Armed Forces Bill

Luke Akehurst Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 26th January 2026 Commons Chamber

[Mr Dhesi]

The hon. and gallant Member makes an excellent point, and I hope that the Minister for the Armed Forces will respond to that in his winding-up speech.

[Luke Akehurst (North Durham) (Lab)]

On the proposal to extend the age limit under which reservists can be called back, a small number of them might have attained the extremely high levels of physical fitness of the Minister for the Armed Forces and be suitable for a wide range of roles, but some could be called back for back-office tasks such as analysing intelligence or training people, where the levels of fitness required are far lower than for any kind of combat role. Does my hon. Friend accept that that would release younger people who are currently in those roles to take up roles nearer the frontline?

[Mr Dhesi]

I thank my hon. Friend for making that point. Some individuals, especially in the media and on social media, have facetiously referred to it as “Dad’s Army”, but there is a role, especially behind the scenes, that older reserves can undertake for the defence of our country.

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[Steve Barclay (North East Cambridgeshire) (Con)]

The Defence Secretary opened the debate by talking about the Bill taking significant steps to improve service lives, but the reality is that the rhetoric is not matched by the record.

Let me take as an example the significant section of the Bill that is devoted to reservists. There are measures that I have no objection to: it allows the recall of those in their early 60s; it aligns the provision across the three services; and it has a new, lower threshold to recall based on warlike conditions, although it does not explain to employers what “warlike” constitutes so that they can know on what basis their staff might be called up. But the reality is that under this Government the number of reservists has actually fallen. It was over 32,000 in October 2023 and under 32,000 in October 2024. The number of training days has also fallen, from 1.3 million in 2023-24 to 1.17 million in 2024-25. The Minister for the Armed Forces, the hon. Member for Birmingham Selly Oak (Al Carns) said that our reservists “are critical” and “absolutely central”:

“Without them we cannot generate mass, we cannot meet the plethora of defence tasks”.

If that is his view—and my right hon. Friend the Member for Tonbridge (Tom Tugendhat) spoke about increased risks and the action being taken by other countries—then why is the number of reservists not increasing significantly?

There might be those on the Government Benches who say, “Well, perhaps our record so far hasn’t been great, but don’t worry—the strategic defence and security review promises a 20% increase in our reservists, so perhaps it will improve in future.” First, that starts from a very low base of 32,000, so a 20% increase is around 6,500. Let us put that in context. Even the French—the French, Madam Deputy Speaker!—are more than doubling their number of reservists, and from a higher starting point. They are going from 46,000 to over 100,000 in the next decade. Many other countries have already taken action. The US has half its army and over a third of its air force in its guard or reserve units. Scandinavian and Baltic countries have also taken action. If we want to see what other countries are doing, we can look at the action the Germans are taking, as my right hon. Friend talked about, or at Poland’s defence spending

We have a very weak target of 20% on a low threshold. What is worse is that the funding commitment to that is almost non-existent. The strategic defence and security review has no hard deadline, and it has the caveat

“when funds allow, most likely in the 2030s.”

Some might say, “Well, isn’t that just my view?” It is actually the view of the cross-party Public Accounts Committee. There are 10 Labour Members on that Committee. It is worth pointing out what that cross-party Committee said just a few months ago, in September:

“The Strategic Defence Review (SDR) sets out the Department’s ambition to significantly expand the reserves’ role, including a 20% increase in numbers from the current 32,000 reserves when funding allows, most likely in the 2030s. However, the Department does not currently have funding or a detailed plan for how it will achieve this expansion.”

That is a report from a Committee with a majority of Labour Members of Parliament.

Let us be honest: it is not just on the issue of reservists that there is no action and little transparency on the funding. To give another example, we do not even have the defence investment plan published—it was promised last year. Given what my right hon. Friend said about the funding steps being taken by other countries, let us put that in context. How much money are we talking about? Spending on reserve pay last year, 2024-25, amounted to £135.3 million, with a further £32 million for bounty payments. The Department’s budget is over £60 billion. A 20% increase in pay and bounty payments would be £33.6 million. We have Government Front Benchers saying that this is critical, central and urgent, but we cannot find low tens of millions until the 2030s.

[Luke Akehurst]

It is an honour to serve under the right hon. Gentleman on the Finance Committee, where we look at slightly smaller-scale issues on spending. He appears to be questioning the Government’s political commitment to find the funding necessary for defence. Does he accept that the downpayment on that political will was the very tough political decision of the Government to take an axe to international development funding, something close to the hearts of many Labour Back Benchers, to provide additional funding for the MOD? If a Labour Government are prepared to take a step with that political courage, he should be in no doubt that, as the years go forward, we will find the funding that is essential to deal with the future defence threats we face.

