Coventry North East (Mr Ainsworth).

I want to finish by emphasising how important and unique Armed Forces day is. It simply unites the whole country. Indeed, the British public are as big a part of the day as the forces. They provide support in countless ways, and their tremendous work enables our armed forces to continue to do such an excellent job.

[Mr James Gray (in the Chair)]

Perhaps I could deviate from normal procedure and, as the Member of Parliament whose constituency includes Royal Wooton Bassett, thank the hon. Gentleman for his kind remarks about my constituents. As chairman of the all-party group on the armed forces, I remind hon. Members that at 3.30 pm they will have the opportunity of welcoming 20th Armoured Brigade, who will march through Carriage Gates to the north door of Westminster Hall. All hon. Members, peers and staff of both Houses will be very welcome at that occasion.

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[Mr James Gray (in the Chair)]

You do a very good job.

[Mrs Moon]

Thank you, Mr Gray. I very much appreciate your comments. I sometimes wonder what my father would think about my chairing the RAF group. During the second world war he served in the merchant navy, and when he left at the end of the war, he entered the Royal Naval Reserve—interestingly, he too was a lieutenant commander. I remember that all family occasions would end up with my father and my two uncles—Uncle Joseph who served in the RAF, and Uncle John who served in the Army—arguing over which branch of the armed forces had made the most important contribution. They would constantly poke each other and tell each other that they belonged to the senior service, and I remember that well as a major aspect of my childhood. Although I do not fit the bill for someone who comes from a traditional military family, the armed forces played a major part in my childhood. When I came to the House that led me to take an ongoing interest in the work of the Defence Committee and the all-party group on the armed forces.

When I attend events that relate to the armed forces in my constituency, there is clearly a widely held assumption that those who have an interest in the armed forces belong to two different branches—older veterans and families with members who are currently serving. We see those as two distinct groups and tend to forget about the reservists and the Territorial Army, as well as the cadets, many of whom are often planning a career in the armed forces. In fact, people who have served in the armed forces are all around us. When someone leaves the armed forces they retain the ethos that they gained during their service, which often remains relevant in the work that they do and the way they view their life and service to their community. To challenge the assumption that people in the armed forces are either elderly veterans or those currently serving, to celebrate the fact that former armed forces personnel are all around us, and hopefully to mark Armed Forces day in a new way, for the past two years I have organised in Parliament an exhibition called “Standing Next to You.”

I know that you, Mr Gray, took part in that exhibition last year and sent us an amazing photograph of an extremely youthful James Gray during his time in the military. The exhibition is designed to highlight the former armed forces personnel working in Parliament. They work in many different branches of Parliament. Each contributor provides a photograph of themselves when they were serving, a current photograph and a short biography. Contributors have come forward from both Houses and across departments, including Doorkeepers, Officers and Committee Clerks, and all with a story to tell. I hope that the exhibition will serve as a fitting recognition of the ongoing contribution and commitment that former armed forces personnel make just in the very small, localised community of the Houses of Parliament. This year’s exhibition will be staged in the Royal Gallery from Monday 25 June. I encourage everyone to come along and see for themselves how many former service personnel are around us in Parliament.

We are discussing Armed Forces day, so it is appropriate that this week is carers week. Armed Forces day is not just about those currently serving or even veterans. It is also about their families and the major contribution that they make to the effectiveness of our armed forces. We must not forget that the families are often on the front line of dealing with the absence of a loved one while they are on active service but also with the consequences of that service when they return home. Sadly, some of those family members will become carers, dealing with the impact of physical injuries but also the mental scars that active service can leave. Carers UK uses carers week to highlight the impact of caring: 83% of carers report that caring has had a negative impact on their physical health and 87% report a negative impact on their mental health. Military families are no different. In fact, military families and the requirements of the military led the way in the development of mental health services in this country. We often forget that. It was the need to help people to recover from their experiences in the trenches during the first world war that led us to begin to discover ways of dealing with people with mental health problems and helping them to recover their mental health. The Royal Marines have done excellent work in the development of TRiM—trauma risk management—which has also been important in highlighting the people who are beginning to find their service difficult and has helped them to find their way back to recovery.

The number of people in these circumstances is difficult to quantify. American studies show that one third of Vietnam veterans needed psychological care and that one in five soldiers suffered combat-induced psychological problems post-Iraq. Our regimental system seems to help people to avoid suffering the same high levels of post-traumatic stress. Regiments help to provide comradeship and support. However, after almost a decade and a half of war in the Balkans, Iraq and Afghanistan, we have to be aware that the number of traumatised and psychologically damaged military and ex-military personnel will grow.

Combat Stress reports an increase in referrals of 66% over the past six years. The most common diagnosis is post-traumatic stress disorder. Interestingly, an analysis of its referrals clearly shows that the common time lag between someone finishing their service and seeking help is, on average, over 14 years. When I was in the United States looking at the work being done there on post-traumatic stress disorder, one of the interesting issues raised was how many in the States are reservists. As we move towards Future Force 2020 and increasing numbers of reservists, whom we will be moving towards the front line, we must consider how we will deal with people suffering post-traumatic stress—how we will provide support to them. That is a step that we have to take. We must plan for it now—we have to be prepared.

Although the services available to help veterans have improved by leaps and bounds, it is important that we do not forget about the toll on their families and the help and support that they might need. I, too, want to refer back to last week’s debate on the Floor of the House about mental health. It was shocking to hear the figures showing the lack of support for people suffering mental health problems in the community. With the potential time lag of 14 years between someone finishing their service and seeking help, we must ensure that veterans can access services after 14 years, when perhaps they do not have the same access to services as those who are currently serving in the military.

It is also vital that we do more to encourage veterans who are reluctant to seek help to come forward. The hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport (Oliver Colvile) gave the example of someone coming forward 28 years after the Falklands conflict. That is unacceptable: we must ensure that people feel able to come forward much sooner. Many out there are suffering in silence while their lives and those of their close family members disintegrate.

We will also need to tackle compassion fatigue, ensuring that funding for psychological services does not fall away as memories and identification with a conflict fade. It is possible that in 10 or 20 years’ time, we will see a rise in the number of veterans seeking help. By that point, we will have withdrawn from Afghanistan and the armed forces may not have the profile that they have today.

We must ensure that Afghanistan does not become something associated solely with the Army. Let us not forget that large numbers of personnel from the Royal Navy, the RAF and the Royal Marines are also serving in Afghanistan. There are also large numbers of reservists in Afghanistan. There are also large numbers of people working for private sector defence companies. They, too, are seeing and experiencing trauma. Those are all people who may well in the future need our help and support.

As I draw my speech to a close, I want to mention the impending decision on the future of certain regiments and the impact that that will have on veterans of those regiments, the serving soldiers and their families. Last week, I met veterans of the Queen’s Dragoon Guards who had come to Westminster to lobby Ministers on the future of their regiment. The fear is that Wales’s only armoured regiment will be lost simply because it is considered to be that regiment’s turn or it will be a victim of politicking with regard to the proposed referendum on independence for Scotland.

