Awards for Valour (Protection) Bill

Bob Stewart Excerpts

Friday 25th November 2016 Commons Chamber

[Philip Davies]

I have no doubt of that, but this is a Second Reading debate. There is no reason why we should not discuss the definition at length on Second Reading as well as in Committee, which is what I am doing.

The Defence Committee states in its report:

“A number of our witnesses emphasised the importance of ensuring that relatives of deceased or incapacitated medal recipients can continue to wear their relations’ medals at commemoration events without risk of prosecution.”

[Bob Stewart]

May we be absolutely precise about this so that there is no lack of clarity? Everyone who is given the Elizabeth Cross, which is awarded to widows and close family members who have lost someone, is entitled to wear it wherever they like on their body.

[Philip Davies]

My hon. Friend, who is an expert in these matters, is absolutely right, but we are talking about all the medals covered by the Bill and the definition of a family member. As far as I can see, we do not have such a definition. People who think they are entitled to wear the medals should be told whether they can wear them or whether they would be breaking the law if they did. As things currently stand, people do not have such certainty. We could have the rather ridiculous situation in which someone who should be able to wear a medal does not because of the chilling effect of not being sure about whether they would be breaking the law. Again, that would surely be a terrible unintended consequence of the Bill.

Crucially, the Defence Committee report goes on:

“The term ‘family member’ must however be defined in terms of the proximity of the relations that it is seeking to include in the defence. It is not a legal term of art with a single definition. Acts of Parliament which use the term commonly carry a definition of ‘family’ within them to be used for the purposes of that Act. Mr Johnson suggested in oral evidence that he was minded that this defence should be quite narrow, so that for example a nephew deceitfully wearing medals could not rely on the defence by claiming that they were his uncle’s awards.”

Do we really want to criminalise a nephew who wears his uncle’s medals? Do we want to send him to prison? Clearly, the promoter of the Bill thinks we should. I contend that we should not.

The Defence Committee report goes on to say:

“The inclusion of a defence to ensure that family members representing deceased or incapacitated relations who are recipients of medals is vital, but ‘family member’ must be properly defined to ensure that there is no room for uncertainty or abuse. We suggest that the Bill include a definition of ‘family member’ in order to provide certainty over who will be covered by this category.”

The exemptions cover the reconstruction of historical events and productions. Does that exempt people in fancy dress? If my hon. Friend the Member for Dartford would make the point that they do not intend to deceive, why are there specific exemptions for reconstructions and productions, as there is clearly no intent to deceive in those cases, but no exemption for people in fancy dress?

In one unfortunate scenario, someone could start off wearing a medal legitimately, but it could turn into an offence by accident. Imagine that an actor goes to the pub for a drink after whatever it is they are acting in and someone mistakenly assumes that they are entitled to wear the medal they forgot to remove when they came off set. Unless the actor corrected them—perhaps the more drinks the actor had consumed, the less likely that would be—they would be committing a criminal offence. Although they had not intended to deceive anyone when they went to work that day, the intent to deceive could come later, almost by accident.

I said that I would come back to sentencing. The Bill says:

“Any person guilty of an offence under this section shall be liable, on summary conviction, to a period of imprisonment not exceeding 3 months, or a fine.”

The Defence Committee report states:

“Mr Johnson indicated that he considered that the appropriate maximum penalty was six months imprisonment or a fine of up to £5,000 at level 5 on the standard scale. The rationale behind drafting the penalty in this way was to address three concerns:

First, the potential for a custodial sentence would ensure that there is no need for a separate power of arrest in the Bill. We note here that, since the removal of the concept of an ‘arrestable offence’ by the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005, the need for a separate power of arrest would be unnecessary in any event;

Second, that a level 5 fine on the standard scale would be at a maximum of £5,000. We note here that this upper limit was removed in 2012. Magistrates now have power to issue a fine of any amount for offences where £5,000 was previously the maximum; and,

Third, that this formulation would ensure that it could be dealt with only in a Magistrates Court. A certain way of doing this would be to have this explicitly stated in the Bill—“This offence is triable only summarily”…

The appropriate level of penalty has clearly been considered in some detail by the Bill sponsor. We are broadly satisfied that the boundaries of penalties proposed—a period of imprisonment not exceeding six months or a fine—are appropriate.”