[Steve Barclay]

The hon. Gentleman is one of the most astute commentators on the Finance Committee, so I always genuinely listen to what he says. However, the point I am making is on the urgency to address this now and the relative modesty of the sums we are talking about to significantly increase the reserves. We are talking about tens of millions in a budget of over £60 billion. Therefore, if the rhetoric that this is central to our national security is meant, why is the action being delayed? To the hon. Gentleman’s point on funding, as a Former Chief Secretary to the Treasury, I know that pages 141 and 142 of the Red Book deal with the resource departmental expenditure limit, which I think is at £1.1 billion this year in cash terms, and the capital departmental expenditure limit is at £0.4 billion—so there is more money. From that £1.5 billion, if I was back in the Treasury I would be asking why tens of millions cannot be prioritised for this, if it is indeed a priority?

If we do not want to look at the MOD budget, we could look at the £27 million the civil service spends on diversity and inclusion officers, or some other areas, such as the over £100 million a year those on the Government Benches voted to spend as part of the Chagos islands giveaway. My point is that these are relatively small sums, which give us scale in terms of our ability to respond at pace.

Ministers are right to say that the reserves are critical, but their record is one in which they have failed to act, and there is no timescale to address those points. Just last month, the Minister told journalists that the UK is “rapidly developing” plans to prepare the country for war, and he warned that:

“the shadow of war is knocking on Europe’s door once more”.

How is that aligned with the approach of the Government in terms of failing to scale reserves, and in allowing their numbers to stagnate or even fall?

I have a specific question to ask the Minister with regard to the article 3 commitment under NATO, on our ability to defend the UK. Will he confirm that for the duration of this Parliament the current level of manpower available in our reserves is sufficient to meet article 3 and cover all our critical national infrastructure, and that in reaching that judgment, he is not double counting reservists—such as those who are police officers, doctors, nurses or work in our NHS—who could be counted as essential in those tasks as part of our article 3 requirements?

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[Luke Akehurst (North Durham) (Lab)]

I pay tribute to the hon. and gallant Members across the House who have brought to the debate personal experience of serving this country in the armed forces. I particularly thank the right hon. Member for Tonbridge (Tom Tugendhat) for his insightful speech, in which he talked about some of the threats we face.

It was mentioned earlier in the debate that there are no Members present from the Reform party. I think that their apparent lack of interest in defence matters could partly be because, while most of us across the rest of the House have sleepless nights worrying about the threat to the United Kingdom and its allies from Russia, Reform Members do not actually accept that that threat exists; they are on a spectrum that ranges from thinking it is all Ukraine’s fault that it was ever the subject of two invasions and the threat of a third, through to their Welsh leader actually accepting money from the people whose military threat we are trying to counter.

For many families across North Durham, the contract between the state and the brave men and women who serve in our armed forces is a key issue—one that they sent me here to focus on. One in every 10 households I speak to in North Durham has a veteran or serving member of the armed forces. When I am campaigning on people’s doorsteps, I often play “spot the cap badge”, as many homes have different badges just inside the door as mementos, and if I manage to recognise it, it helps to strike up a conversation.

Across my constituency are people who have served in all three services and many different units, but North Durham has a particularly strong connection with the Durham Light Infantry—also known as the DLI or Faithful Durhams—and its successor regiments following amalgamation. I pay particular tribute to the Durham Light Infantry Association for its role in my constituency.

For my constituents, having proper housing, social care, justice and other support for veterans is not just about making a pledge; they must be a reality for them and their loved ones in order to get on with life. Since being elected, I have tried to use my role in this place as a platform to stand up for our armed forces and veterans and call for greater investment in defending our country. In an increasingly turbulent world, the importance of the invaluable efforts of our servicemen and women is clearer than it has been at any time since the end of the cold war.

I am proud that we have a Labour Government who are showing through this Bill that we are on the side of our armed forces. I was elected on a manifesto that promised to renew the nation’s contract with those who serve through better housing, services and protections for our forces and their families. The Bill will do exactly that. It will also renew, as is done on a five-year basis, the existence of standing armed forces—a tradition that has gone on since 1688. I am sure Members will be unsurprised to hear that I am happy for this country to have standing armed forces. As others have said, I hope that the standing armed forces will grow and that we will attain the kind of mass that we need to deal with the threats we face.

