Armed Forces

Lord Bilimoria Excerpts

Monday 5th November 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bilimoria]

My Lords, on 22 October, in the third presidential debate, Mitt Romney said:

“Our Navy is old—excuse me, our Navy is smaller now than at any time since 1917 … That’s unacceptable to me. I want to make sure that we have the ships that are required by our Navy. Our Air Force is older and smaller than at any time since it was founded in”—

he got the date wrong—

“1947 … we’ve always had the strategy of saying we could fight in two conflicts at once. Now we’re changing to one conflict. Look, this, in my view, is the highest responsibility of the President of the United States, which is to maintain the safety of the American people. And I will not cut our military budget by a trillion dollars … That, in my view is making our future less certain and less secure”.

President Obama responded:

“I think Governor Romney maybe hasn’t spent enough time looking at how our military works. You mentioned the Navy, for example, and that we have fewer ships than we did in 1916. Well, Governor, we also have fewer horses and bayonets, because the nature of our military has changed. We have these things called aircraft carriers”—

we do not—

“where planes land on them. We have these ships that go under water, nuclear submarines”.

Long may they exist. We need them. He continued:

“And so the question is … what are our capabilities? And so when I sit down with the Secretary of the Navy and the Joint Chiefs of Staff, we determine how are we going to be best able to meet all of our defense needs in a way that also keeps faith with our troops, that also makes sure that our veterans have the kind of support that they need when they come home”.

As the noble Baroness, Lady Dean, and the noble Lord, Lord Davies, have said, morale in our Armed Forces is very low. There is no running away from that. I have heard it first hand from all the services. I am glad the Government have made the military covenant a priority, but are we honouring it? With the cuts that we are making, are we diminishing esprit de corps? The services are called the “services” because they serve and continue to serve us.

Peace in our time is a utopian dream that has never existed and, sadly, probably never will. As we have heard, we have been in Afghanistan since 2001, which is now longer than the First and Second World Wars combined. In his brilliant speech, the noble Lord, Lord Robertson, spoke about the whole debate of why we are there. Why are we there? What is achieved? What will people say about us when we leave? Are we leaving too early? Did we get the job done? We are meant to be securing the UK that is why we went there in the first place. We were right to go there in the first place, but were we right to stay there all this time and are we right to leave when we are going to leave? Are they going to laugh and say, “Oh well, the Russians were here and they left and look what happened. Now they have come, they are going, look at what is going to happen”? It is tough.

What is the role of the Armed Forces? We are a wonderful, caring nation. I have been privileged to support and be involved with institutions such as the Army Benevolent Fund, a soldiers’ charity that does amazing work; I have been a commissioner of the Royal Hospital; we have got Help for Heroes, we have got the Gurkha Welfare Trust—we are fantastic. We have Remembrance Sunday coming up where we remember not only the fallen but those who have served and sacrificed and those who continue to serve and sacrifice today. I was president of the commemoration committee of the memorial gates at Constitution Hill, and I continue to serve on its committee, founded by the noble Baroness, Lady Flather. The gates commemorate the sacrifice and service of the 5 million volunteers from the Indian sub-continent, Africa and the Caribbean. Without those 5 million individuals, we would not be sitting here doing what we are doing today; we would not be a free world.

In my tiny community of Zoroastrian Parsees, which now numbers fewer than 70,000 in India, my late father, Lieutenant-General Bilimoria, was commissioned into the Indian Army. His father, my grandfather, Brigadier Bilimoria, was commissioned from Sandhurst. My father’s cousin, Lieutenant-General Jungoo Satarawalla, from my father’s regiment, the 5th Gurkha Rifles (Frontier Force), was awarded the Military Cross in the Second World War, as was India’s first Field Marshal, Sam Manekshaw, also a Zoroastrian. My maternal grandfather, J D Italia, served as a squadron leader in the Royal Indian Air Force during the Second World War. I could on with a long list of Zoroastrian Parsees from this tiny community who have served in the British Armed Forces.

As to the Gurkhas, what an amazing contribution they have made to Britain over centuries. My father’s battalion, 2nd Battalion 5th Gurkha Rifles (Frontier Force), was awarded three Victoria Crosses in the Second World War—and those three names are inscribed in the roof of the pavilion at the memorial gates on Constitution Hill. I am so happy that the previous Government eventually recognised the contribution of the Gurkhas, allowing Gurkhas who wished to settle in this country after they retired to do so.

