Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what recent assessment he has made of the extent of racism in the armed forces.

The Armed Forces, and Defence as a whole, are committed to taking action to eradicate racism and have a zero-tolerance approach towards it. We are committed to solidifying racial equality as a fundamental principle in Defence, creating a more inclusive environment for all, enabling everyone, irrespective of background, to deliver our outputs, enhance our operational effectiveness and better represent the nation we serve. Our department-wide Diversity and Inclusion strategy, the Armed Forces Race Action Plan, and the Civil Service Race Action Plan clearly set out a challenging vision, goals, objectives, and commitments of where we want to see change.

We continue a wide programme of work to prevent and tackle unacceptable behaviour. All allegations of such behaviour are taken extremely seriously and investigated thoroughly. Service personnel have a number of routes to raise such issues, either with the military police, within the Chain of Command or independently with Diversity and Inclusion Advisers. Defence has mandated Active Bystander training so that personnel have the skills to challenge unacceptable behaviour effectively when it does occur.