People’s link with their regiment is very important. They see their regiment as their extended family. I appreciate the difficulty that the Ministry of Defence has with the downsizing of the Army, but the proposed cut is not just about numbers and our ability to engage in future operations. It is about the individuals who have invested part of their lives in regiments that face amalgamation and those returning from Afghanistan who may be facing an uncertain future. That is devastating for them and their families. Those left behind when someone is on service overseas have a difficult enough time as it is, but to be facing an uncertain future at a time of great economic difficulty is doubly hard. Losing one’s Army job ultimately means losing one’s home and community. If those cuts are to be made in the Army, it is especially important that careful consideration is given to the families, who will also feel that impact.

Armed Forces day and particularly the military covenant serve as useful vehicles for keeping the needs of our armed forces personnel high on the agenda. They are certainly high on the agenda in this place. I am pleased to say that I will be attending the welcome home later today of the 20th Armoured Brigade. Those who serve this country need to know that the House is not interested in them only in times of service during conflict. It is an ongoing interest and an ongoing commitment. Armed Forces day is a way of demonstrating that throughout the country.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Robathan]

The hon. Lady speaks with passion. Each individual case can be a matter of great pain for the individual concerned, so I entirely take her view. The problem is that if we are reducing the armed forces—frankly, that is not what we want to do, but we are compelled and constrained so to do—there will be fewer opportunities, so some people, I regret to say, will have to be made redundant or will not be given the job that they would wish to do.

Nevertheless, I still maintain that joining the armed forces is an excellent career and I wish everybody the best opportunity. It is true that a lot of people who wish to get into the armed forces now cannot do so, whereas not so long ago, when the economic situation was more buoyant, we were frankly a bit short of recruits. In many ways, although it is unfortunate for those who cannot get in, we are in a fortunate position in that we can pick and choose more than before. As I said earlier, it is important that people can learn valuable things, such as attitudes, values and skills.

The hon. Member for Stalybridge and Hyde mentioned replacement medals. If he would like to grab me, I will be happy to talk that through with him. He raises an issue, but it is one with two sides, as most issues are.

Our armed forces want and deserve to be valued. Not everybody in the armed forces is perfect, but they do an excellent job on our behalf. They do not want to be patronised. Most of them are high-quality individuals who can make their way in life, and they do not want to be talked down to; they want to be given opportunities, not to be discriminated against, and to carry on their lives in the best possible way. They deserve our support and recognition because of their outstanding contribution to this country. They make personal sacrifices to defend the United Kingdom and its interests, and they contribute to international peace and security.

A wide range of support and advice is already available from the Government, ex-service organisation charities and the voluntary sector. We are unwavering in our commitment to ensure that our armed forces and their families are not disadvantaged by service, and we will continue to raise awareness of the role of the armed forces in society. I urge all hon. Members and all members of society to show their support on Armed Forces day and to make it the success that service personnel, their families and ex-service personnel so richly deserve.

[Mr James Gray (in the Chair)]

I thank hon. Members for an excellent debate, and may I remind everybody that at 3.30 pm we will have the opportunity of welcoming 20th Armoured Brigade through the gates of Parliament?

Oral Answers to Questions

James Gray Excerpts

Monday 11th June 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con)]

I will not start an Adjournment debate on the matter, Mr Speaker, but the armed forces compensation scheme, although first class, does not go quite far enough. It was recently reported that as many as 50 soldiers killed on the front line in Afghanistan had no private life insurance at all. Could not the MOD do more both to encourage and to facilitate the provision of private life insurance to everyone on active service in Afghanistan?

[Nick Harvey]

We do encourage individuals to take out additional cover, but people’s circumstances will vary enormously in terms of mortgage liabilities, the size of their family or anything else they wish to cover for. We heavily subsidise these schemes while people are on active service in Afghanistan, but it would not be right for the state to assume responsibility for this and take it over completely.

Afghanistan (Troop Levels)

James Gray Excerpts

Thursday 26th April 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hammond]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman that there is no long-term solution without reconciliation and reintegration, but it would be a mistake to judge Afghan society by our own standards. While I was in Helmand, I was astonished to see an attitude survey suggesting that Afghans object to the level of bribes, not their existence. They accept the existence of bribes as part of everyday lives, but they do not like their reaching extortionate levels. We have to go with the grain of Afghan society, but he is absolutely right that the willingness and ability of the political elite to manage reconciliation to a successful conclusion will ultimately determine whether the process succeeds.

[Mr James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con)]

The nation will be very glad that today marks the beginning of the end of combat operations in Afghanistan by our magnificent troops there. Nevertheless, does the Secretary of State acknowledge that the next three or four years will be among the most dangerous and sensitive times that our troops have had to face, as they withdraw, and that any information that he might inadvertently give in the House or elsewhere might endanger that withdrawal? Will he therefore be very cautious indeed about the tactical level of information that he gives out about the withdrawal?

[Mr Hammond]

My hon. Friend is of course absolutely right. As we go through the withdrawal, our troops will face new and different challenges, and nothing that we say in the House should place them at any greater risk. I reassure him that my statement was made with the full agreement of the military commanders to the detail that it contained.

Oral Answers to Questions

James Gray Excerpts

Monday 26th March 2012 Commons Chamber

[Nick Harvey]

The accommodation to which the hon. Lady refers was an entirely temporary arrangement while the units of accommodation that those personnel would ordinarily have been living in were being refurbished—I think this was made clear to the Select Committee on its visit. Those personnel will be in that permanent accommodation as soon as it is ready.

[Mr James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con)]

As the Minister correctly says, this Government have done a great deal since they came to power. However, does he agree that the provision of decent accommodation, for both single servicemen and married couples—and, indeed, for families—is central to the military covenant? Does he agree that there is so much more to be done, and that even the announcements that he has made are not yet all that could be done? When does he anticipate having an entire military estate that is fit for purpose?

[Nick Harvey]

As I explained in my initial answer, we continue to make substantial investments, which were further boosted by the additional funds that were made available last week in the Budget. It is important to keep a sense of proportion about the condition of housing at the moment. More than 96% of family accommodation in the UK is in either condition 1 or 2, and we are now meeting the commitment in the armed forces covenant that no family accommodation will be newly allocated if it falls in condition 3 or 4. There is more to be done in the case of single living accommodation, but that work continues apace. Even as we speak, the Allenby Connaught project is continuing to deliver new units of single living accommodation across Salisbury plain and in Aldershot.

Strategic Defence and Security Review

James Gray Excerpts

Thursday 26th January 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr James Arbuthnot (North East Hampshire) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the matter of progress on defence reform and the Strategic Defence and Security Review.

I begin by welcoming the Secretary of State to the first full debate on defence in which he has taken part as Secretary of State. In the short couple of months in which he has been in post, he has really impressed the Defence Committee, and me. I have formed an extremely high opinion of him as Secretary of State. I am perfectly well aware that he will be thinking at the moment, “If only I could say the same of him,” but I hope that during the course of the debate we will get to the bottom of some of the issues we face. I also welcome the very fact that we are having the debate, and thank the Backbench Business Committee for at last finding a day on which we can discuss one of the most important issues in the world, and the most important issue of government.

[Mr James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con)]

I, too, welcome the fact that the Backbench Business Committee has found time for this debate, but does my right hon. Friend not agree that defence should be a matter not for that Committee but for Her Majesty’s Government? This issue should be debated in Government time, not in Backbench Business Committee time.