We now have Future Force 2020 and we had the SDSR in 2010—but the SDSR was all about means and not about ends. We have heard passionately from the noble Lord, Lord Judd, that we do not have any aircraft carriers. We got rid of our Harriers for a song and we do not have our Nimrods. What happened straight after that? In autumn 2010, I spoke in the debate on the SDSR and said that we are short-sighted. We did not predict the Falklands. No one predicted 9/11. We do not know what is going to happen or what is around the corner. What happened around the corner? We had the Arab spring and Libya. What we needed was our aircraft carriers. We were sending Typhoons all the way from Coningsby in Lincolnshire. When are we going to learn that we need these aircraft carriers?

Now, two years later, what do we have? We have troop cuts. When my father commanded the central Indian Army, he had 350,000 troops under his command. When he commanded a corps before he became an army commander, his corps was comprised of over 100,000 troops. We announced the troop cuts, and what happened? There was a problem with G4S and the security of the Olympic Games. As we have heard in the debate, who stepped in? Our wonderful troops stepped in. When I went to the Olympics and saw our troops, I thanked every one of them personally because they saved the day. We are now to have a British Army of fewer than 80,000 troops.

This country is famous for its soft power. We are so lucky because we have the BBC, the Royal Family, our history, London, which is the greatest of the world’s great cities, our tourism and the Olympics. We publish the Economist and the FT; we have the City of London, and we have Oxford and Cambridge. I could go on. We are one of the top 10 economies in the world, but soft power is useless without hard power. In terms of population, we rank 22nd in the world, and yet however we are ranked as an economy or a defence power, we are in the top 10 in the world. We punch above our weight the whole time, and yet today we are devoting half the percentage of our GDP spending on defence than we did 30 years ago, in 1982—the time of the Falklands war. You could argue that there was the Cold War back then, but we are in a war that is far more uncertain. We do not know what is around the corner. We did not know how long we would spend in Afghanistan when we went there. No one, however much we debate Afghanistan, should ever say that even one of our troops has made that sacrifice in vain. The troops have been doing their duty. They have been attempting to help a nation and to help our security over here. We should always be grateful for that and inspired by what they have done for us.

I welcome the noble Baroness, Lady Garden, to the Front Bench, and I thank the noble Lord, Lord Astor, who is a true champion of the armed services; I have seen that for myself. His heart is in the right place and we always appreciate what the noble Lord does.

Our Armed Forces are the best of the best in every way. Our regiments are the elite, and their history is phenomenal. I asked one of our legendary sergeant-majors at the Royal Hospital Chelsea what he felt about all these cuts. He was dismayed and said, “What people do not know is the term ‘espirit de corps’. Yes, we fight for our country, but we also fight for our regiment and for the comrade who is right next to us. We fight for each other”. When you amalgamate regiments, cut out battalions and then lump them all together, you are cutting away history and espirit de corps. Backing for the Armed Forces in this country is almost at an all-time high; it is fantastic. Yet in many ways I feel that the Government’s support for the forces is low. That is both frightening and disappointing when we look at the sacrifices that are made.

As the noble Baroness, Lady Dean, said, it is not just the soldiers and service people who make a sacrifice, it is also their families. I remember as a 10 year-old that when my father went to fight for the liberation of Bangladesh, I would read the papers every single day, terrified that my father’s name would be in them. That is how I remember being a child in an army family; I know what it is like. I also know what my mother felt like. Do we really look after the families well? The noble Baroness spoke passionately and stressed that what leads to low morale and problems is the uncertainty. It was the word she used most often. What are the Government doing about it? Putting our hand on our heart, are we fulfilling our side of the military covenant?

