Veterans and Service Personnel

Anne-Marie Trevelyan Excerpts

Tuesday 8th November 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Anne-Marie Trevelyan (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Stephen Doughty) on securing this debate, which is so important in this important week. It is a great opportunity to stand up and talk about our exceptional armed forces—the personnel and their families, who quietly support them all. Our forces have the best training in the world. We are renowned; other nations come to Britain to be part of what we do here.

What I find extraordinary in the work that I am doing with the Armed Forces Parliamentary Trust is the depth of patriotism in every single member of the armed forces as they put themselves in harm’s way on our behalf. Their families quietly support that wish. Members of the armed forces are very happy to go and do exciting and dangerous things too, but fundamentally there is an extraordinary patriotism and belief in our great nation. The Royal British Legion’s work, which the hon. Gentleman highlighted so well, shows a profound respect for the patriotism, effort and risk that these individuals take on our behalf.

The key point is that every member of our serving armed forces will become a veteran; that is a self-evident truth in many ways, although we do not necessarily think about it. The fact that nearly three quarters of a million members of our communities have served in the armed forces since 1991 is extraordinary. Having set up the all-party group on the armed forces covenant when I arrived in the House last year, I am a huge fan of the fact that the former Prime Minister set into law the belief that the covenant should be a total commitment for the nation as a whole to embrace, to ensure that our military family suffer no disadvantage as a result of their service to our nation.

I begin by asking about how we are doing. This is a journey; to go from a standing start to creating a legislative framework, and moving forward in supporting those serving, and their families and veterans of all ages, is a long and complex thing. I pay enormous tribute to the Ministry of Defence, which drove forward the challenge set by the Prime Minister to put the covenant into law. Some really interesting work has been going on over the last six years to do that.

I have RAF Boulmer and the Otterburn Ranges in my patch, so I see a lot of young men and women doing training of all sorts. One of the key challenges I have found is that our serving personnel and their families have no voice, and that is part of the contract they make when they take the Queen’s shilling and stand at the frontline on our behalf. It is so important that we in this House can be their voice, because they want to serve, and they grin and bear it as they face all sorts of things that are unimaginable to a lot of us in our daily civilian lives. We must make sure that we speak up for them in this House, so it is fantastic that this debate is taking place.

I want to mention just a couple of charities I do a lot of work with. One, which I have recently become a patron of, is called Forward Assist. It is based in Northumberland, and it is run by an amazing man called Tony Wright, who is a former Royal Marine. He explained to me how he views the journey of those who serve, and his explanation sticks in my mind—if I could do cartoons, I would turn it into one. He said that we go out and seek young men and women to become members of our armed forces—they are the sheep, and we pick the sheep from the great flock that is our nation. We then turn them into wolves; that is quite a harsh statement, but that is what we do—we take them and we train them to the nth degree to become incredibly honed fighters, able to defend us with all the tools we provide them with. They then go out and fight, and they live in teams—in packs, as wolves do—fighting for us and taking on the enemy.

However, when they leave the armed forces, what do they do? They become a veteran. What is that? What we need them to become is sheepdogs. We will never turn wolves back into sheep, but if we get things right, we might just turn them into sheepdogs. The sheepdog is one of the farmer’s most important tools and a critical part of looking after the community. The challenge we have is to ensure that, as members of our armed forces become veterans and return to civilian life, we give them the tools to become sheepdogs and to lose the wolf—to park that as part of their history—so that they can live a full life as civilians, channelling their skills in new ways, and they have such extraordinary skills.

Forward Assist, this wonderful small charity in Northumberland, has developed a programme that ensures that, as these people—quite a lot of them are young men and women—come out, they maintain team activities. One of the key problems is that they live in teams—that is how they fight as military personnel—and they never work alone. However, they then come away from that environment, and ensuring that they maintain those relationships restores their confidence as they get to grips with civilian life.