[Mr Arbuthnot]

I would hope that this issue could be debated both in Back-Bench time and in Government time, because of its central importance, but as the Committee will see, the pressure on speaking opportunities this afternoon is heavy, so there is a time limit even though there will not be a vote at the end. I hope that that means that we will have further such debates.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Secretary of State for Defence (Mr Philip Hammond)]

Let me begin by paying tribute to Signaller Ian Sartorius-Jones of 20th Armoured Brigade Headquarters and Signal Squadron, who died on operations in Afghanistan on 24 January. Our thoughts at this difficult time are with his family and friends. All of us in this House are acutely conscious of the sacrifices being made in Afghanistan on a daily basis by the men and women of our armed forces. The experience of my first 100 days as Secretary of State for Defence has only reinforced my admiration for their selflessness, dedication and bravery, as well as for the commitment and professionalism of the civilians who support them. They are rightly a source of great pride to the nation.

I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for North East Hampshire (Mr Arbuthnot) on securing this debate on behalf of the Select Committee on Defence, and on his speech, most of which I wholeheartedly agreed with. I am delighted to have the opportunity to address the House on the defence reform programme that I have inherited, on my approach to it, and on how I will take forward the delivery of the defence outputs required under the strategic defence and security review.

[Mr Gray]

Does my right hon. Friend remember—perhaps he would do so nostalgically—the days when we had at least three debates annually on defence on a Government motion in Government time? Does he agree that this should be a Government debate rather than a Back-Bench one?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Gray]

Will my right hon. Friend give way before he moves on?

[Mr Hammond]

I will not give way to my hon. Friend a second time, as I am conscious that a large number people wish to participate in the debate.

People remain the greatest asset of defence and, despite the tough decisions that must be taken, we will do all we can to protect them. This Government understand our duty to the country and to our armed forces. We have made the tough choices necessary to put them on a sustainable footing for the defence of national security and of the United Kingdom’s interests around the world. We know that making those changes will not to be easy, but I have no doubt that the British armed forces that will emerge will be formidable, flexible and adaptable, supported by the fourth largest defence budget in the world, meeting our NATO responsibilities and equipped with some of the best and most advanced technology on earth.

To get there, we need not just the series of structural and organisational changes I have set out, but a cultural shift in the way the organisation thinks and works. We need a shift in military doctrine to deliver the defence effect we will need, using the capabilities we will have; a shift in civilian culture to one of discipline, individual accountability and delegated decision making; and a shift to a leaner, fitter, more empowered and more empowering organisation. This is a programme of renewal and change of a scope and on a scale greater than anything else being delivered across the public sector. It is a blueprint for a sustainable future for the UK’s armed forces as one of the world’s most capable fighting machines. That is what Britain needs and what our armed forces deserve, and as we move forward to deliver it we will never forget that at the heart of this organisation are the servicemen and women who are prepared to put their lives on the line for us day in, day out. We owe it to them to make sure that the transformation we have embarked upon delivers its full promise.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con)]

If I may be forgiven, I shall not dwell on the welcome recommitment made by the hon. Member for Barrow and Furness (John Woodcock) to the independent nuclear deterrent, which my hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis) will have very much welcomed, if not the right hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne East (Mr Brown)—who, I am sure the hon. Gentleman will be pleased to hear, none the less looked perfectly benign during his speech. Rather, I would like to focus on more general topics.

I was very struck, and impressed, by the speech of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence. He has been dealt an extraordinarily difficult hand, in the sense that he came into government, discovered a £38 billion black hole in the defence budget and was then required by our right hon. Friends the Prime Minister and the Chancellor of the Exchequer to make defence’s contribution towards balancing the books. However, the purpose of today’s debate is not to consider the great national issues of balancing the books and dealing with the deficit left to us by the previous Government. That is a matter for other times and other people, in a higher position than mine. Rather, our position in this debate ought to be that which was exemplified by my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Mr Leigh): to consider whether what we are currently doing is the right thing for the defence of the realm. If it is not, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the Prime Minister and others at a higher pay grade than me will have to explain why they are doing the wrong thing for the defence of the realm. However, we in this debate should cast to one side economic constraints—I hope that I am not being naive or difficult in doing that—and instead focus on what we should be doing for the defence of the realm.

I had the good fortune of being asked to serve on our policy review group before the last election. I was the MP on the group, which was chaired by the noble Baroness Neville-Jones and produced this weighty document, “An Unquiet World: Submission to the Shadow Cabinet”, on which our manifesto was subsequently based. She says on page 8:

“Capability…needs to be reassessed. An incoming Conservative government should conduct a Defence Review not with the aim of inflicting further cuts, but of ensuring that our armed forces have been asked to do the right job, are properly equipped and trained and are employed on the right terms and conditions.”

Elsewhere in the report she says:

“Defence Reviews tend to strike dread into the hearts of those involved or affected,”

because of the likelihood of cuts, although this is

“not a necessary outcome and not one this Policy Group would wish to see.”

In other words, the policy group on which I served, and which informed the manifesto of my party, took the view that there should be a defence review, but that it should not necessarily involve defence cuts.

The reality, of course, is what we have seen since, which the Secretary of State laid out plainly in his speech. Indeed, it rather reminded me of a speech by a chairman of a multinational company explaining to shareholders that things were not all that great and that he would have to make some cuts to the company, but that he very much hoped that dividends would once again start to be paid in the years to come. It was an accountant’s speech, rather than a defence speech. I do not blame him for that: that is his job. None the less, I have the great luxury of being a Back Bencher and being the chairman of the all-party group on the armed forces. I therefore feel it right to speak up for the armed forces, even if that were to upset those on my own Front Bench, which is not something that I would ever seek to do, as I know my hon. Friend the Minister would agree.

The first thing to say is that the only certainty in the defence world is uncertainty. We never know what is going to happen next. Who would have predicted the Falklands? Who would have predicted Saddam’s invasion of Kuwait? Who would have predicted 9/11 or 7/7? Who would have thought that we would simultaneously be fighting two wars, as we were recently in Afghanistan and Iraq? Who would have predicted Libya, Kosovo, the Balkans or Sierra Leone? None of them was even remotely predictable—nor, of course, was the second world war or the first world war, which was sparked off by the assassination of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo. Unpredictability is the absolutely highest certainty in defence.

Against that background of uncertainty, let us think about what we are facing today. Who knows what Iran will do? We could see further activity from the Iranians within weeks—there is a threat to block the straits of Hormuz. Israel is threatening pre-emptive—nuclear, potentially—action against them. The whole Palestinian question remains unanswered, and Syria is in turmoil. We have no idea what is going to happen in Egypt, despite the lifting of the state of emergency, and Pakistan is on the brink of collapse. We do not really know what is going on in Libya; there is certainly a bit of a vacuum there. The situation in Afghanistan is uncertain, and Iraq is close to meltdown. We are living in an incredibly dangerous and uncertain world, and we should be preparing our defences for that uncertainty.

So what are we actually doing? The hon. Member for York Central (Hugh Bayley) was right to say that Labour Governments tend to spend more on defence than Conservative ones; that is historically accurate. I very much regret to say that my great party is announcing an Army that will be the smallest since the Crimean war. Some define an army as a body of 100,000 soldiers. It is therefore arguable, depending on how one uses the word, that in the near future, Great Britain will no longer have an army; it will have only a defence force. As a Back Bencher who does not labour under the great considerations of state, I am able to say to the House that that would be a disgraceful situation, given the uncertainty that we are facing. The Royal Air Force is being cut in half; the Navy is being emasculated. It is my view that this country no longer has the capability to do the things that we have always done.

