The Role and Capabilities of the UK Armed Forces, in the Light of Global and Domestic Threats to Stability and Security

Baroness Hodgson of Abinger Excerpts

Tuesday 15th September 2015 Grand Committee

[Baroness Hodgson of Abinger (Con)]

I, too, add my thanks to my noble friend for initiating this debate. It is with some trepidation that I take part in it, because many noble and gallant Lords in this House have spent their whole careers in the Armed Forces and many have much more experience in military matters than I will ever have. However, during the past year I, too, have had the pleasure of being a member of the Armed Forces Parliamentary Scheme, which enables non-military parliamentarians to learn about defence. Through this, I have made a number of visits to the Army at home and abroad, meeting serving personnel from senior officers to new reservist recruits.

We all recognise how dangerous and increasingly unstable the world is. Global interconnectivity means that today’s conflicts can endanger us all, as jihadists call for attacks on London and other western cities. The numbers of displaced people fleeing conflict in the Middle East are higher than at any time since World War II, with hundreds of thousands trying to come to Europe as a result. Delivering security is thus of paramount importance and I am sure we all welcome this Government’s commitment to defence spending. Consideration needs to be given to how and where conflict will emerge in the future, such as the risk of cyberattacks. This is all set against a backdrop of a growing world population where there may not be sufficient food, water and other resources for all.

Our Armed Forces are outstanding and have, in recent years, done exceptional work in Iraq and Afghanistan. However, lessons from Iraq and Libya have taught us that simply removing a hostile regime does not lessen the threat; worse risks may emerge from a chaotic void. Military intervention alone cannot deliver post-conflict stability, and DfID and NGOs need to come in alongside to assist with institutional reconstruction and establishing a rule of law. We may well also need help from the military to deal with the challenge of our domestic threats, and to work with police and security services.

I have been impressed to learn how our Armed Forces contribute to building relationships for the UK across the world. The world-class training delivered by Sandhurst and the Defence Academy at Shrivenham draws students from many countries, building lasting relationships. As we have heard, the British Army is engaged in activities around the world. In 2014, I believe that troops were deployed to over 300 tasks in around 50 countries. Last December, in my capacity as a member of the steering board of the Preventing Sexual Violence in Conflict Initiative, I visited the Gurkhas in Mali, where they were training the Malian army, and watched them deliver a training session on human rights. Delivering military training to enable countries to deal with their own domestic insecurity is an extremely valuable contribution to world security.

I have spoken before in your Lordships’ House about the disproportionate impact of war on women, and how their participation is crucial in building peace and helping to create post-conflict stability. So it is particularly important that our military are trained to engage with women as well as men in conflict zones. This can be extremely challenging, especially where rape and sexual violence are used as weapons of war. In May, I visited Erbil and met some of our military who are training the Peshmerga. As well as delivering military training, they are also training on protection of civilians and on dealing with victims of sexual violence. This is ground-breaking work, which I hope will be rolled out more widely in training for the British Army and in other overseas training missions.

I know that there is concern about whether we will reach the target of 30,000 army reservists by 2018, and I wonder if there has been sufficient recognition of the challenges of being a reservist and how onerous trying to reconcile this role alongside family and work can be. Are the Government looking innovatively at what more can be done with regard to attracting and better supporting reservists, especially post-deployment, as well as to incentivise employers and companies to release employees, particularly from small and medium-sized enterprises, to encourage greater numbers to sign up?

First-class Armed Forces mean first-class leadership, and that means attracting and retaining the best. I suspect that the military will never be able to offer the same salaries as industry and the City, but it can offer other things. Being in the forces is a way of life as well as a job, and this impacts greatly on families. Unhappy families create pressure to leave. It must be very hard being a wife in the macho environment of the forces, having to move with the children over 20 times to accommodate your husband’s career choice, or being left looking after small children while your husband is away on a dangerous deployment. Modern families’ lifestyles must be properly considered and facilitated: the wife who has her own career, and the returning children who wish to live at home post-school and university. As more women enter the forces, consideration needs to be given to male partners, as well as to accommodating couples who are both in the forces.

Above all, we have a duty of care to all those who serve in our Armed Forces. My noble friend Lady Fookes raised the issue of the military covenant. Has there been any study of how effective that actually is? Although it says the right things, does having no penalties if it is ignored not make it somewhat toothless? Is there more that we can do to support the families of those killed in action, for whom life will never be the same again? We must provide the best care and welfare for those who are wounded, especially those who suffer life-changing injuries. We need to ensure that they can access the best care and facilities, wherever that may be, and receive support for the rest of their lives. This includes the invisible mental wounds too. Access to psychological help outside the chain of command is important, as is good support once they leave and are back in the community.

Much has been written about PTSD and the fact that it can occur years after operations. Many service charities provide support for this, and more must be done to signpost the help that they can give. However, there are also many myths about the levels of PTSD. Research by the King’s College military research unit has shown that the rate of PTSD in service men and women who have been deployed is 4%. This is equivalent to the rate seen in the general population, although the rate rises to 7% for those who are in a combat role. Inaccurate impressions can damage the military in terms of not only recruitment but their employability when they leave the forces.

Many of the service personnel I have talked to have said that they are trained to do a job and want to do it. There are concerns that the public have lost their appetite for our forces being deployed in combat situations, due to what are perceived as ill-considered judgments over the past few years. If we are to ask our young men and women to put themselves in the way of danger that they are trained and willing to face, it places an especially heavy burden of responsibility on leaders, both political and military, to ensure that the full implications of decisions are properly assessed.

Visiting our Armed Forces is a humbling experience. At times we ask them to do some very difficult and dangerous things. I pay tribute to them for their professionalism, courage and dedication. We owe them a huge debt of gratitude. As Winston Churchill is sometimes thought to have said, we sleep soundly in our beds because rough men stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would do us harm.