The length of imprisonment has been changed from six months to three months, but it is still too long in my opinion.

I am not sure what sentencing guidelines my hon. Friend the Member for Dartford envisages for the offence. Would the type of medal being worn—or not worn, as the case may be—be a factor? Would the type of incident be a factor: the more people deceived, the more severe the offence? Would it depend on the duration of the deception or the place? Would it be worse at a Remembrance Day parade? All those factors need to be considered when we pass legislation in this House, and none of them appear to have been considered for the purposes of the Bill.

I do not think that this offence should be created in the first place, but if it were, would not the confiscation of the medal be sufficient? I cannot support the criminalisation and imprisonment of Walter Mitty types. We have plenty of eccentrics in this country and some, I dare say, in this House. To criminalise someone for this type of behaviour would be very concerning indeed.

I should say, in passing, that all of us in this House know about the Liberal Democrats claiming credit erroneously for other people’s work. Are we really going to get to the point where we send them to prison for doing so?

--- Later in debate ---

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

I, too, support the Bill, and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Dartford (Gareth Johnson). I endorse what my right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis) said: the Bill can be improved a little as it goes through the House.

It takes some neck to wear medals that one has not earned in front of veterans. Those who do so must have some sort of courage, because it is so easy to out them. One can read what a fellow’s or a girl’s service career has been from the medals on their chest, so it is pretty odd when people think that they can get away with it. As I said earlier, wearing medals that have not been earned is often linked with the practice of wearing the berets and badges of regiments to which one does not belong. Challenging these military imposters publicly is a hellishly good detergent. It sorts them out very quickly. Ridicule by real service veterans is a very good way to deal with such Walter Mitty characters, because they normally turn up where other people are wearing medals. It makes them retreat very fast. It is very easy for someone like me, who has a fairly good idea of what medals are, to spot an imposter. It is not just the medals they wear but their order—gallantry medals, for instance, should be first on the chest, coming behind other kinds—that gives them away.

I am pleased that my very good hon. Friend the Member for Dartford has enlightened me on theatrical productions not counting, because otherwise I would have been very worried about what would have happened if the cast of “Blackadder” had nipped out for a quick drink, particularly Lieutenant the Hon. George Colthurst St Barleigh MC and Captain Kevin Darling MC, and especially General Sir Anthony Cecil Hogmanay Melchett VC DSO, who wears an MC in the wrong order; I have spotted that. These fellows, if they went for a drink during filming, had better watch out. I am personally saddened—I am sure that everyone in the House will join me in this—that Captain Blackadder had no gallantry medals, because he thoroughly deserved them. He only wears two campaign medals, but I have been unable to identify them.

I often wear fake medals myself. They are fake in that they have not been given to me but are reproductions that I have had made, the real ones being stuck in some safe somewhere, because if I lost them, I would never get them again. If hon. Members ever see me poncing around, proud as a peacock, wearing medals, I ask that they please do not denounce me, because I am sure as hell that my medals would be wrong.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)]

Order. If the hon. Gentleman used language that was uncomplimentary to any other Member, I would call him to order. He is using language that is uncomplimentary to himself. He may, of course, continue to do so, but the rest of the House objects, because he does not deserve to be so denigrated, by himself or anyone else.

[Bob Stewart]

I do not know what to say, Madam Deputy Speaker. I am so touched. It is the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me. I accept what you say. You do not consider me as bad as I think myself.

We do not want companies such as the Worcestershire Medal Service, which produced my fake medals, to be shut down, because they help veterans to wear medals. By the way, miniature medals are not awarded by Her Majesty the Queen; people normally buy those, so they are not quite the same as other medals either.