Why should that be the case? I want to quote a previous Prime Minister, who shall remain nameless. He said to me, “I went to see the teachers, and they told me to get lost. I went to see the doctors and nurses, and they told me to get lost. Then I went to see the generals. They saluted, turned to the right and marched off, saying, ‘Whatever you say, Prime Minister. I will happily carry that out.’” That is precisely what is happening now. Whatever task is put before our armed forces, they will find a way to do it—they are a can-do organisation—but should we be asking them to do it?

In the 15 years that I have been in this place, we have talked, in these dusty Thursday afternoon debates, about overstretch and about the fact that the armed forces were unable to carry out their duties. We blamed the Labour Government for all that, but I now find myself speaking from the Government Back Benches and making precisely the same arguments as those I have made over the past 15 years. I do not believe, given the cuts that we are now facing, that we will be able to carry out our moral duty to lead the world and to intervene for good around the world. We are hampering ourselves in that regard.

For that reason, I believe that defence spending and budgets should be separate from those of schools and hospitals and from other parts of the national budget. We have a moral duty to do certain things in the world, and we should not allow our economic situation to prevent us from doing them. I regret to have to say that I am at odds with my own party on this great subject. We should find a way to maintain our defence spending at a level at which we, as a nation, can punch above our weight.

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[John Glen (Salisbury) (Con)]

As a member of the Defence Committee, I welcome this opportunity to contribute to the debate. Defence reform is a complex matter and it is not easy, in a few minutes, to encapsulate coherently and completely in an incisive contribution how one would move things forward. I say that to mitigate the disappointment when I sit down and to reflect how difficult it is to reform a Department that has so much complexity hard-wired into its fabric. Much analysis and many reports on this issue have been undertaken over the years and I do not want to use my time now to revisit controversial decisions on whether, if or when we will have an aircraft carrier or aircraft carriers, or on the number of senior posts that will be rationalised, or on how those decisions were taken. Neither do I want to examine the different reasons armed forces personnel face a greater likelihood of compulsory redundancy than their civil service counterparts.

The three points I wish to raise today concern culture, accountability and the measurement of outcomes. Regardless of what decisions are made about programmes and the size and shape of the three services, it is in those three areas that lasting, effective and meaningful reform will be achieved. Many people will probably raise their eyebrows at the mention of culture and think it is a soft and peripheral concern. They might think that the culture of the armed forces is well defined and focused, so let me explain what I mean.

I have no doubt whatever that the sense of discipline, service and mutual dependency is fully developed within the culture of the armed services, as is that brave willingness to risk life and limb for country. However, I am increasingly of the view, through all my different interactions with the armed services in the two years I have been in the House, that although in operational terms there is no doubt about how well the different services work together, when it comes to taking decisions in the interests of UK defence at the strategic and policy level, individuals display an undue dependency on their own service, department or section and the affinities that go with them. Often, I feel that decisions on fundamental matters of reform are made on the basis of the relative political skills of the senior individuals involved. Until a culture exists that rewards and prizes fully at all levels the good of UK defence above other ingrained imperatives, lasting and successful reform will not happen. We cannot continue to pay lip service to jointery from a structural and organisational chart perspective but make no real investment in the mechanics of decision making within the MOD.

The second issue I want to address is accountability. The Defence Committee’s report of just this week says that

“the MoD could not provide adequate audit evidence for over £5.2 billion worth of certain inventory and capital spares.”

My hon. Friend the Member for North Wiltshire (Mr Gray) referred to the Secretary of State appearing like the chairman of an international company.

[Mr Gray]

A very good one.

[John Glen]

Indeed, but what would happen in a business if such inventory could not be accounted for so that for the fifth year the financial director had to qualify the accounts? My gallant Defence Committee colleague, my hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart), recently told me he had once been severely reprimanded for an unaccounted rifle. That was only a generation ago, yet today £125 million-worth of Bowman radios are still unaccounted for.

Many Members will raise their eyebrows, because the issue has been highlighted so many times in different reports, but poor accountability for decisions and outcomes and for the use of public money needs to be addressed. Accountability needs to be hard-wired in the MOD, not just at the highest level but at every level, otherwise reform will not be successful.

The final issue I want to examine is measuring outcomes. As a member of the Select Committee, I draw attention to our recent report, which notes that we were told that

“88 per cent progress had been made to a stable and secure Afghanistan.”

It is a promising statistic, but when we examined it further we were told that

“the performance was not 88 per cent against a full range of indicators of what is happening in Afghanistan, for example on the quality of governance, the economy and security.”

In that case, what is the point of such a statistic in the MOD’s annual report and accounts? We can debate at length the different aspects of decision making and allocation of resources, but until we have proper accountability and measurement of outcomes we cannot have real change in future outcomes and conduct in our MOD. We need to change the culture. We need real accountability, with consequences. We need to measure outcomes so that effective decision making can be built on well into the future.

Mental Health (Veterans)

James Gray Excerpts

Tuesday 6th December 2011 Westminster Hall

[Hazel Blears]

Yes. The hon. Gentleman makes a very important point. The capacity of the people at Combat Stress to cope with the increasing number of referrals is of concern to all of us in the House, because they are specialists—they know what they are doing and are very effective. The best way to use Government funds is to put them into the services that we know achieve positive results, and Combat Stress has an excellent record. I will come to the issue of funding shortly.

Combat Stress provides very practical help. It is establishing 14 community outreach teams across the country. It has three short-stay treatment centres and it wants to enhance the clinical care that it provides at those centres; it wants to provide better clinical care. That is one of the uses to which any additional funds should be put. These are very specialised areas of intervention, and giving people the highest-quality clinical support is very important indeed. Since 2005, Combat Stress has seen a 72% increase in demand for its specialist services catering for veterans’ mental health problems. The services are free of charge to veterans, so they have to be financed through fundraising and from public sources as well.

A number of veterans leave the armed forces with very severe psychological wounds. Post-traumatic stress disorder can go on for a long time—for years, in fact. These conditions are not susceptible to easy treatment. Therefore, there needs to be a sustained commitment to funding and support for organisations such as Combat Stress.

Combat Stress also offers a 24-hour helpline. That provides confidential help not just to people who have been in the military, but, crucially, to their families. We sometimes forget the huge impact on the families of veterans suffering from mental health problems. If people commonly have nightmares and panic attacks, lose their temper and occasionally become violent, the impact on families can be enormous. The 24-hour helpline is therefore a practical way for people to get emergency help when a situation gets out of control.

Combat Stress has an expanding outreach service. It has a team of mental health practitioners, community psychiatric nurses and regional welfare officers. It has three centres, in Shropshire, Surrey and Ayrshire. In September, it introduced a six-week veterans programme, which provides enhanced treatment for people with complicated presentations—it is intended really to dig deep and to delve into all the symptoms people exhibit.

Combat Stress also has a well-being and rehabilitation programme, which is available to all the veterans in the short-stay treatment centres. The programme uses a really structured occupational therapy model, which draws on best practice in civilian mental health. It includes employment mentoring and life skills workshops, and it deals with the practical issues of rehabilitation so that people can take up social activities in the community, which they may have lost touch with while they had post-traumatic stress disorder.

