Iran: Nuclear Deal

Debate between Lord Hammond of Runnymede and Lord Garnier

Wednesday 15th July 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hammond]

I think that it would be a mistake to view the agreement simply in terms of opportunities for foreign powers to lecture Iran about its human rights record. The big prize here is that the agreement takes the brakes off Iranian society. It allows more interaction with the rest of the world through trade, investment, travel and study, and it changes the way in which Iranian society works from the inside. We will continue to promote our views on human rights to the Iranian Government, but the message will be much more powerful if Iran starts to receive it through internal change.

[Sir Edward Garnier (Harborough) (Con)]

I believe that a very large proportion of the population of Iran is under 30 years old. To develop long-term good relations with the country following the agreement, will my right hon. Friend ensure that we, like the Americans, allow Iranian students to come to our universities, study and become friends with us? Then future Presidents might go not just to Glasgow Caledonian University, but to some other very good universities here as well.

[Mr Hammond]

My right hon. and learned Friend is absolutely right: Iran is a young country. I believe that 70% of the population is under the age of 35. Most of those people are desperate to normalise their lives and establish contact with the outside world, and we should encourage that. The United Kingdom’s higher education sector is open to those who wish to come here and study, and we should extend that invitation to Iranians as our relations with Iran also normalise.

The Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Bournemouth East (Mr Ellwood), has just reminded me that there is a significant Iranian diaspora in the United Kingdom, consisting in many cases of people with high levels of skill who left Iran after the revolution in 1979. Judging by the experience of many other countries that have opened up—for example, countries in eastern Europe—there will be great benefits for Iran if it can lure some of those people to go back over the coming years.

Afghanistan

Debate between Lord Hammond of Runnymede and Lord Garnier

Monday 10th February 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hammond]

There are 30 women per training cohort. I will need to check whether there are five cohorts in a year—if there are, the target is still in place. I will do so and write to the hon. Lady.

[Sir Edward Garnier (Harborough) (Con)]

Last Saturday, I went to the squadron of the Leicestershire and Derbyshire Yeomanry, part of the Royal Yeomanry based in my constituency in South Wigston, where I presented campaign medals to three members of the reserve forces, two of whom had recently come back from Afghanistan where they had been serving in active roles. One of them, Trooper Edwards, was a driver of a Warthog vehicle stationed with the Royal Tank Regiment. The Secretary of State mentioned repatriated equipment. Will some of it be repatriated for use by the reserve forces, who have demonstrated their ability to take their role alongside the regular forces, but who need the equipment to train so that they can be more effectively deployed with it?

[Mr Hammond]

There are two separate points here. First, the equipment that was bought for Afghanistan through urgent operational requirements, especially armoured vehicles, represents a significant investment and we are repatriating it into core. All armoured vehicles except those that are damaged beyond economic repair will be returned to the UK and brought back into the core equipment fleet.

On the question of reserves, we have made a commitment that the reserves will increasingly in the future train on and use the same equipment as the regular forces. We have already started to deliver on that commitment by rolling out new deliveries of equipment to reserve units across the country. The pool of equipment will be joint, for the use of the integrated force—regulars and reserves.

Defence Reform Bill

Debate between Lord Hammond of Runnymede and Lord Garnier

Wednesday 20th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Sir Edward Garnier (Harborough) (Con)]

I defer to the military knowledge and experience of those who have spoken before me. The House has had the particular advantage of hearing the remarks of my hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border (Rory Stewart) and it will now have the advantage of not hearing me repeat them.

My constituency of Harborough has a squadron of the Leicestershire and Derbyshire Yeomanry. It is suffering from poor recruitment and I have one practical solution to offer those on the Ministry of Defence Front Bench and the Secretary of State in particular. In order to avoid the attrition rate—the wastage rate—of those who express an initial interest in serving in the reserves, the Territorial Army as was, we should bring them into the units and give them weapons training much more quickly, rather than wait for them to go through medical tests and so forth. Once we have grabbed them, got their interest and introduced them to the practical, military side of the reservists and their camaraderie, we can then decide whether they are fit for the role they wish to play or whether we should deploy them in a less front-end activity. That is a simple, practical proposition and I trust it would enable the Secretary of State and his Ministers to produce the 30,000 reservists and not to lose so many on the way to achieving that number.

[Mr Philip Hammond]

I think this is the first time that I have had the pleasure of addressing the House while you are in the Chair, Madam Deputy Speaker, so I offer you my congratulations.

I congratulate all right hon. and hon. Members who have spoken this afternoon. This has been a good debate, during which many passionately held views have been expressed and much deep knowledge displayed. I thank those who served on the Public Bill Committee and scrutinised the Bill very effectively.

Most of all, I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury (Mr Brazier), who led the debate so ably on this group of new clauses and amendments. He speaks with an authority on this subject that is unquestioned throughout the House, and when he speaks on this subject, we listen. By “we”, I mean not only Members of the House, but the Government.

What my hon. Friend has said to me and the House today about the crucial importance of protecting the distinctive ethos of the reserve movement, even as we move to an integrated armed forces, is compelling. He is absolutely right that we must get right the balance between integration and protecting that distinct ethos if we are to achieve our goals.

I am happy to have made a commitment to my hon. Friend to introduce in the other place an amendment that reflects his new clause 1, which I have to say is technically imperfect, to ensure that this House has an annual opportunity to consider an independent report, produced under statute by the RFCA, not only once, as is proposed in new clause 3, but every year—not just as we roll out the programme, but thereafter—so that we can monitor not just the expansion of our reserves, but the maintenance of them in future.