Investigation of Veterans

Iain Duncan Smith Excerpts

Thursday 16th May 2019 Commons Chamber

[John Penrose]

The difference is that, were a case to be brought tomorrow, those letters would not be a piece of legal body armour. It is important that we make that point, and I hope the message will go out loud and clear from the Chamber that anyone who thinks they can swan around scot-free as a result of that does not have the legal protection that some people may have thought they did.

[Mr Iain Duncan Smith (Chingford and Woodford Green) (Con)]

rose—

[Mr Speaker]

The right hon. Gentleman is hovering—

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I recognise that I arrived slightly late, but I wondered—

[Mr Speaker]

Well, I am in a generous mood, so in recognition of the right hon. Gentleman’s military background and former leadership of his party, I think the House should indulge him.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I am grateful to you, Mr Speaker, and I apologise that I came in when the Minister was already on his feet. I served in Northern Ireland and in what was then Rhodesia. I received a general service medal for one campaign, and a separate campaign medal for the other—as has been said, they were both operations. We were sent to Northern Ireland, and I lost friends, particularly Robert Nairac—I am sorry I was not here when he was mentioned. I do not know how I can honestly, and with a clean heart, say that my Government represent the best interests of ex-servicemen and women who have served their country. I simply state to the Minister this simple principle: when natural justice collides with the law, we change the law.

[John Penrose]

That has to be correct. That is why we are talking about bringing forward a Bill in this place to change the law to put this right. My right hon. Friend is also right to say—I think he is echoing the point made by my parliamentary neighbour, my hon. Friend the Member for Wells (James Heappey)—that for serving soldiers who get campaign or operation medals, whatever it may be, it feels the same whether or not the legal underpinning of the operation is different. We therefore have to come up with an Act of Parliament that ensures that protections are the same, even if they are arrived at through a different legal route. Either way, it absolutely and essentially has to be robust in the event of legal challenge, otherwise we will have failed in our duty to look after our veterans, no matter where they have served.

Northern Ireland Budget (No. 2) Bill

Iain Duncan Smith Excerpts

Money resolution: House of Commons & 3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Monday 9th July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sir Mike Penning (Hemel Hempstead) (Con)]

As my right hon. Friend the Member for Sevenoaks (Sir Michael Fallon) said, his amendments are not perfect, and there will be concerns, but when is the right time for us to defend our veterans? When is the right time for those in this House to speak out and say, “Enough is enough”?

I have to declare an interest. It was not 30 or 40 years ago that I got on the troop ship from Liverpool across to Belfast docks. It was 42 years ago that I and the 1st Battalion Grenadier Guards went across to Northern Ireland. I was petrified, like most young people were when they went into the armed forces and into combat. I was not going abroad—we were not going to Afghanistan, Iraq, Aden, Borneo or Malaya. I was going to another part of the United Kingdom to protect a community from terrorism. It was a policing role. I have never quite understood why we issued the general service medal for those who went to Northern Ireland, because it was part of the United Kingdom. It was not an operation, as we have heard. We were not on ops; we were assisting the RUC to protect the community. Sometimes that community turned on us, and we lost a lot of good friends and soldiers. Some we have never found. I have spoken in the House before about my captain, Captain Robert Nairac, whose bravery everybody should understand.

We are not here this evening to just accept what the Secretary of State has said and give it carte blanche. The Secretary of State has no idea what I am going to say, and other colleagues are waiting to argue for these amendments as well, but the Secretary of State and the Opposition Front Benchers have already made their mind up, before hearing from gallant colleagues who have served and colleagues who have never served but have constituents who are under threat day in, day out of a knock at the door or a letter. Perhaps that letter will come to me; perhaps I am one of those people. I am probably one of the older ones who served back then. I went in 1976, and the forces that were out there—some were volunteers for the Ulster Defence Regiment, which my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) was serving in—were doing a fantastic job. The RUC was doing a fantastic job. At one stage, we had 10,000 soldiers putting their lives on the line in the Province to keep people safe.

[Mr Iain Duncan Smith (Chingford and Woodford Green) (Con)]

I, like my right hon. Friend, served out there, in ’75, and I recall serving in the Bogside when we used to have to accompany the RUC there; they would not go were the military not with them at the time, patrolling in the same area. We were dealing with circumstances that are very difficult for modern generations to understand. We had to do so under a very different set of rules, and my concern is exactly his: that we are now judging on the basis of a wholly different set of criteria.

[Sir Mike Penning]

My right hon. and gallant Friend understands this so well. It was not so much that the RUC could not cope, but the threat to them was so great that we had to patrol with them. I did not serve in Londonderry or Belfast, even though I have been accused of doing naughty things in Belfast by the IRA and Sinn Féin. I served in Monaghan, Keady and Middletown, where we were in the RUC post, sometimes with the RUC and sometimes on our own.

It was a very difficult time, but we were not conscripts. We were young people who volunteered to serve in our armed forces. When I joined up, I knew that I was going to Northern Ireland. Basically, every 18 months you would go to Northern Ireland if you were from an infantry regiment. We knew we were going to go, and we knew how difficult it was going to be, but—this is the big but—I expected those who sent us to look after us. I honestly feel at the moment that veterans, and not just those from my day, do not feel that this House did the right thing for us, and they passionately feel that we are letting them down.

If this evening’s debate is not the answer and these amendments are not the right ones, I say to colleagues around the Chamber—I am so disappointed that some of my Labour friends who served in the armed forces are not here for something so damn important—that the people who did the right thing for us and for Northern Ireland are flagrantly being let down, day in and day out. They are told there is another consultation, that we cannot do it—that there is technicality here, and the judges will not do it—or that Sinn Féin will use this against us. I don’t give a monkey’s. The Commons should stand up for our veterans, and if we do not vote for that this evening, there is something seriously wrong.