In his excellent speech, the noble Lord, Lord King, said that nowadays we talk about wars of necessity and wars of choice. We had to go to war in the Falklands, and we had to go to war in Kuwait. We had to go to Afghanistan in 2001. With hindsight, Iraq in 2003 was a huge mistake, but let us think of the practicalities. The United States, our biggest ally, went to Iraq. We regret having gone, but did we have that much of a choice? The bottom line is that we have to be prepared for the unexpected. The noble Lord, Lord King, also talked about conventional wars and unconventional wars. When my father took over command of the central Indian Army just over 20 years ago, one of the first things he did was to go to Sri Lanka, where there were a lot of his troops, and in his view that was resulting in conflict. Within two weeks of returning from his visit, the Indian troops were withdrawn. It has taken more than two decades for the issue to be resolved by the Sri Lankans themselves.

In many cases, we do not know what is going to happen. We might intervene, but then we do not know how long it is going to last. The noble Lord, Lord King, also talked about defence being the number one priority, yet we have had five defence Secretaries in five years. I am sorry to say that under this Government, we have had two in just over two years. You cannot say that you are taking defence seriously if you do that. It is one of the most important jobs in government. Cutting is easy, but training up troops again is difficult. I have full respect for the Territorial Army, but should we rely on it? The Territorial Army should be there as a support, not as something to be relied on. We have to rely on our main Armed Forces for the security of this nation.

Let us take a look at international comparisons just within NATO. I am using the 2010 figures, from before the cuts. In 2010, France had 234,000 service people, while Germany had 246,000. We had 198,000, while the Italians had 193,000. Soon the Italians will have more service people than us. The Americans have 1.4 million service people, and we are never going to compete with them. I think that we are cutting too much and that is not right for the safety of this country.

I am going to conclude by quoting from a poem sent by my mother’s cousin in honour of my father. There is no name for the author, so I shall just quote an extract from it. It is called “The Final Inspection”:

“The soldier stood and faced God,

which must always come to pass.

He hoped his shoes were shining,

Just as brightly as his brass.

The soldier squared his shoulders and said,

I’ve had to work most Sundays,

and at times my talk was tough.

And sometimes I’ve been violent,

Because the world is awfully rough.

And I never passed a cry for help,

Though at times I shook with fear.

And sometimes, God, forgive me,

I’ve wept unmanly tears.

If you’ve a place for me here, Lord,

It needn’t be so grand.

I never expected or had too much,

But if you don’t, I’ll understand.

There was a silence all around the throne,

Where the saints had often trod.

As the soldier waited quietly,

For the judgment of his God.

‘Step forward now, you soldier,

You’ve borne your burdens well.

Walk peacefully on Heaven’s streets,

You’ve done your time in Hell’.”

We can never thank our troops enough for their service and sacrifice or show them enough gratitude for what they do for us every day. All we can say is thank you, thank you, thank you.

Defence Transformation

Lord Bilimoria Excerpts

Monday 18th July 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, I am very grateful to my noble friend for his support. Service personnel, the Veterans Agency and the single services are working together to simplify their business processes and ensure that their advice and guidance help to improve transfer between commitments; that is, to make it easier for transfer between the regulars and the reserves. A service-terms and conditions-of-service subject-matter expert has been appointed for each service to advise and educate those involved. Work continues to look at ways of streamlining the processes. My noble friend makes a very important point: we want to get as many former regulars into the reserves as possible.

[Lord Bilimoria]

My Lords, the Minister has outlined some very welcome news about the reserves in particular and the increase in spending by 1 per cent in real terms. When I speak to senior people in government, the answer to my first question about defence is, “There’s no money”. When I speak to senior service officers, they talk about “mitigating” and “removing capability”. This Statement shows that the Government are willing to listen. With Libya, we have seen that we could have done with an aircraft carrier, that we could have done with Harriers and that we could have done with the Nimrod, yet the Nimrod was just dismantled. Was it really worth doing that? Was it not short-sighted? What if something happens in the Falklands? What about our nuclear submarines having AWACS cover? Have we not learnt? Have we been penny-wise and pound-foolish? Have we put means before ends?

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Lord for his support. We inherited a very difficult situation; it was not perfect. We tried to do the very best we could under the circumstances. I did not feel comfortable with a lot of the cuts, but under the financial circumstances, we had no alternative.

