Armed Forces Covenant

Debate between Tom Tugendhat and Jack Lopresti

Thursday 2nd February 2017 Commons Chamber

[Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)]

I welcome the report, and I particularly welcome the work of my hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mrs Trevelyan), who has done so much for the armed forces in just a year and a half. It is extraordinary to think how much she has already achieved in such a brief period.

We have heard much about the burden of service, and I think it might be helpful for us to remind ourselves of the joy of it. The reason I joined the armed forces—it is the reason many of us joined—was that it is the most extraordinary opportunity to serve one’s country in the most dynamic and demanding environments.

I cannot express to the House the joy that I experienced when conducting fighting patrols in Afghanistan and Iraq. It might sound absurd, but actually to spend days with men—in my case it was only men—who were like-minded, focused, determined in pursuit of a goal that they knew to be right in the service of a country that they knew to be honourable, and serving alongside men we knew to have integrity: what a rare experience that was. What an experience it was not to be clouded by mortgage fears or annoyed by the words of Whips, but simply to be free to do exactly what was right.

However, the experience was also hugely demanding. We were operating in very difficult circumstances, in heat and dust, sleeping little, often in danger—at risk of either improvised explosive devices or direct action—and also working alongside people from other nations. I speak not only of the Americans with whom, obviously, we worked very closely, the Australians with whom I had the great joy of serving, or the Estonians, Danes and Czechs, all of whom were impressive and quirky in their own ways, but of Afghans and Iraqis—men of huge courage and great integrity who literally put their lives on the line for us and many of whom, sadly, did not live to tell the tale.

That experience was almost like a drug it was so powerful. It is so electric to be challenged in everything you do—physically, mentally, morally—for such a period. It is so demanding. It is exhausting and exhilarating all at the same time. That is why the covenant matters. The challenge of coming back is much greater than the challenge of simply going from an institution to a free civilian life. It is almost like kicking a habit. Living in such an environment that is so all-consuming and so demanding, but also so rewarding, gives you a purpose that very few things can match—even some of the things that we are doing now, Madam Deputy Speaker.

[Jack Lopresti]

In the light of my hon. Friend’s military service and the operational tours that he has done, may I ask whether he is comfortable with the way in which we have treated our interpreters and other locally employed civilians?

[Tom Tugendhat]

I have only a few minutes to speak, so if my hon. Friend will forgive me, I will not talk much about locally employed civilians, except to say that I am hugely pleased that this country has given refuge to a wonderful man who served as my interpreter for a brief period when I was working for the governor of Helmand. That man went through several explosions with me—literally alongside me. We managed to escape with our lives from several relatively closer calls than I think my parents would have liked to know about.

I mention my parents for a specific reason. While I was experiencing the exhilaration of combat and the joy of camaraderie, my family and my then girlfriend—my wife should not hear about that too much!—were left behind. Of course, for many of the folk I was serving with, their families were waiting anxiously, hoping that they would not get a knock on the door. That, again, is where the covenant comes in, because when my hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury (Sir Julian Brazier) is talking about accommodation models, he is talking about not only the place where people live, but a community that supports them. We must not destroy the communities that support our armed forces who serve in battle—those around Aldershot, for example—where the families live together and understand the pressures everyone is under. Accommodation is not simply about a need for a house—a set of bricks—but about a need for a family of a different sort that reinforces those families who also serve as they sit and wait.