The Bill forms a key part of a wider picture of a Labour Government who are delivering on the defence of this nation. I spoke about the tough political choices that we are making to obtain the funding that is needed for that, but landmark deals have also been secured to protect British jobs and help keep the world safer from hostile actors. We secured an £8 billion deal with Turkey on Eurofighter, which I spoke about in a Westminster Hall debate late last year, and we have seen the selection of the UK’s Type 26 frigates by Norway. Incidentally, I consider Norway to be one of our key strategic partners in defending the north Atlantic bastion.

As parliamentarians, we all have a duty to deliver a renewed covenant with our armed forces. We must do that for the brave men and women in North Durham who were willing to put their lives on the line throughout history and do so even now for the good of the rest of our constituents up and down the country. We must do it for the current generation in active service, who are safeguarding the nation from threats, wherever they come from. We must do it for the entire population, who rightly expect that their Government will do all that they can to keep them safe from any risk of conflict and bloodshed.

Armed Forces Bill (Fourth sitting)

Luke Akehurst Excerpts

Select Committee stage
Tuesday 14th April 2026 Public Bill Committees

[Dr Shastri-Hurst]

I am grateful for the opportunity to speak in support of the amendment, which was tabled in the name of His Majesty’s loyal Opposition, and to set out my broader support for clause 20. I will begin with the clause itself, because it addresses the composition of the court martial. In such circumstances, it is right that we support the very sensible change that the clause sets out, with its underlying intent to ensure that the court martial is properly constituted and capable of commanding confidence across the armed forces and the wider public. Enlarging the pool of those who can sit on it is a welcome amendment.

Precisely because we support that principle, however, we also need to examine whether the system is fully equipped for the realities it faces. In that context, the amendment becomes not only relevant, but in my view increasingly necessary. The amendment proposes a simple change, as set out by my right hon. Friend, to include retired holders of the relevant rank among those qualified for membership of the court martial.

At first glance the amendment may appear relatively modest, but I suggest that, like many apparently modest changes in defence legislation, it subtly reflects something much more significant. It reflects a recognition of the demands placed on our armed forces justice system and how those are changing over time, and changing rapidly. We are operating in an era of increasing operational tempo—a phrase that is often used in defence debates, sometimes frequently.

[Luke Akehurst (North Durham) (Lab)]

Has the hon. Gentleman made any assessment of whether the capacity savings from serving officers not having to serve on the court—because under the amendment they would be replaced by retired officers—are perhaps exceeded by the burden on the service justice system of having to track and maintain some kind of database of the retired officers that it would call on to serve?

[Dr Shastri-Hurst]

The hon. Gentleman makes a helpful challenge. Clearly, there is no impact assessment with the amendment. However, there is a joint service publication, the RARO—regular army reserve of officers—list, and there are those letters I receive annually asking me to update my address and contact details. There are already mechanisms by which individuals can be identified and recalled for this service. Given the operational tempo that I have described, it makes sense that we ameliorate the pressure on those who are currently in active service while not impacting the flow of justice through the service justice system.

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I say that because one challenge sometimes faced by the armed forces justice system is not necessarily a lack of expertise, but a lack of availability of individuals at the precise moment when that expertise is required. The danger of that, and something that I suspect we would all agree we want to avoid, is that it creates delays. It can create scheduling and listing difficulties; and in some cases it puts an enormous strain, as I have said, on those who have served. We have to be absolutely candid. Justice delayed is not just justice denied in the civilian context. In the military context, that can cause much wider issues in terms of morale, discipline and operational focus.

[Luke Akehurst]

I feel that the hon. Member is perhaps trying to fix something that is not broken. In the evidence we heard about the service justice system, was there anything that implied that there was a large-scale problem with delays and scheduling? I ask because I thought I was hearing about a system that was relatively efficient and speedy compared with the delays that we all know are afflicting the civilian justice system. There was just one instance—I think it was of a general who had done something inappropriate regarding funding for school fees. It was almost a sui generis incident where it had been difficult to put together a board. Will the hon. Gentleman accept that there is some danger that the amendment is attempting to fix something that is not broken in a system that is actually working rather well?

[The Chair]

Order. I gently remind hon. Members that interventions should be slightly shorter than that.

Armed Forces Bill

Luke Akehurst Excerpts

Committee of the whole House
Tuesday 2nd June 2026 Commons Chamber

[James MacCleary]

I understand exactly what the right hon. and gallant Member is saying, but failures in the civilian justice system—which, as he rightly observes, has a big backlog of cases—should not be a reason for reducing people’s confidence about coming forward with complaints. We know from the continuous attitude survey, to which he has referred, that the main reasons given by personnel for not making a written, formal complaint continue to be not believing that anything will be done with the complaint, and believing that it might adversely affect their career. It would encourage more people to come forward if they knew that the complaint would be dealt with in the civilian system. The amendments I have spoken to do not unpick the Bill, nor do they reverse its intentions.