Armed Forces Bill

Lord Bilimoria Excerpts

Wednesday 6th July 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bilimoria]

My Lords, let us imagine a dream scenario; one in which the public are 100 per cent behind the Armed Forces, combined with a public who are 100 per cent behind the Government, who themselves are 100 per cent behind the Armed Forces and finally, a public who are 100 per cent behind the way in which the Government deploy the Armed Forces. In Iraq in 2003 the public may have been 100 per cent behind the Armed Forces, but they certainly were not 100 per cent behind the deployment. This would apply equally to Afghanistan—sadly, it has been 10 years and we are still there. There are announcements of troop withdrawals and senior people have been saying that the timings of those withdrawals are linked to political timings here and in the United States.

The military covenant is a two-sided coin: the Armed Forces are unquestionably willing to make the ultimate sacrifice, whether or not they agree with where and why they are deployed. We know that they are doing this time after time and day after day. The amazing esprit de corps present in the Armed Forces is something that every business in this country could learn from. It is this spirit that inspires such incredible loyalty, commitment, and sacrifice; a spirit that is upheld unilaterally, a spirit that we, as a nation, are always grateful for. To be accused of taking the Armed Forces’ side of the military covenant for granted is an awful thing, and yet the sacrifices are made time and again by our Armed Forces without question.

My late father, Lieutenant-General Faridoon Bilimoria, was commissioned into the Gurkhas, commanded his Gurkha battalion in war, was colonel of his regiment, the 5th Gurkhas and was president of the Gurkha Brigade in India—the Gurkhas were his life. I will never forget that whenever my father asked one of his Gurkha soldiers to do something, the answer that came back from Gurkha soldiers was not, “I will try”, or, “I will do my best”, it was always two words, “Honcha hazoor”. Translated, that is, “It will be done, sir”. No ifs, no buts: it will be done. That is the spirit of the Armed Forces.

To continue with my dream scenario, I see fully financed Armed Forces with the best and most appropriate equipment for known and unknown requirements. A stark example of our falling short is the SDSR being rushed through in three months when it took a year last time; an SDSR that, many say, looked at the means and not the ends; an SDSR that, in my view, has clearly not thought through Britain’s foreign policy strategy and defence strategy.

As a country, we want to intervene when we are needed. Nobody predicted the Arab spring even as we in this House were debating the SDSR last autumn. We were not prepared and now we are in a ridiculous situation, with no aircraft carriers and no Harriers, conducting our Libya operation with Tornados from Italy and Typhoons from Britain. We do not have the Nimrod AWACS cover that is desperately needed. We have been caught off guard.

I am delighted that the military covenant is being included for the first time in an Armed Forces Bill. This is wonderful news. I believe that it is very important to have a report on the state of the military covenant every year and I believe that to have the covenant written into law would lead to incredibly complex circumstances with endless court cases and laws which would be very difficult to apply in the conditions in which the Armed Forces operate. Could we not, though, come up with a better name than the external reference group, or the covenant reference group? The covenant is too precious to be referred to thus: it is at the heart of the Bill, so, please, may I ask the Government to change the name?

Constant scrutiny of whether the military covenant is being honoured is needed and we often fall short. What about accommodation? I hope that it is reported very specifically that we are still falling far short of the mark, particularly when it comes to the Army. Are we going to do our best to attract the brightest and the best? Will the Government commit to maintaining the boarding school scheme? Where healthcare is concerned, I know we have a high-quality unit in Birmingham and we have Headley Court, but is there adequate priority for all our serving officers, veterans and their families? My father passed away in a military hospital. We do not have those any more, but India does. My mother will benefit from military care for the rest of her life.

There is no question that our Armed Forces, particularly at the low end, do not get paid enough to justify the work and sacrifice they are willing to make. Will the Government address this? This is very much part of the covenant.

Most importantly, the military covenant is about trust and confidence: trust that the Government will always put the defence of the realm first, as its top priority, and trust that they will never let our brave troops down in any aspect. We know that we have the trust and the faith of our troops: we know that they hold their side of the bargain, in spite of breaches, I believe, in our side of the covenant over many years, but our troops need the confidence that they will always have the support of the people, that they will always feel they are fighting for a cause that is appreciated.