Combat Stress is absolutely the leading organisation in this field in terms of expertise. It now has a partnership agreement with the Ministry of Defence and the Department of Health, and £350,000 of investment was recently agreed, which is, of course, very welcome. Despite that, however, Combat Stress is still feeling the pressure, as the hon. Member for Mole Valley (Sir Paul Beresford) said, and that pressure is likely to increase. I therefore asked it what it was looking for from Ministers, and I want to put to the Minister the points it raised so that he can address them.

First, Combat Stress is looking for increased recognition of the number of people who are beginning to disclose that they have post-traumatic stress disorder, especially given that an increasing number of servicemen are being withdrawn from the combat zones we have had in Iraq and Afghanistan. As these people come home, the pressures will build, and more and more of them will need services.

Combat Stress estimates that 960 of the service personnel leaving the armed forces in 2012 are likely to suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder, while about 4,700—a huge number to cope with—are likely to suffer from a more common mental illness, such as depression or anxiety. That is the nature of the problem. Combat Stress’s services are running at capacity and demand is going up, so my first question to the Minister is whether the MOD and the Department of Health, which is responsible for treatment, recognise that this problem, which will increase, should be firmly on the agenda.

Combat Stress’s second request is for increased capacity. The organisation is now extremely well known, so anybody who is in the circumstances I have described turns to it for help. The last thing Combat Stress wants to do is to turn people away because it does not have the facilities to cope. Can the Minister therefore tell us whether any planning is being done to deal with this issue? What proposals are there to meet the increased demand over the next few years? Where will the investment go? There will be investment in NHS facilities, but the facilities I am talking about, which are close to people and their families, can make a huge contribution in addition to that made by the NHS. I would therefore like to hear what specific proposals the Minister has to provide more funding, more resource and more capacity, particularly for Combat Stress’s outreach work and its 14 outreach teams, which will be extremely helpful for people suffering from the problems I have mentioned.

The third issue I want to raise with the Minister is the stigma around these conditions. There is much more to be done on this. Some 81% of veterans with a mental illness feel ashamed or embarrassed, which sometimes prevents them from seeking the help they absolutely need if they are to get well. One in three veterans—this is a very sad figure—are too ashamed even to tell their families about their mental health problems. I can only imagine what it must be like to live in a family with someone who becomes withdrawn, who is no longer part of the family, who suffers from all the symptoms I have described and who is often in a desperate state and too embarrassed to tell the other members of the family how they feel.

The Government—indeed, all of us—have a job of work to do to raise the profile of these issues and to remove the stigma around them. These things happen in conditions of war, and we should not be embarrassed or ashamed about them. We should do our utmost to help people in such circumstances. I welcome the MOD campaign on this, which is called “Don’t bottle it up”. It is a good way of starting to get rid of the stigma, but more could be done.

[Mr James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con)]

The right hon. Lady is talking a great deal of sense. Allied to the question of stigma is people’s failure to recognise symptoms in themselves. People often suffer some of these things many years after the incident that caused them. Does she agree that another role the NHS could usefully play would be to advertise some of the symptoms and causes of these unfortunate mental disorders so that people actually recognise what is happening to them?

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[Oliver Colvile (Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport) (Con)]

I congratulate the right hon. Member for Salford and Eccles (Hazel Blears) on securing the debate. It is on an issue that I have spoken about on one or two occasions. I am delighted to say that in my maiden speech I gave warning and notice to my right hon. Friend the Minister that I was likely to carry on banging on about it. I am therefore grateful to have the opportunity to do so. A big problem with such debates is that the issues are covered by not only the Ministry of Defence but the Department of Health, and it would be helpful if we could, at some stage, get a Minister to come to talk about the health implications of what we want.

The right hon. Lady has given a very good briefing on Combat Stress, and I, like her, have been to talk to that organisation. It has been incredibly good at ensuring that I am kept informed and have an understanding of exactly where the problems are. Of course, we have heard a lot about the concentration and focus on veterans who have come out of Iraq or Afghanistan, but we must remember that people who were involved in conflicts in Northern Ireland will also need help. They also make up a significant number of the casualties who were created from that long and bloody conflict.

We talked at some length about how there will be an increasing number of people dealing with combat stress over the years. The Government have announced that we will withdraw from the Afghanistan conflict by 2014, but activities will continue there. During a trip that I made to Afghanistan a couple of weeks ago, I was told that although the troops will not go out on patrol, we will almost certainly need to support and help those in the Afghan army and police, who will need guidance. I am in no doubt at all that elements in the Afghan resistance will seek to ensure that our troops are subject to many attacks.

I grew up with these issues. My father went into the Royal Navy at 14, and was awarded the distinguished service cross for his activities in Narvik. He told me, when I was a child and a teenager, of how it was that he had been responsible for trying to take the head of one of the people he had served in a cabin with to throw it over the side when it was blown off in action. Fortunately, that did not have an impact on us as children. He was a very normal man and lived a full and active life until he was 89, but there was a real chance that such activity could have had a significant impact, not only on my mother, who, I have to say, had the most wonderful sense of humour, but on us, as children. We have all come out, I hope, reasonably sane and balanced.

The other day, I visited the Royal Marines in Exeter. One person told me a sad story of how when he had served abroad in action, he came back and wanted to talk to his wife about what he had faced. He wife looked at him and said, “Don’t start talking to me about any of that. I’ve had a damn awful day as well. I’ve had to deal with 300 e-mails, so that’s my priority”, so he did not talk to her about it. He tried to talk to his mates, who were not involved in the armed services, but they found it very difficult to understand, so he had to find his fellow servicemen—Royal Marine friends—who lived in Aylesbury, where he came from, and talk to them. It was only by having that opportunity to share his experiences that he saw what was going on.

I represent Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport, and it is a great pleasure to do so. We have just, literally, had 3 Commando Brigade come back from Afghanistan, and I think it also has some of the scars that come with that.

I am delighted that we have accepted the military covenant into law. I hope that the Secretary of State’s regular reports on that issue will be informed, and that we will be able to talk about mental health. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for South West Wiltshire (Dr Murrison) on writing the paper called, “Fighting Fit”. I think that that was the benchmark for ensuring that we were able to produce a strategy, and we are taking the issue more seriously.

I am also concerned about the reservists. We are enormously good at talking about regular service personnel, but we do not talk too much about reservists, although I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury (Mr Brazier) has been doing an extraordinarily large amount of work on this. I was talking to the British Legion the other day, and it told me how it did not seem possible to share information on reservists with charities that are delivering support and help. Could we look at that? Can we make sure that the information is much more readily available, so that people such as Combat Stress and the British Legion are aware of exactly where the issue is going to?

[Mr Gray]

There is a particular problem regarding the Territorial Army and reservists in general. Whereas a regimental family closes around someone among the regulars who is bereaved or has mental problems, and regulars tend to live in the same place as where they are serving, reservists often come from right across the land, and there is a much less strong regimental hierarchy to look after them. Reservists need particular help from the Ministry of Defence.

[Oliver Colvile]

I was just about to make that point. Those people work and live in isolation. The problems that they have with decompression are enormous. When they come back, they do not necessarily have the same amount of time as regulars do to unwind and be debriefed. We need to look at that issue. When I was talking to a senior Royal Marine the other day, he said that it would be helpful if the decompression time for reservists could be longer. I urge the Minister to consider that.

