Al-Sweady Inquiry Report

Debate between Lord Snape and Lord Astor of Hever

Wednesday 17th December 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, I am assured that there is now a clear policy on tactical questioning and interrogation. This policy has been in place since 2005. The policies were separated in 2010 to emphasise the distinction between the two disciplines. They were further revised in 2012 to incorporate recommendations from the Baha Mousa inquiry and have been reviewed following the Court of Appeal judgment on the Hussein case.

Obviously, as the noble Viscount said, I cannot go into details of interrogation, but again I have spoken to a large number of service men and women about this subject, which interests me a lot, and I have visited military police. I accept that we still have many lessons to learn from noble Lords with a lot of experience in this and I am always ready to hear whatever advice they may have.

[Lord Snape (Lab)]

My Lords, as, I suspect, one of the few ex-NCOs here, I feel considerably outgunned by one or two of the contributions.

[Lord Snape]

Well, like the noble Viscount, my father joined up in World War II and became an NCO. I was fortunate enough to join the Armed Forces during a period of peacetime. What I was attempting to put to the Minister was that I believe that no other army in the world could behave with the restraint shown by the British Army, particularly after incidents such as the Danny Boy incident.

As for the report’s conclusions about ill treatment, does the Minister agree that the question of inadequate food and sleep would apply to the soldiers as much as to the detainees? On the question of Public Interest Lawyers, is the Minister aware that Mr Shiner made his reputation by attacking members of the police force, largely unsuccessfully for many years, before moving on to trawling round the battlefield looking for people prepared to make allegations against the British Armed Forces?

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, I agree with what the noble Lord said about our Armed Forces. I do not think that any other army would put themselves through the inquiry that we have had since 2004. The noble Lord asked about inadequate food and whether that also applied to the soldiers. That may well have been the case. I was not aware that Mr Shiner had started his career chasing after the police. I was interested to hear that.