Armed Forces Commissioner Bill

Baroness Hoey Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 5th March 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Carberry, on her maiden speech and look forward to her being involved, perhaps even in this topic as it goes through Committee.

I welcome the Bill, as I think everyone here does, and that the Minister gave a clear outline of all its details. We could not have a better Minister taking this through the House today. What I like about it is that, crucially, it is on a statutory basis. That is key to making it clear to service men and women that they will have someone there with real authority to initiate investigations into general service welfare matters. That will be crucial in raising morale. As we have all said, and the Government have admitted, our Armed Forces are badly demoralised. The right person in that job could really make a difference. I hope that the right person will be appointed to it.

I appreciate that the Bill went through the House of Commons unamended, with cross-party support, and it will of course do so here. However, we might want to look at some amendments, but all will be in the context of making the Bill better and stronger. It is a particularly important time to be debating this Bill given the pledge that the Prime Minister has made to send our troops to Ukraine in the event of a ceasefire and agreement as a peacekeeping force.

Many in the military have followed in the footsteps of their fathers and grandfathers, and mothers these days too. My concern is that the younger generation will not be so willing to join up when they see how their older relatives and retired military have been treated. That is why the link that the new commissioner has with veterans commissioners is crucial. It is vital that the job of veterans commissioner is also put on a statutory basis. In Northern Ireland, we lost an excellent veterans commissioner, Danny Kinahan, recently, because he found the lack of independence in his role not just frustrating but preventing help and support being given to veterans. The role is part-time, for two days a week, though Mr Kinahan spent far more time than that on the job. However, because of how the Office of the Northern Ireland Veterans Commissioner is set up, it is not on a statutory footing and the commissioner does not have the independence to do the job without constant interference from the Northern Ireland Office. The two staff members report to the Northern Ireland Office, and not to the commissioner, which puts the staff in a difficult situation—wanting to co-operate with the commissioner, wanting to help to do something for veterans, but the Northern Ireland Office for other reasons wanting to stop it. The structural limitations imposed by the NIO have transformed the role of the commissioner into a figurehead.

I know that the Minister understands Northern Ireland very well and knows that a very large number of veterans live there. Despite the Belfast agreement and the changes that have come about, many of them still live in fear. We also should remember the various soldiers who have been killed at different times. Around 1,441 British military personnel died during the deployment in Northern Ireland. In one year alone, 1972, 130 British soldiers died. We must never forget their sacrifice to keep people safe in Northern Ireland.

The previous Government abolished the veterans’ support office, which helped to co-ordinate all the veteran support services in Northern Ireland, so I am afraid that a lot of veterans in Northern Ireland do not trust the MoD, having experienced decades of neglect and inertia in the provision of help. An independent body is essential, as the veterans welfare service and the Office for Veterans’ Affairs are now run by the MoD and are not independent.

Then we have section 75 of the Belfast agreement, which means that no one can be picked out above or before anyone else, so Northern Ireland veterans cannot be identified and are then, in effect, discriminated against compared with their former colleagues living in GB. A way has to be found of working around section 75 so that veterans can be identified, understood and supported properly.

I could talk quite a lot, but I will not, about the delays and problems within our health service in Northern Ireland, which affect veterans in acute need of physical and mental health support even more. Some of them have had to wait up to eight years for operations or critical care. I do not think that, across GB, their colleagues as veterans have to wait so long.

An inability to understand the difficulties arising from veterans in Northern Ireland not having suitable care means that we must look at this. Unless we have a veterans commissioner who can stand up with power and authority, we will never change that. Although this is going slightly wider than the details of this Bill, at Second Reading we can go wider, and this must be looked into.

Because the Government are going to repeal the Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Act, we are moving back into a phase where we will see many more veterans, from incidents 30, 40 or 50 years ago, dragged through our courts. We saw the Clonoe decision recently—33 years on, some soldiers are likely, if the judge gets what he wants, to be prosecuted for something that they did on a dark night under huge pressure, doing what I think they were absolutely right to do, which was to shoot four people who had been out deliberately trying to kill civilians and police officers.

Those kinds of issues are why veterans are incensed about the recent legal judgment. They are incensed— I have to say it again—about the possible compensation payments to Gerry Adams. I hope the Minister will do his bit from the MoD side to ensure that that will never happen.

My message is this. While much in the Bill is good, please do not forget that, in looking at how we treat our military today, if we do not remember the service and dedication of those veterans who are now, in many cases, seemingly being abandoned, we will not get young people who feel that going into the armed services is worthwhile.