Another issue that we need to look at is how the national health service is dealing with the matter. As I said, the question is not just about how the MOD deals with the issue, although the Minister has been doing excellent work on veterans. I support the way in which we will change the structures of the NHS. I voted for the legislation, and I think it is the right way of going about it, but will our general practitioners and commissioning boards be able to manage the matter? If GPs commission such services, how far up the agenda is the mental health issue going to be? How will policies be implemented? Will we have lead GPs taking an interest? I will most certainly be asking my GP commissioning board down in Plymouth how it is proposing to manage the issue. We must think the matter through. We in this place can pass legislation easily, but we must ensure that it is implemented and that we monitor the results.

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[Ian Paisley (North Antrim) (DUP)]

I, too, add my congratulations to the right hon. Member for Salford and Eccles (Hazel Blears) on securing this important debate today. Raising the profile of the matter will in itself do much to enhance public recognition of the issue, and she spoke passionately and poignantly about the need to achieve that.

The hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport (Oliver Colvile) made an excellent point in his comments, which is that we must cast the net a lot wider than the immediate conflicts that we are aware of in Iraq and Afghanistan. It will not be unusual for Members to hear me speak about what has happened in Northern Ireland. We have a walking community of forgotten heroes who have served the nation well and with gallantry, from the Ulster Defence Regiment, the Royal Irish Regiment, the British regular Army and the Royal Ulster Constabulary. Only today, as the situation has normalised, has there been a true opening and unfolding of the trauma and devastation in the lives of individuals who gave service to this nation, and the effect that the conflict had on their families. Families lived with service personnel who not only served our country but lived within the community that they were serving—it was a double impact. It is only now, in this new Northern Ireland, in a more peaceful society, that that is starting to unravel and unfold. We must ensure, as we have started to peel back the issue and look at what could be an appalling vista, that we as a country recognise that we have a responsibility to address the concerns that we are starting to discover.

Several former soldiers, from the Ulster Defence Regiment in particular, visited me in my constituency office. They had stopped serving in the late ’80s and early ’90s, and yet they were still talking about things that they saw that are impacting their lives now. They look back and recognise that the awful pictures that flash in their memory have had an impact on how they have lived their lives in the past 20 years, and on members of their community and family.

[Mr Gray]

What the hon. Gentleman is saying with great passion brings to mind an episode yesterday. My hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) was entertaining on the Terrace of the House of Commons one of the widows from the outrage of Ballykelly all those years ago, when 20-odd souls were killed in a pub. My hon. Friend was reminiscing about how he cradled his lance corporal in his arms. His lance corporal had lost all four limbs before he died. What sort of effect does that have, not on my hon. Friend—I am glad to say—who is remarkably well-balanced, but on any less well-balanced soldier? What possible effect will that have on the rest of their lives?

[Ian Paisley]

The hon. Gentleman makes a very important point. I also had a constituent who visited me about this problem. He was a big, strong, tough frame of a man, but he was like a quivering autumn leaf when he started to tell me about what he had seen and what he remembered. Indeed, his constant memory was the sound of the scrape, scrape, scrape of the shovel that he had used to put his comrades and colleagues into a waste disposal bag after an outrage by the Provisional IRA. It is a burning memory that he will never forget and that woke him in the dead of night, leaving him soaked in sweat and crying out in fear, and yet it is a memory that he has had to bottle up and carry with him.

As a nation, we must take responsibility and recognise that there are things that can be done for these people we are talking about. They are not hopeless people; they are people whom we can actually give hope to, if, as the right hon. Member for Salford and Eccles said, we first help to remove the stigma, and help people to recognise that there is help available and that they will not be stigmatised by going for that help. In fact, that help will only be of benefit to this community, this nation and indeed the NHS, which will have fewer problems to deal with as the years go on.

I hope that the passionate words that the right hon. Member for Salford and Eccles put to this House this morning will be recognised and that we also recognise that post-traumatic stress disorder is not only about the immediate battles that we are aware of today but about the long-term problems that our country faces. More than 100,000 gallant soldiers from our nation passed through Northern Ireland in service and we are just starting to scrape the surface of this issue when we recognise that, 20 or 30 years after the conflict ends, there could be people who will come forward to say, “I have a problem because of what I saw, because of what I witnessed and because of what I went through as a serving personnel officer in Northern Ireland.” We must ensure that that issue is properly recognised.

The right hon. Member for Salford and Eccles spoke about the capacity to take on board the cases that will come forward. I want to see that capacity extended, to ensure that the needs of Northern Ireland and of the soldiers there are also taken on board. The Big Lottery Fund money—the £35 million—that has been brought to our attention today will be a welcome spend and of course it must include spending on people who served in Northern Ireland under Operation Banner, to ensure that their issues are properly addressed.

I want to make a final point about the issue of stigma. We need a public champion who can be identified with this issue and whose association with it will give a boost and encouragement to those soldiers who are sitting at home, and perhaps staring into an empty glass, contemplating self-harm or having a fight with their children or other family members. That public champion will give those soldiers the ability to say, “There is someone who can help me; there is an organisation addressing what has affected me, and I can now see that I have someone to shoulder this burden and someone who can be a help or a crutch”, at the most important time—when they are at their most vulnerable. I hope that that public champion can be identified.

In addition, I love the idea of a GI Bill or something similar for the UK. There would be so much opportunity with such a Bill that we could build on, and I think that we could do things even better than they have been done in the US because this is a nation of people who come up with even better ideas than people in other nations do. We could learn from what has been done in the United States and come up with something really tremendous. I hope that this debate itself acts as a springboard and is a very hopeful and positive start to something that we can take great pride in.

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[Stephen Gilbert]

I am very grateful to the hon. Lady for that intervention, and she could not be more right about that issue. I chair the all-party group on housing and I have made it a particular business of mine to look at homelessness; in fact, I have applied to speak in an Adjournment debate on that very issue, Mr Dobbin. When I talk to organisations such as Centrepoint or St Mungo’s, it is absolutely clear that there is a particular problem with people who leave our armed forces and who are unable to adapt to civilian life and stabilise their housing needs. The hon. Lady makes a point that I hope the Minister will find time to address when he winds up the debate.

[Mr Gray]

I just wanted to intervene on that particular point, before the hon. Gentleman moves on. It is often anecdotally said that there are more people living on the streets who are from a service background than there are civilians and it is also anecdotally reported that there is a higher proportion of people in prison from the armed forces than there should be. However, I suspect that there has not been a proper statistical analysis of either of those issues and perhaps one of the things that the Government could usefully do is to come up with some hard facts to establish whether or not the anecdotal reports about those issues are actually correct.

[Stephen Gilbert]

My hon. Friend steals one of the key points that I was going to ask the Minister to respond to, but hopefully the fact that we are both making the same point will be better than just one of us making it, and so I am very grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention.

The risk of suicide in army males under the age of 24 is two or three times greater than that of young males in the same age group in the general population. A recent study of 9,000 veterans showed that 20% of them had symptoms of common mental health problems and that 13% had symptoms of alcohol misuse. The right hon. Member for Salford and Eccles is absolutely right that we should be entirely clear that mental health issues can affect anybody in any part of the population, and that we should try to move away from the stigma that is all too frequently associated with those issues. Indeed, it is my understanding that 25%, or a quarter, of British adults experience at least one diagnosable mental health problem in any one year, and that one in six experiences such a problem at any given time. Mental health problems are very pervasive in our society and we must tackle the taboo about discussing them.