I have another word: morale. That is the key word that esprit de corps is linked to. It will exist only if there is an alignment between public backing of the Government’s decisions, financial support in welfare and equipment and the treatment of our troops and their families, as the noble Lord, Lord Thomas, said. This is before, during and after their deployment in conflict zones. If there is no alignment, we put the covenant at risk, and we have been pushing the boundaries of this alignment for years. Regardless of technology, robot warfare and drones, there will always be a bare minimum number of troops needed. No amount of technology can make up for feet on the ground, and morale is being affected by the thousands of our service personnel being cut in each of the services today. How can anyone serving feel secure with all these cuts around them every day? How can there be good morale? It takes the stroke of a pen to cut thousands of troops. It takes years to train them and to rebuild those numbers should we ever require them. We are being so short-sighted here, quite apart from the constant pipeline that needs to be filled, even with the cuts. We need to attract the best quality recruits possible to what they see as a secure career.

I remember when my father was General Officer Commanding-in-Chief of the Central Indian Amy with 350,000 troops under his command over an area several times the size of Britain. Whenever I visited him I saw that everyone had a smile and I said, “Dad, what’s the secret of this?” He said, “The secret, my son, is that it is no good just to have an efficient army; you need to have a happy and efficient army”. That is how important morale is.

Our defence spending is now half, as a percentage of GDP, what it was 25 years ago. We must ask ourselves, are we providing enough support? The service chiefs have been speaking out individually about the lack of resources. Historically, this is highly unusual. Just imagine the lengths to which these individuals have been pushed in order to feel the need to speak out. The Prime Minister’s response to the service chiefs was, “You do the fighting, I’ll do the talking”. Everyone I have spoken to thought these words were unwise and insensitive. This Government have been accused of being a Government of U-turns. I would prefer to think of them as a Government who are willing to listen, to analyse different views and not simply bulldoze through policy, and to change plans if necessary. The Minister holds regular meetings to listen, which I genuinely appreciate. I know that the Prime Minister’s heart is in the right place when it comes to the Armed Forces, but when he says that, for the Armed Forces, he will do the talking, is he walking the talk?

To conclude, we may be a tiny nation, but we are still one of the seven largest economies in the world. We still have one of highest defence budgets, in absolute terms, in the world, despite the current cuts. We have influence and the ability to intervene when we require it and feel it is necessary. Our first line of response should always be soft power, but that soft power is hopeless without the hard power if we want to maintain the capability to defend our realm and to intervene where there is little or no choice and where we feel we need to.

Libya has provided us with a harsh warning. If we are to be ready for the unexpected, then the military covenant must be implemented in every way. Then, and only then, will it be a true covenant, a true two-sided coin based on mutual trust and confidence. Then my dream scenario will become reality and, where the military covenant is concerned, we will truly be able to walk the talk.

Great War: Centenary Commemoration

Lord Bilimoria Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd March 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, I understand that the Imperial War Museum is prepared to lead the national commemoration of the centenary and has already appointed a programme manager. We are keen to work with it to develop a co-ordinated approach. It is hugely important that we continue to remember the sacrifices made in the Great War. I agree with my noble friend that our children, and their children, need to be taught how the freedoms they take for granted were won, and at such heavy cost. The Government commend any initiative to maintain a memorial that honoured those who made the ultimate sacrifice for this country.

[Lord Bilimoria]

My Lords, for six years I chaired the commemoration committee for the memorial gates on Constitution Hill that are in memory of the 5 million volunteers from the Indian sub-continent, Africa and the Caribbean who served in the First and Second World Wars. More than 130,000 gave their lives and 42 were awarded the Victoria Cross. In the First World War alone, more than 1 million of those volunteers were Indian. Will the Minister reassure us that the Government will ensure that the service of those individuals and their sacrifice will be acknowledged during the commemorations from 2014 onwards?

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, of course I can give the noble Lord that assurance. I was very honoured to lay a wreath at the gate about 10 days ago in memory of all those brave people who gave their lives in the First and Second World Wars.

Defence: Military Covenant

Lord Bilimoria Excerpts

Thursday 27th January 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bilimoria]

My Lords, when he was Leader of the Opposition, the Prime Minister David Cameron made this assertion:

“Everyone should know what an enormous priority the Conservative Party attaches to our Armed Forces and to keeping Britain safe, and we will always make the spending necessary to deliver that”.

I thank the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Wakefield for initiating this crucial debate at this time.