We have to help veterans understand what their skills are. They have a very diffident view of the extraordinary talents they are given as they are trained to the nth degree, and they need to understand what those can be worth in the civilian world. So many do not value themselves, and we clearly have to challenge that. We have to ensure that we support the charities and organisations that help to empower these men and women to get into the modern workplace.

We also have to help veterans to get to grips with what one might call day-to-day life challenges. When people who have lived in an institutional framework as part of the armed forces, and who have been focused entirely on the defence of the realm, come back, they have to deal with a lot of stuff that they have not dealt with during that time. Those are critical things, which so many of our charities help these people to do, and we need to make sure that charities are able to do that.

Another charity that is a wonderful representation of how those who have served bring their talents to our communities is a small charity called Challenger Troop, which is run by Simon Dean. His team of veterans take the military ethos of discipline, self-belief, personal motivation and challenge and go into deprived communities. They take groups of children out into the big outdoors. Many of these children have never been beyond their small community, and he empowers them to discover who they can be. He tests them and pushes them to their limits, and that revolutionises the vision they have of what the world might offer them. It is extraordinary to watch the charity’s staff do that and to hear how they talk about the challenge of helping those in our communities who have probably had little, if any, contact with the military to discover just how far they can go and to do what they thought they could not do. It is extraordinary to watch what the Royal Marines would call “commando morale”, when at the point when someone thinks they cannot go any further, they keep going and find that they can do something extraordinary. That has been brought to our most deprived communities and children who otherwise would not have such opportunities.

A very small charity called PTSD Resolution does, in a baby way, what Combat Stress does, working individually with those who need psychological support to bring them through what can be a very traumatic side-effect of having dealt with these incredibly stressful environments, and quietly making sure that they can be supported. They may hold down really good jobs, but sometimes it becomes too hard. We have seen that this weekend with fireworks, which can often trigger PTSD-recurrent behaviour. It is extraordinary to know that there are people out there who understand and quietly provide that support, so that we ensure that the wolves can be sheepdogs, doing amazing jobs while sometimes feeling that parts of them have been damaged by their service.

As the hon. Member for Cardiff South and Penarth said, the big charities do extraordinary work across the board. They have been in the system for 100 years, looking after veterans from 1918 right through to now. We all support them at this time of year, and it is important that we make sure that people support them all year round.

[Carol Monaghan (Glasgow North West) (SNP)]

The hon. Lady is telling us about lots of laudable charities that are doing excellent work with veterans, but does she agree that the state has a role in supporting them fully rather than leaving it entirely to the charity sector?

[Mrs Trevelyan]

The hon. Lady makes an absolutely critical point. This is about the great question of what the covenant might become—how, as a nation, as a Government, and as Departments we might consider the best way to take it right through our nation’s consciousness, so that we not only feel that it is a good thing but it becomes a reality across the board. Then, wherever serving personnel who come back into civilian life and their families live, the communities they return to understand, respect and support them, and can value and make best use of the extraordinary talents that they have brought back.

[Stephen Doughty]

The hon. Lady is making some important points. Does she agree that one of the ways in which the Government could do more would be in ensuring the consistency of data on veterans? Many of us have been campaigning for the “Count them in” campaign to ensure that there is a question on the census, but there are also issues about what is included on the service leavers form—for example, it has signposts to only two charities and not to others. There are things we could be doing a lot better to understand who needs our support, where they are, and how we can get to them.

[Mrs Trevelyan]

I absolutely agree. As the hon. Gentleman knows, we are working hard to see whether we can get the Cabinet Office to ensure that we have the census marker, because that will give us a starting point from which we can tackle the question of how big our military family is and how we are making sure that we look after them.

We all want our armed forces to be there when we need them, but in—thank goodness—times of peace here at home, we do not think that much about them, as the statistics prove, horribly and truly. In reality, though, our armed forces are not sitting about in barracks with nothing to do, or on the dockside twiddling their thumbs. Our Navy is absolutely at full stretch across the oceans and under our seas, our Air Force is fully engaged in the fight against Daesh in Iraq and Syria, and our Army is going through an extensive re-basing programme as troops return from Germany and we prepare for ongoing NATO operations in the face of uncertain times ahead.