I have spoken before in the House about the harm that alcohol abuse can cause, and that same study of veterans showed that 40% of the veterans who responded met the criteria for heavy drinkers; 27% of them met the criteria for very heavy drinkers; and 15% of them were classed as problem drinkers. Again, young men in the armed forces are more at risk than young men in the general population, with 36% of 16 to 19-year-olds in the armed forces drinking harmful amounts compared to just 8% of 16 to 19-year-olds in the general population.

It is right and proper that we do all we can to help those who have served our country, and not only while they are serving but after they leave the armed forces. That is why I welcome the recent pilots by the Department of Health and the Ministry of Defence to ensure that NHS health professionals have the appropriate support and available expertise to treat veterans with mental health problems. The four national health Departments, the UK Ministry of Defence and the charity Combat Stress have been working together closely to develop and pilot a new model of community-based mental health care, and I particularly welcome the fact that one of the pilots is in Liskeard in Cornwall, which is close to my constituency.

Nevertheless, we need to see what else we can do. At the moment, the support offered for the reintegration of former service personnel into civilian life is proportionate to the time they have served but, as we have seen, those with mental issues and other illnesses often need the most help, and we need to consider whether we have right the balance between the time we are putting into their transition and their needs. We also must ensure that when people leave armed forces medical care, their transfer into the NHS is seamless. My hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport made it absolutely clear that we need to look again at what happens to our reserve and territorial forces when they are demobilised, as they are increasingly part of our war-fighting mix. I welcome the previous Government’s reserves mental health programme, which aimed to tackle some of these issues.

We must redouble our efforts to raise awareness in the NHS, to help veterans who are concerned about their mental health. And it is not just within the NHS; there is an issue closer to the Minister’s own Department. The MOD’s website has only one link buried within it to a charitable organisation that can help with these kinds of issues, and I ask the Minister to undertake to see whether the website could be looked at, and the links made more prominent, so that people who are clicking through will be better signposted towards help.

In all the defence establishments that I have visited during the 18 months I have been an MP, and before that as a parliamentary candidate, I have seen awfully large numbers of posters, notice boards and other ways of conveying information to our forces, and I wonder whether they are being adequately exploited to signpost our armed service personnel to the help that they need. As my hon. Friend the Member for North Wiltshire (Mr Gray) pointed out, we need more analysis and research into the wider consequences, and into whether we are providing the seamless support that we should, and to families as well.

Our service personnel never let us down. We ask them to do a difficult job under very difficult circumstances and they are prepared to make the ultimate sacrifice, so it is vital that this Government maintain the military contract post their departure from uniformed service. We must not let them down either.

[Mr James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con)]

I did not intend to speak, and I see the little time available to us, so if I may I will hold the House for just a few minutes before the shadow Minister does her bit and the Minister, from whom I very much look forward to hearing, speaks.

First, I pay a warm tribute to everyone who has spoken so far in the debate, in particular to the right hon. Member for Salford and Eccles (Hazel Blears). She and I might not agree on many subjects, but on this one I think we are entirely ad idem. Everything she said was absolutely right. This issue is terribly important and she has raised it in a timely way. I also pay particular tribute to my next-door neighbour, in constituency terms, my hon. Friend the Member for South West Wiltshire (Dr Murrison), whose seminal work on this subject fulfilled a coalition agreement commitment to do something about the mental health conditions of the armed services. His report was extremely good, and it has given the Government a series of pointers as to what they can now do about this terrible problem.

I think that we are unanimous about the fact that there is this problem. I was struck by a conversation I had yesterday with my hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart), who sends his apologies for not being here. He was having a drink on the terrace with a young lady who was the widow of one of his soldiers. He recounted how when he was digging into the pub in Ballykelly, she insisted on calling him “sir” throughout the time she was struggling to escape from the mud and dirt, and how he said, “You don’t need to call me ‘sir’ under these conditions. Your husband is dead beside you; we can forget the ‘sir’.” What kind of effect can that kind of episode, in which someone cradles a dying soldier who has lost all four limbs, have on those who are left behind? My hon. Friend is one of the most well-balanced individuals I know, and I am not for a second suggesting that he has any such problems, but how many people will have had similar experiences in Afghanistan and Iraq, and how many soldiers who have had such an experience know what effect it will have on them in later life?

I remember speaking to a 19-year-old sniper when I was visiting Afghanistan last year. I asked him, “How many confirmed kills have you got as a sniper?” and he replied, “I’ve got 34 confirmed, and a further 26 probables”, so something like 50 or 60. I asked, “Doesn’t that worry you?” and he said, “No, sir, it’s no trouble at all. It’s a blur at the end of the sight, and I pull the trigger and do my job and that’s that. It has absolutely no effect whatsoever.” Who are we to say whether when that young lad is 50 or 60 he will have some form of effect from that experience? It is therefore incredibly important that we address this grave issue. I pay tribute to Help for Heroes and to my constituents in Wootton Bassett and across the area, who have done great stuff with bereaved families and soldiers coming back from theatre of war with injuries, but this is a much more invisible problem. We should be just as aware of it, even though the average time before a patient realises his problem is 14 years after the incident, and it may well be 20 or 30 years. It is important that as a society we do something about the problem.

Having agreed that—I am sure that everyone here today will strongly be in agreement—it is much more difficult to say precisely what to do. It is very easy to say, “Isn’t this an awful problem? Mustn’t we do something about it?” Well, yes, but what do we actually do? Two or three interesting proposals have come up in the debate. The first, and as I come from the Territorial Army myself I think this is very important, is that we should ask the reserve forces carefully to consider precisely what they can do. Very often, TA people coming back from the theatre of war leave the reserve forces within a year or two. They do not particularly want to carry on much beyond that, and they then disappear into civilian life and are gone for ever. We do not know where they are or who they are, and they may well be suffering from these same problems. We must find a way of pinning down where our reserve forces go when they retire, and do something about it.

[Mrs Linda Riordan in the Chair]

The second problem that people talked about very convincingly earlier was that of stigma and of people feeling that they do not want to come forward, and I think that that particularly applies to the testosterone-filled young men we send off to war—and women to a degree, but not the testosterone. They come back and do not want to say, “I’m a bit daft. I’ve gone a bit loopy. There’s something wrong with me.” The ethos is not to say that, and we have to find a way of encouraging them to believe that it is a normal thing to do, that they can perfectly sensibly bring themselves forward and say, “I’ve got a problem here, and I need some help.”

One thing we might want to think about doing is this. Some 10 or 15 years ago, our servicemen coming back injured from the theatre of war felt very uncomfortable being in civilian wards in Birmingham. No one is saying that they were not well looked after, but only a year or two after the conflicts began the previous Government introduced military-style care in Birmingham. Armed servicemen feel at home and relaxed in such an arena, and I think that something similar has to apply to mental health. Too many civilian mental health workers do not understand the problems, which may well present many years after the incidents that cause them. Particularly in areas such as mine and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport (Oliver Colvile), where there are very large numbers of armed servicemen, we have to find a way of saying to our primary care trusts, “This sort of problem is coming your way over the years. You have to find a quasi-military way of dealing with it. You have to realise that military life is different from civilian life and that these are different problems from civilian mental health problems, so let’s find a specifically military way of dealing with them. Let’s keep in touch with the armed services and find out precisely what they know about post-traumatic stress disorder and the rest of it, and let’s find a military solution to what is a military problem, albeit within a civilian environment.”