All jobs are important, but the military are willing to make the ultimate sacrifice, so they are always a special case. There has to be a special arrangement to compensate for that sacrifice. I always thought that the special arrangement ought to be delivered through government. I always thought that it was through government that the gratitude of the people could be expressed, and servicemen and their families looked after and remunerated well, and their equipment, clothes, weaponry, accommodation at home and abroad and trauma care supplied and subsidised at the best possible level by a nation that is committed for a lifetime. This is where we as a country have gone down a slippery slope. In India, my father was General Officer Commanding-in-Chief, Central Army Command. There I know a soldier’s family is cared for for life, well after the death of the serviceman, as my grandmother and my mother have experienced. There is a commitment, a strong bond, that holds the soldier to his country, and the soldier’s family is born into the military family, as I was. This trust and care encourages camaraderie, morale and esprit de corps, which you cannot buy.

The previous Government got the balance between the public and private sectors completely wrong. I have said this before a number of times. Public spending went up to nearly 50 per cent of GDP when it should be nearly 40 per cent. As for the Armed Forces, we have got it the wrong way round. Public pay is not high enough, and we are making further cuts, as we have heard. Cuts worth £250 million are being made to servicemen’s allowances. Surely these are the people who should suffer last at a time of economic austerity, given what they are sacrificing. We must view the NATO level of 2 per cent of GDP on defence expenditure as a base, not a ceiling. While defence expenditure is set to go up over the spending review period in cash terms, as a percentage of GDP it is actually going to go down. Over the past three decades, our defence expenditure as a percentage of GDP has halved from 5 per cent. In 2009, it was 2.5 per cent. We are at war at the moment and, if you do the sums, you could argue that we are already at 1.5 per cent of GDP.

Our Armed Forces are spread too thinly. The SDSR is all about means, it is not about ends. We have aircraft carriers without aircraft and nuclear submarines without AWACS, and I fear that that is where the covenant is heading. It is now written in law for the first time in the Armed Forces Bill, but there is little action to justify those words. I just heard first hand a story from my son at boarding school. His friend’s uncle is a commanding officer and has recently had to use his own money to buy clothing and boots for his troops. Are we really stooping to this level? This parsimony reaches well beyond equipment. I am sure that most of us remember that in June 2008 the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Dannatt, who is in his place, pointed out that the starting salary of a new recruit was, on average, £16,000 compared, at that time, with the basic salary of a traffic warden of over £20,000. The pay scale has risen, but in line with inflation. It has not risen in line with the level of sacrifice that these men and women are making.

This SDSR has been drafted in wartime. We have to keep in mind the future. People’s memories can be short, especially when we enter a peacetime period. Our Armed Forces need to know that the covenant will be honoured in peace and in war. To protect the needs and interests of our Armed Forces, including our reserve forces, at home and abroad is not a choice the Government must make. It is compulsory. It is required because the Government are not just making good on their own commitment, they are holding true to the promise of the people. I do not think that any of us can question the strength and emotion of the people of this country. We see it expressed time and again. Just look at the support garnered through charities and the private sector. This is the big society at work. We have Help the Heroes, the Army Benevolent Fund, the Soldiers’ Charity and the Royal British Legion. I could go on.

It is very good to hear that the Government plan to start to right the discrepancy between compensation for physical injuries and for mental illnesses. For too long, the mental stresses and strains of our servicemen have had to be endured. They have not been recognised and have been undercompensated. Just this month, a professor at the Department of Psychology, Harvard University, told me the harrowing fact that in January 2009, for example, more United States soldiers committed suicide after returning from the battlefield than were killed in combat in Iraq and Afghanistan combined.

It is the people’s promise to repay the tremendous debt of gratitude that this nation owes to its Armed Forces. We know that soldiers attempt to fulfil their duties, whatever the circumstances; it is the commitment that they have made. But soldiers’ confidence and morale reaches much higher levels when they know that they have the support of the people back home, and the trust and support of the Government. They must know that the country can trust that the Government will take care of them while they are fighting, that they will take care of their families, that that is a priority, and that they will always show that commitment.

How can they feel that it is a priority when they see the way in which so many veterans are treated and some of the appalling accommodation that is available during peacetime and wartime? How can they feel that it is a priority when they are worried about the well-being of their families? In India, after my father died, my mother was, and still is, given the utmost level of care, affection and respect by the Indian Army. It is a lifetime commitment. We need to guarantee that veterans never feel as though their sacrifices have been forgotten.

The noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, suggested that we should have an independent commissioner. I believe that we should have an independent veterans’ commission. A veterans' commissioner would co-ordinate outside the MoD and look at pensions, social security, prisons, health and charities to ensure that our veterans are protected and cared for because of the incredible contribution that they have made. There needs to be a balance between the MoD and the Armed Forces. The NHS has scared me greatly because doctors and nurses are often overshadowed by NHS managerial staff. In the MoD and the Armed Forces, is the tail wagging the dog?

In conclusion, the services are called the services because they serve our country. The right reverend Prelate spoke about leadership. Last week, this was explained to me by Professor Ranjay Gulati at Harvard Business School as a tripos: logos—the knowledge and experience needed to garner trust and respect from those who follow you; pathos—the emotional intelligence and understanding needed to form bonds with those who follow you; and ethos—the possession and adherence to a set of moral and ethical values that are important to those who follow you. The Armed Forces epitomise service leadership.

At Sandhurst, where my grandfather was commissioned, the motto was “Serve to Lead”. At the Indian Military Academy, where my father was commissioned, the motto was:

“The safety, honour and welfare of your country, come first, always and every time. The honour, welfare and comfort of the men you command comes next. Your own ease, comfort and safety comes last, always and every time”.

The Army is keeping its side of the covenant. I know that the Minister believes in the covenant. Unfortunately, the Government do not, and we as a nation should be ashamed of this.

Strategic Defence and Security Review

Lord Bilimoria Excerpts

Friday 12th November 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bilimoria]

My Lords, in June this year, General Patraeus spoke to us in Parliament at the invitation of the Henry Jackson Society. At the time, he was the US Central Army Commander. My father, the late Lieutenant-General Faridoon Bilimoria, was Commander-in-Chief of Central Army Command, with 350,000 troops under his command. When I asked General Petraeus about winning the hearts and minds of the people of Afghanistan, his explanation was that to do that, you have to be talking from a position of strength—in other words, hard power enables soft power. The two are not opposites but actually two sides of the same coin.

We know that Britain is no longer the biggest empire the world has ever known but, whichever way you look at it, we are a powerful force in this world. We may not be a superpower, but we are one of the six largest economies in the world. As my noble friend Lord Hannay said yesterday, Britain punches above its weight. When it comes to defence spending, we have the third highest military expenditure in the world, after the United States and China. How can we be termed a medium-ranking power? By any reckoning, we are a power to be reckoned with. Humility, self-effacement and understatement may be our hallmarks, but let us get real; with all our problems we are still very much a force of influence in this world.

The Government’s strategic defence and security review is an impressive document that attempts comprehensively to address all the aspects of the defence of our realm. However, there is criticism, as we have heard from the noble Lords, Lord Rosser and Lord Lee, that it has been rushed through in five months when the previous review took a year. Would the Minister agree that this has been the case?

We understand the nation’s scale of debt and deficit and the Government’s desire to address it. I am really relieved that defence expenditure will not be cut but will actually go up in cash terms; however, as a percentage of GDP, it will go down. Over the past three decades, our defence expenditure as a percentage of GDP has halved. At the time of the Falklands war, it was 5 per cent of GDP; in 2009 it was 2.5 per cent of GDP; now we are talking about getting to the NATO threshold of 2 per cent. At the time of the Falklands War there was a cold war, and let us not forget that in those days, Russia was spending 16 per cent of its GDP on defence. We must not forget that in the past two decades we have had the first Gulf War, Bosnia, Kosovo, Sierra Leone, Afghanistan and Iraq. In all that time our Armed Forces have been shrinking and shrinking. There are now 250,000 personnel, including our reserve voluntary forces. Our Armed Forces are stretched to the limit.

When it comes to United Nations peacekeeping forces—a real force for good, with which my father served with his Gurkha battalion as part of the UN forces in the Congo in the 1960s—Britain is the third highest contributor financially, but what are we doing to contribute personnel on the ground? No amount of technology can replace men and women on the ground. My father commanded a mountain division on the Chinese border, where India had serious defences in place after the Chinese war in 1962, which took India completely by surprise. He said that you could defend positions in mountainous terrain with a ratio of one defender to 10 attackers. But in the engagements in which the British Armed Forces have been involved over the past two decades, we have invariably been attacking, not defending. There comes a stage when the size of your Armed Forces does not have the de minimis critical mass. The Army is shrinking to below 100,000 personnel. That will be smaller than the strength of the corps that my father commanded in the Punjab.

