Northern Ireland Veterans: Prosecution

Debate between Louise Jones and Stuart Anderson

Monday 14th July 2025 Westminster Hall

[Louise Jones]

I say to anybody who signed the petition or is here today because they fear the raking over of every firefight, weapon discharge or contact from 50 years ago: that fear is false. I say again: it is complete scaremongering spread by people who are at best naive—perhaps they do not know the details of the legislation or are ill informed on the content.

[Stuart Anderson (South Shropshire) (Con)]

I have just been outside with a load of veterans who, like me, served on Op Banner. Is the hon. Lady saying that they are naive and misunderstand this?

[Louise Jones]

I have said—the hon. Gentleman can read back—that scaremongering has been spread by people who should know better. They know fully the details of the legislation and the context of Northern Ireland and have gone out to these veterans and said, “There’s going to be lots of malicious lawfare against you if this Act is repealed”, when everybody here knows that is not the case at all. They are pushing a cynical political agenda.

I and my colleagues who are veterans are vehemently opposed to spurious prosecution, to dragging people through the courts where there is absolutely no case to answer and to malicious lawfare. I cannot repeat that enough. I do not want to see a single veteran who has not committed a crime in any sense being hounded. Op Banner was an incredibly complex campaign. I find abhorrent the idea that any veteran should be at risk of malicious lawfare simply for doing their job on a very difficult operation. I call on the Secretary of State to explain how we will protect any veteran who is accused of any wrongdoing in Northern Ireland.

--- Later in debate ---

[Stuart Anderson]

I thank the hon. Member’s son for his service. Mine joins in two months at the age of 16. I hope that 30 years down the line, when he has defended his country as the hon. Member’s son has, they do not go through this, because morale is at rock bottom. There is no naivety among veterans.

[Louise Jones]

The hon. Member is welcome to check Hansard after the debate, but I was referring specifically to people—we all know they exist—who are scaremongering without knowing the details of the Bill and naively making up things that are not based on evidence. At no point did I say that any veteran is naive, and I know that he has too much respect for our procedures and for colleagues to keep repeating that when it is not true.

[Stuart Anderson]

I think that all the veterans in this room believe that the Government’s current route is wrong—are they misguided, or are they naive? If we go down the route of changing the law in this way, I can guarantee that our veterans will face prosecution for the service that they gave their country for many years.