I will conclude, because I know that we want to get on. I very much appreciate the efforts of my hon. Friend the Member for Dartford, and I endorse the comments of the my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies). I am not sure that we need to jail people for this, but my goodness we could embarrass the hell out of them and make them do community service. Personally, I think that community service spent spud-bashing at the military corrective training centre in Colchester would be a very good way of dealing with General Walter Mitty.

[Fabian Hamilton (Leeds North East) (Lab)]

I agree with you, Madam Deputy Speaker, that no one could ever denigrate the hon. and gallant Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) for his service and the medals that he has been awarded. An appropriate punishment for anyone contravening this Bill, should it become law, might be the polishing of those medals, or any other medals.

My hon. Friend—I hope he will allow me to call him that—the hon. Member for Dartford (Gareth Johnson) summed up the Bill for me and the Labour party when he said that it was to tackle the stealing of valour from genuine heroes. We in the Labour party support that wholeheartedly. We support the Bill because we firmly believe that anyone impersonating a veteran by wearing medals that they have not earned should face legal sanctions, whether that be spud-bashing, community service, medal polishing or, in extreme cases, serving a prison sentence, as he pointed out.

It is right that we recognise the real offence that wearing unearned medals causes to the community of armed forces personnel, and that we therefore impose the appropriate punishment on these military imposters, in the same way that we punish the offence of impersonating a service member by wearing a forces uniform. The law as it stands does not go far enough. Military imposters can be prosecuted for fraud, as the hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) pointed out, but we think that it should be an offence to wear a medal that has not been earned. For all sorts of reasons, as mentioned, that is currently not an offence.

It is right, however, that we allow relatives to honour veterans by wearing medals on the right breast, as the hon. and gallant Member for Beckenham pointed out. I hope that the House will allow me to recount a brief story. Back in 1998, not long after I was first elected to the House, the Lord Mayor of Leeds, the late Councillor Linda Middleton, asked me why I was not wearing my late father’s medals at the Remembrance Sunday parade in Leeds city centre. I was not aware that this was even possible, but she said, “If you wear them on your right breast, everybody will know that you are not claiming them as yours but are respecting your late father, who earned them.” So, every single year, including two Sundays ago, I put on my suit and coat and I wear those medals proudly on the right-hand side, including the one that I am proudest he earned, the French Resistance medal—he fought in occupied France.

[Bob Stewart]

My good friend makes a valid point, but there is something else: when relatives wear those medals, the person who won them lives again, in their memory and ours. That is terribly important, particularly for those killed in action.

[Fabian Hamilton]

I thank the hon. and gallant Gentleman for that point. My father died in 1998, far too long ago, unfortunately, at a relatively early age; it seems a relatively early age to me now that I am over 60, because he was not long past 60 when he passed away. The hon. and gallant Gentleman is absolutely right that in wearing the medals, I am honouring my father’s memory and gallantry. Looking around at the Remembrance parade in the centre of my city of Leeds, I see so many relatives of deceased soldiers, including those who died in battle, proudly wearing those medals. I look at them, and I know that they have not earned them, but they are not pretending that they have. I am pleased that the hon. Member for Dartford has made that point so clearly in his Bill. That is one of the reasons why Opposition Members support the Bill wholeheartedly.

The last Labour Government were mentioned, as was the Army Act 1955 and the Air Force Act 1955, which were repealed when the Armed Forces Act 2006 passed into law. That repeal has meant that for the past 10 years, falsely wearing and misrepresenting military medals has not been an offence. The last Labour Government have a strong record of support for our armed forces, as all Members would acknowledge. We paved the way for the armed forces covenant, which the coalition Government passed into law. We were the first Government to recognise that the forces community should receive priority access to health services. Again, those services have been developed since by both the coalition Government and the current Conservative Government.

Let me respond briefly to some of the points raised in the debate. The hon. Member for Dartford made it clear that family members must continue to be able to wear medals that belonged to their relatives, in honour of those relatives. He stressed that there was no intention in the Bill to stop that practice. The hon. Member for South Thanet (Craig Mackinlay) said that fraud legislation had never been used to prosecute dishonest medal wearers, and that the Bill would have a deterrent effect on those who sought fraudulently to wear those medals. He pointed to legislation in Australia and the United States, and made the point that this Bill was long overdue in this country.