We know that we can never compete with the giants; China has 2.2 million, the United States has 1.5 million and India has 1.3 million. These armies will be the largest in the world for years to come, but the Government can cut the numbers of our troops with one stroke of a pen. It is harsh and it is swift, but rebuilding these numbers cannot be done overnight. It takes years to train our service personnel, who are considered the best of the best in their professionalism, capabilities and expertise. There is no short cut to achieving this excellence, and I dread to think of the awful possibility of being caught short in the future, desperately needing trained service professionals when realistically it would take years for us to rebuild that capability. Surely the Government are concerned about the numbers shrinking too low. However, I do not think that any of us would argue about cutting the size of the defence ministry when we know there have been huge inefficiencies. I found it quite shocking when I did my research that the ratio of active troops to civil servants in the Ministry of Defence is 2:1. All the other 27 western alliance countries employ proportionately fewer civil servants in their defence ministries: France has five troops per civil servant, while in Spain the ratio is 8:1.

Our brave troops are making the ultimate sacrifice. The whole nation is proud of and grateful to them, but do we show our gratitude enough? As my friend General Sir Richard Dannatt, whom I admire greatly and who had the guts to stick up for his troops, said two years ago, one of the most cited reasons given by the 20,000 personnel who left the forces in 2007 was poor salary. He pointed out that the lowest paid soldiers at that time were on a mere £12,500, less than a traffic warden on a basic salary of £17,000. On top of this, soldiers' accommodation has also been described as “appalling”. Has the SDSR addressed these concerns enough?

I am relieved that the SDSR has rightly recognised the importance of our nuclear deterrent and will not compromise on this in the long run. On the other hand, the scrapping of the Harriers, as we have heard from the noble Lord, Lord Lee, and leaving our aircraft carriers without aircraft, seems completely illogical. Surely they could have been phased out once our new aircraft were operational. This leaves a big hole in our capability.

I am delighted that the Eurofighter Typhoon is going to play a major role in the future. I have witnessed at first hand the amazing capabilities of this aircraft, and I hope that the Indian air force will choose to procure the Typhoons to add to their existing range of British aircraft, including the Hawk Advanced Jet Trainer, which is considered one of the best training aircraft in the world.

The recently signed defence collaboration with France, which has been spoken about, was not covered in the review but shows how quickly things can move, and we must seize these opportunities. However, the review does not do enough justice to the significant bridges we have built through our staff college and the Royal College of Defence Studies, international officers coming here and officers going aboard to places such as the National Defence College and the Defence Services Staff College in Wellington, India, where my father was commandant. There is no better person to speak about this than our very own Yeoman Usher, Lieutenant Colonel Ted Lloyd-Jukes, who, as a major, attended the staff college in Wellington when my father was commandant. On this note, does the review place enough emphasis on the potential for closer collaboration with other countries and armed forces, including joint exercises with countries such as India?

The SDSR has correctly addressed the multitude of threats facing us today, well beyond conventional warfare, but are we doing enough to support military intelligence? As the noble Lord, Lord Lee, said, after phasing out Nimrod, what are our Government’s plans for our AWAC capability? Could they clarify their plans here?

In conclusion, during the financial crisis, Her Majesty the Queen asked:

“Why did nobody notice it?”.

Similarly, nobody predicted 9/11 and nobody predicted the Falklands War; they both happened. Sadly, no one knows what is going to happen next. We have to be prepared for the unexpected.

Without doubt, the biggest factor for us is the economy at the moment, but the most important role of government is the defence of the realm, both internally through the police force and intelligence services, and externally through our Armed Forces and intelligence services. We are a tiny island, with just 1 per cent of the population of the world. Yet thanks to the hard power that having one of the most powerful defence forces in the world gives us, we have the soft power. This is so powerful because the world knows that this hard power and soft power emanate from a country that is respected for, and has fought for, freedom, fairness, justice and liberty for centuries.