[Luke Akehurst (North Durham) (Lab)]

So that I can understand, could the hon. Gentleman explain slightly more carefully why he is proposing to remove the choice that the victim has? They can say which of the two systems—the service justice system or the civilian justice system—they have more confidence in. Why would it be better for the victim if that choice were removed, and they had to go down the civilian justice system route?

[James MacCleary]

As I am sure the hon. Member is aware, this was a recommendation of the Atherton report, and there was good reason for it. That inquiry took a lot of evidence on this subject, and the view was that this change would increase confidence. Serving personnel bringing complaints against senior officers may feel pressure to keep their complaint within the service, and so may not receive the justice they need. We have looked at the findings of the Atherton report and agree with them, so we have included that recommendation in the amendments that we tabled to the Bill.

We ask the Government to go one step further and convert general commitments into specific duties, and provide the structures, standards and oversight that will determine whether those duties are genuinely met. Our armed forces are held to the highest standards in everything they do; it is not unreasonable to expect the same of the legislation that governs how we treat them. I hope that the Government and this Committee will take these amendments in the constructive spirit in which they are meant, and will support them.

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[Josh Babarinde (Eastbourne) (LD)]

I speak in support of amendment 88, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Epsom and Ewell (Helen Maguire). It would require the Secretary of State to review the way that former service personnel are communicated with about their pension entitlements, and I support that wholeheartedly.

I want to use this opportunity to raise again in this Chamber an injustice that goes far deeper than communication; it goes to the heart of what this country owes its veterans. I want to share with the House, for the sixth or seventh time, the story of legendary Eastbournian Pauline Cole. Pauline was a staff sergeant, and served this country with distinction during the conflict in Aden in the ’60s. As a direct result of her service, she suffered solar skin damage, resulting in cancer and post-traumatic stress disorder. After years of tribunals, the Government recognised her sacrifice and awarded her military compensation in the form of a war disablement pension.

Before receiving that compensation, Pauline had been in receipt of £76.96 a week in pension credit. After receiving that compensation, her pension credit collapsed to just £9.23 a week. That is because military compensation is considered income for the purposes of calculating pension credit, even though compensation awarded in a civil context is disregarded from such calculations. Indeed, military compensation is disregarded from universal credit calculations, but not from pension credit. In this case, the Government gave with one hand and took with the other. In order to sustain herself on that new income, Pauline was forced to seek lower-cost accommodation, and moved out of her Eastbourne home to somewhere else in the county of Sussex.

I raised the case with the Pensions Minister. Pauline came with me to the Department for Work and Pensions. I have raised the matter in this Chamber at Prime Minister’s questions, and Pauline sat in the Gallery. Sadly, she passed away a few months after having to move, in November 2025, never having seen this issue corrected. I have pledged to continue this fight around pension communications and pension entitlement in her honour, together with her sons Simon and Les Haffenden.

The Royal British Legion has been clear that the current state of affairs is, in its view, a violation of the armed forces covenant. When I raised this injustice with the Government via the DWP, they said that the Government have no plans to change this policy. When I asked a written parliamentary question on what it would cost to exempt military compensation from pension credit entitlements, the answer was that

“no formal assessment has been made.”

The Government say that they cannot afford to fix this, but they have not undertaken to find out what fixing it would even cost. They cannot hide behind affordability when they have never looked at the price tag.

The Government have shown that they can act differently: after the Etherton review on LGBT veterans, the Minister confirmed that those compensation payments would, as is right, be exempt from tax and would not affect benefits. The Government have accepted the principle; it just has not been applied to Pauline, or the thousands of veterans like her. It must be applied to them, and that must be communicated to all of them.

I urge the Minister to begin correcting this injustice by undertaking a financial assessment of this change, and communicating that to veterans in receipt of the war disablement pension. I urge him to meet me and Pauline’s sons, Simon and Les Haffenden, who are continuing the campaign, so that we can discuss provisions to correct this injustice before the Bill’s Report, and can ensure that no veteran is ever again penalised for serving our country.