The hon. Member for Shipley had a lot to say about the Bill, and he was not entirely happy with it. He pointed to the typical tradition of private Members’ Bills having worthy sentiments, but amounting, in his view, to gesture politics. He said that the idea was admirable, but the Bill was not necessary or helpful. That point was echoed to some extent on Radio 4’s “Today” programme this morning, when a military officer said that he felt that this House could do more useful things for veterans. That, however, is to misunderstand the purpose and effect of private Members’ Bills. If we started tackling something genuinely controversial or more heavyweight in this forum and setting, it is doubtful whether it would see the light of day. I thoroughly support and defend the fact that this private Member’s Bill will do what the hon. Member for Dartford intends it to do.

The Defence Committee produced an excellent report, dated 22 November, on this subject, and I commend the Chairman, the right hon. Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis), on producing it. Let me briefly quote from it:

“The protections sought in the Bill are necessary to safeguard the integrity of the military honours system, to reflect the justifiably strong public condemnation of the deceitful use of military honours, and to ensure that legitimate recipients of these distinguished awards should not have to endure the intrusion of imposters…Such sanctions are common in other legal systems around the world and the lack of similar protection in the UK is exceptional.”

The Committee stressed the importance of clarity when framing new criminal offences—a point made eloquently and at some length by the hon. Member for Shipley. It recommended that the awards covered by the Bill be listed in a schedule, or an authoritative external list.

Finally, let me quote my hon. Friend the Member for Llanelli (Nia Griffith)—I hope that I have pronounced her constituency correctly—who is our shadow Defence Secretary and who responded to the Defence Committee’s report on the Awards for Valour (Protection) Bill. What she said sums up the Opposition’s view:

“It is absolutely disgraceful that anyone would seek to impersonate a veteran by wearing medals that they have not earned, and it is right that the law should prosecute these fraudsters who could well be marching side by side with our ex-service personnel at veterans’ parades…Seeing these charlatans who pose as real ex-soldiers causes great offence to the veterans’ community and it is time to put a stop to this abuse once and for all. Labour supports the bill to criminalise this practice and I hope that the Government sees sense and helps bring this into law.”

I hope that we can agree to Second Reading today, and that the Government will enable this excellent Bill to become law very soon.

--- Later in debate ---

[Harriett Baldwin]

My hon. Friend was certainly making a case for opposing the Bill. In a moment, I shall come to our reasons for supporting it.

We heard a very good speech from my right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis), who chairs the Defence Committee. We are grateful for the time that his Committee spent taking evidence on the Bill, and for the insights that it has shared in its report. He gave another good example of the perhaps unintended consequences of failing to make this a criminal offence by telling us that his partner’s father had been questioned, during an event specifically for veterans, about his entitlement to wear the medal of which he is so rightly proud.

My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) argued passionately in favour of allowing people who wear medals in “Blackadder” and other dramatic events to be covered by the exemptions in the Bill.

[Bob Stewart]

I hope that the Minister will indulge me, because I wish to make a short comment. Tomorrow I shall have the extreme honour of presenting the order of the Légion d’Honneur to Canon William Clements in Coloma Court home in my constituency. The priest was offshore in a royal naval vessel on D-day, and I am going to his bedside to give it to him. That is a singular honour for me. I hope the Minister will forgive me for that intervention; I think it was appropriate.

[Harriett Baldwin]

I am glad that my hon. Friend made that intervention. He has rightly put a wonderful example on the record. I know that many people throughout the country are very grateful to be receiving the Légion d’Honneur from the French Government at this time.

I am pleased that the hon. Member for Leeds North East (Fabian Hamilton)—along with the shadow Defence Secretary, the hon. Member for Llanelli (Nia Griffith)— supports the Bill. He gave a very good example of how important it is that the Bill should protect the rights of family members to wear their loved ones’ medals, saying he proudly wears on his right breast on Remembrance Day the medals his father won for his service.