This has been a useful debate. We have raised the issue very satisfactorily and the armed services, which are aware of the problems, will, I think, be grateful to us for having done so. But it is very easy to do two things. First, it is easy to exaggerate the problem, and it would be useful if the Minister could initiate a statistical analysis of how many people it affects in a real sense. Earlier, we discussed prisons, alcohol and homelessness. How much of that is caused specifically by combat, and how much is in the normal run of human beings? There are 200,000 people in the armed services. A number of them will be drunken or homeless. That is the nature of the beast. How much of that is caused by military service, and how much is incidental to it?

So first, we must not exaggerate the issue. Secondly, we must not just take political capital from expressing our sympathy and concern; in debates such as this, we must make specific proposals about what we can actually do to lessen this problem in our society. I look forward to hearing from the shadow Minister and, perhaps more importantly, from the Minister, on what we can do about this dreadful problem.

[Gemma Doyle (West Dunbartonshire) (Lab/Co-op)]

I, too, congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Salford and Eccles (Hazel Blears) on securing this debate on an important and topical issue. More importantly, I thank Neil for coming along today and allowing us to hear his story, which has both provided a context for our discussion and put a face on the issue that we are debating.

I welcome the opportunity to discuss these issues with the Under-Secretary of State for Defence, the right hon. Member for South Leicestershire (Mr Robathan). We have spent much time during the past year discussing the Armed Forces Bill and the armed forces covenant. The Bill has now received Royal Assent, so it is perhaps fitting that as we come to the end of the year, we are again discussing the welfare of our brave serving personnel and veterans and the impact on their families.

My right hon. Friend painted an honest and vivid picture of the problem of veterans’ mental health. It is easy to be preoccupied with the scenes from Afghanistan that we still see and not to pay as much attention to the issues facing service personnel and their families when they leave the forces or return from theatre. We know that they are skilled, highly trained and resilient people, but more than 180,000 personnel have served in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere, as we have heard, and a significant number will have returned with mental ill health or will, sadly, go on to develop problems later in life. We should be prepared to deal with that and ensure that the right facilities and support are in place to diagnose and treat such conditions.

Significant progress has been made in recent years, particularly through mental health pilot schemes and work done since then, to improve support and treatment for personnel suffering from mental health problems, but no party has a monopoly on wisdom when it comes to improving services for our forces. We have all met constituents who have told us about their experiences. We have heard about some of those and about Members’ personal experiences of the issues.

I emphasise the importance of the current campaign by Combat Stress about the stigma attached to mental health, which my right hon. Friend mentioned. Combat Stress provides an invaluable service to veterans around the country. Its centres and outreach work allow veterans to get the help and support that they need in a specialised environment, along with other veterans going through similar experiences. Combat Stress’s “The Enemy Within” campaign seeks to tackle the stigma that, unfortunately, can be a barrier to people getting the support and help that they need.

However, the work of Combat Stress and of many other important organisations and charities such as the Royal British Legion should not give the Ministry of Defence or the Government an excuse to opt out of their responsibilities, or indeed ours. It is important that we do not view the services offered by the voluntary and charitable sector as a replacement for acting ourselves. Such organisations should complement, not replace, the services that the Government offer. The voluntary and charitable sector is facing a tough time at the moment. Forces charities are spared some of that pain by generous ongoing public support, but we should not assume that those services will always exist and will always have enough funding to run.

Government should decide what services they have a duty to provide and should fund them properly. The Government need not always be the vehicle to deliver those services, as we have heard, but they can fund experts such as Combat Stress to do so on their behalf. This Government should also consider how mental health services for veterans or anyone else who needs them can be guaranteed when their national health service reforms are removing accountability. Again, we have discussed that already.

Those in the forces are trained to be strong, resilient and able to push through any challenge that stands in their way. That does not lend itself easily to admitting that one needs help because of a mental health problem. My right hon. Friend highlighted the high proportion of veterans suffering from a mental health condition—a staggering 81%—who are embarrassed by or ashamed of their condition and do not feel able to come forward. We have also discussed the average length of time it takes people to present in search of support, which is about 13 years. I understand that there are examples of people who have waited up to 40 years to get help. We must do all that we can to change that situation. We cannot just let it continue.

Combat Stress has also provided detailed evidence involving cases of individuals who have faced marriage break-up, unemployment, social isolation or substance abuse, all because they were unable to deal with their mental health. My hon. Friend the Member for Clwyd South (Susan Elan Jones) mentioned homelessness as well. We should be concerned about the figures, and I agree that it is right that we should seek to quantify the problem. The figures show that, even though help and support exist, too many people still find the stigma far too great to overcome. Until we tackle that stigma, no matter what support is out there, there will be no real change. Combat Stress’s campaign focusing on the issue of stigma is vital.

We have spent much of this year’s parliamentary debates on the forces discussing legislating for the covenant, so it is welcome that we are now debating the substance of the issues covered by the covenant and what it should mean in practice. It is right that nobody who serves their country in the forces should be disadvantaged as a result of their service. In some ways, however, getting the Government to enshrine that in law was the easy bit. The Government must now take action to implement the covenant so that we can see what it means in practice. I would welcome information from the Minister about the planned implementation of the covenant and how the Government intend to ensure that Departments and public bodies audit and change their policies to give our forces, our veterans and their families a fair deal.

My right hon. Friend highlighted the need to recognise how many veterans suffer from mental health issues. My hon. Friend the Member for North Durham (Mr Jones), the previous veterans’ Minister, announced plans when he was in post for a veterans’ ID card. The card would have enabled veterans to be identified easily and to get priority NHS treatment.

As we have discussed, it is difficult to quantify the level of need. Without a tracking system for veterans, we will never be able to do so. My right hon. Friend has asked in written questions how many ex-service people are being treated for mental health problems on the NHS, but there is no record, so the Minister replying was simply unable to give an answer because the data do not exist. Being unable to quantify the problem makes the Government unable to quantify the true cost of treating mental illness among former members of the armed forces. Therefore, the true impact is unknown at the moment. A veterans’ card would enable the Government to track veterans and offer the right support to those who need it.

In the Armed Forces Bill Committee, on which the Minister and I both served, the Minister reiterated his opposition to introducing an ID card, but the Government agreed earlier this year to launch a veterans’ privilege card allowing veterans to access commercial discounts. That is welcome, but I urge the Minister to look beyond discount schemes and extend those proposals, and to use the card as a way to ensure that veterans can access the support that they require when they need it.

[Mr Gray]

I am puzzled as to why the deeply bureaucratic and complicated system of issuing 5 million people with a piece of paper would help those suffering from mental stress many years after service to come forward and ask for the help that they need. I am not certain as to why that is a solution to the problem under discussion.

[Gemma Doyle]

The proposals were not overly complicated. The initial proposal was to start issuing a veterans’ card to people who are leaving the services now, not necessarily to go back and identify the 5 million people, because, as the Minister has told me, he cannot identify them. If we do not start to make some changes, we will never be able to quantify the problems. When we are able to know who the people are, the right support and services can be offered to them and contact can be maintained where it is wanted to ensure that the services are being delivered. Then, when an individual presents with a mental health problem, they can clearly be identified as a veteran and we will be able to see the problem much more clearly.