[Luke Akehurst]

It has been a pleasure to serve on the Select Committee set up to scrutinise this important legislation, which, as Members will know, renews our mandate for a standing Army and takes important strides on the covenant, service housing and service justice. The thrust of my speech will be against new clause 2, which is an attempt by the Opposition to play a political game with the timing of the publication of the crucial defence investment plan.

First, I pay tribute to the armed forces community across my constituency. As I said on Second Reading, North Durham is home to a large number of veterans and families of serving personnel. As their Member of Parliament, I want to use my voice to stand up for those people in our community who are serving, or have served, our country. That is why I was so keen to play a role in the passage of this Bill. The Select Committee also allowed me to highlight the work of the combined cadet force at Park View school in Chester-le-Street. I welcome the provisions to better integrate cadets into our armed forces by transforming the reserve forces and cadets associations into a non-departmental public body.

I turn to new clause 2. I would like to think that there is no one—with the possible exception of my hon. Friends the Ministers at the Ministry of Defence—who wants the defence investment plan tabled more than me. As I said in the defence estimates debate in this place on 4 March to the Minister for Defence Readiness and Industry:

“My message to the Minister is to take back into the Whitehall system the support on both sides of the House for seeing the defence investment plan sooner rather than later”—[Official Report, 4 March 2026; Vol. 781, c. 895.]

We cannot afford more delay, because in the event of a war with a dangerous opponent, every month we delay could, in just a few years’ time, be a month in which our troops do not have the right kit in their hands.

As a north-east MP, I am aware of the strong industrial case for providing certainty about the footprint of our defence spending, so that we can drive investment towards communities like the one I represent. Many of my constituents are proud to travel to work for BAE Systems in Washington, where they make munitions for the British armed forces and our gallant allies in Ukraine, or work at Pearson Engineering in Newcastle, making essential components for armoured vehicle programmes, such as the turrets for Challenger 3. My constituents also hope that future MOD contracts will lead to the north-east of England becoming a major centre for the space industry. We need to get this right. We only have one shot at dealing with the equipment implications of the strategic defence review. We do not have an infinite pot of money. In fact, all of us know that the state of the public finances that this Government inherited in 2024 means that the pot of money for many pressing priorities, including defence, is decidedly, and sadly, finite, so we must make the right decisions about where to allocate resources.

As I have now said three times to the House, the political commitment of this Labour Government to finding the funding for defence equipment and procurement should not be doubted, given the early decision to cut the overseas development budget by half in order to increase defence spending. That was extremely painful and politically contentious, given that the aid budget is close to the hearts of many Labour Members, but it was the right thing for the Labour Government to do. That represented a historic commitment to the largest increase in defence spending since the end of the cold war. Given that, no one should be in any doubt of this Government’s preparedness to make the further tough political decisions needed to properly fund the defence of the nation.

Indeed, I am hopeful that the DIP will be published before the plan would be that new clause 2 is trying to bounce the Government into. The Defence Secretary confirmed yesterday in the House that the Prime Minister is determined to publish the DIP before the NATO summit, which starts on 7 July. The plan in new clause 2 would be left until the end of the year, which is when the Bill will complete its passage. The Conservatives lost the political and moral right to dictate the timetable for how we best prepare for conflict after the British people ejected them from office, following over a decade of the tragic underfunding of our armed forces. Indeed, in their first year in government, the Conservative party cut defence spending by £2 billion. That is in stark contrast to this Government, who are spending over £11 billion more on defence than in the last year of the previous Government. Rather than tacking a timetable on to the Bill—a Bill that will play a hugely important role in improving how the state delivers for our armed forces community—I will be supporting the Government in publishing a well-thought-out DIP, that is not rushed but is published as soon as possible, so that we can start directing investment towards those industries that will play a key role in defending our nation in the coming years.

[Sarah Bool (South Northamptonshire) (Con)]

It was a pleasure to serve on the Select Committee, and I thank the Clerks and all those who made it run so smoothly.

Today I will focus on one area.

“I certainly think it is bizarre that there is not an English commissioner. That is 85% of the veteran population, while the other 15% have three commissioners to represent them. I would certainly support that.”

Those are not my words, but those of retired Lieutenant Commander Susie Hamilton, the Veterans Commissioner for Scotland, in response to a question from the Minister for the Armed Forces on the Select Committee earlier this year, regarding whether there should be a veterans commissioner for England. The view shared by all three commissioners for Northern Ireland, Wales and Scotland is that the circa 1.4 million veterans who live in England lack their own veterans commissioner. They believe it is vital that we have parity and consistency across the nations, and an independent statutory advocate for veterans in England, so today I once again call for a national veterans commissioner for England, as proposed in new clause 3.