The mood of the House today is that the dishonest behaviour and egregious examples we have heard about are not harmless fun or mindless eccentricity; in actual fact, their implications are far greater and their ramifications far graver than many would appreciate at first glance, and all the more so when they involve the unauthorised wearing of decorations and medals. That is, first, because it is a gross affront to those who have genuinely served their country at considerable risk to themselves and who, as is intended, wear their medals with great pride. As Siegfried Sassoon wrote in “Memoirs of an Infantry Officer”:

“nobody knew how much a decoration was worth except the man who received it.”

But this is about more than feelings, important as they are, which brings me to my second point: wearing unauthorised medals is harmful because it undermines the integrity of our formal military honours system, a historical system that has honoured the bravery and dedication of our world-class armed forces since the 19th century. Thirdly, and perhaps most crucially, by undermining that system bogus medal-wearers erode the vital bond of trust and respect between the public and the armed forces.

It is for those very significant reasons that during the first world war the Defence of the Realm Regulation 41 made it an offence to

“wear a decoration or medal without authority”.

As we have heard in several contributions today, that prohibition was transferred into statute after the war, and later incorporated into the Army Act 1955 and the Air Force Act 1955. I should also mention that it is still an offence under the Uniforms Act 1894 to wear a military uniform without authority, and that offence carries a maximum penalty of a fine not exceeding level 3.

In the early years of this century, when the Armed Forces Act 2006 was drafted, the concern about Walter Mittys was not widespread, and the then Labour Government decided not to carry forward the offences into the new Act. The most egregious acts of deception in this regard, where the individual uses medals to which he is not entitled in order to obtain a financial advantage, are crimes of fraud and, as such, are rightly punishable at a much higher level.

The American Stolen Valor Act 2013 covers only the higher military awards for bravery, as well as certain other military awards such as the Purple Heart and some awards for combat service. But that Act makes it an offence only if the awards are being worn for gain. Nevertheless, the Government recognise the concern about the gap not covered by the Fraud Act 2006, which the Bill seeks to address. It is for that reason, I point out in response to the intervention by my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley, that the Government support the Bill. I know that there are questions about the extent of the problem.

--- Later in debate ---

[Harriett Baldwin]

My right hon. Friend rightly proposes a potential compromise, but other questions arise, including the scale of the exercise and whether the London Gazette might be able to maintain such a database. I look forward with interest to hearing constructive suggestions on those concerns from those who are following the debate.

[Bob Stewart]

My hon. Friend the Minister has hit the nail on the head with her comment that the London Gazette could keep such a database. Every gallantry award goes through the London Gazette, even those awarded to people who have done something for the security services. I am sure that some kind of system could be made available through the London Gazette that would enable the information to be accessed very quickly. At the moment, trying to find gallantry awards using the system at the London Gazette is almost impossible.

[Harriett Baldwin]

I share my hon. Friend’s support for that suggestion. It will be interesting to hear, as the Bill progresses, of any practical solutions to enable us to bring the system into the 21st century and create a database that is easily searchable and readily trusted. I hope that people will come forward with such solutions. The Government will of course make a fuller response to the Committee’s report in due course, but it is fair to say that we would need to consider carefully the practicalities of such a large task.

The Government support the Bill’s Second Reading today. It has some drafting issues that we will seek to help my hon. Friend the Member for Dartford to address in Committee, and I hope that he will take that as a constructive process, as we want to help him to produce a Bill that will achieve his laudable aims. I look forward to discussing the Bill further in Committee. Above all, I look forward to putting into statute our steadfast commitment to maintaining the solemnity of our military honours system for the sake of our brave servicemen and women, past, present and future, who have served and will continue to serve this country with selfless commitment, loyalty and integrity. I therefore once again congratulate my hon. Friend on introducing the Bill, and I urge the House to support its Second Reading today.