I have serious concerns about the impact of the current levels of undermanning on families and on the retention of our highly trained personnel whom we cannot easily replace once lost. I worry that we are putting too great a strain on the offer to our serving personnel. As one recent veteran said to me only last week, “Redundancies, pay restraint, pensions slashed, new pay model, CAAS, FAM, and now future base closures. What a way to boost morale!” With the impact on the next generation of personnel as we recruit and want to retain them, it is critical that we understand what it looks like from the inside and how we can support those who are serving now, because they will be our future veterans and we need to make sure that we surround them with the right package to ensure that they will be able to serve for as long as they choose and we can hope to keep them.

[Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Stephen Doughty) on securing the debate. Along with the new generation of service personnel, there will be a new generation of children, young people and young carers of veterans who are profoundly impacted by pre-deployment, deployment and reintegration. Does the hon. Lady agree that in existing policy documents, particularly around health and social care, we need to revisit the idea of the broader family supporting the veteran back into community and civilian life?

[Mrs Trevelyan]

I agree. It is absolutely critical that we look at a whole-family approach to military family support, and there is a lot more work to do. We have a small charity in Northumberland that supports the children of military family carers. The charity is working, with some support from the Department, on how we can understand that better and provide support in a more holistic way, with the hope of achieving a more constructive outcome.

Although there was much in the statement yesterday from the Secretary of State about better use of MOD estate assets and the technical side of things, we must actively start to value in a financial way—I speak as a chartered accountant, and I apologise if that lowers the tone—our armed forces personnel. They are our human capital. Our armed forces are often thought of as big tanks, shiny ships and fast jets, but none of that works without the humans making it work. Human capital is a critical military asset. People are vital to the whole process, and without them we have no armed forces. We do not value our military personnel as an asset. They are listed in MOD accounts as an overhead, and that fundamental mindset is a huge challenge. I challenge the Department regularly, as the Minister knows, to think differently. To assess, for instance, retention risk—how to keep our finest when we really need them—we need to look holistically across the MOD, on a value-for-money basis, at how we value those individuals.

The Minister is a great advocate of our personnel and veterans at a personal level, but I urge him to encourage the Department to adopt a more holistic perspective on how we invest in our human capital: the men and women of our Army, our Navy, our Air Force and our Royal Marines. Those people have spouses and children, without whose silent commitment and loyalty to our nation’s protection we would not have the world-class armed forces that we are all so proud of and grateful for.

I had the unexpected privilege of attending the submariners’ remembrance parade last Sunday. I still do not know why it happens the weekend before Remembrance Day, rather than on the main weekend; that must be one of the mysteries of submariners. It was an extraordinary privilege to meet an enormous number of men who had served—they were all men, although there are a few women who are serving now—in what is known as the silent service. That remarkable group of people, with whom I have previously had very little to do, have spent decades under our seas quietly and continuously looking after us, protecting us and keeping an eye on our enemies. They continue to do so day in, day out.

It is so important that the nation understands that this is a continuum. People are putting their lives on the line for us every day and every night. People such as the Northumberland Fusiliers who died in the third-to-last week of the war in 1918, for whom I am going to lay a wreath this Friday in Tezze in northern Italy, and William Chapman, whose grandson still lives in Berwick-upon-Tweed and has asked me to lay a special wreath for his family, were extraordinary men whom we must always remember. But today there are people serving across the globe—British men and women who are putting their lives on the line, and whose families are quietly waiting at home, supporting them. As we remember those who serve today and those who have gone before, we must never forget.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs Trevelyan]

Just for clarity, my hon. Friend and I had the great honour of sharing a tent in minus 23°C conditions 3° north of the Arctic circle with a group of 19-year-old Royal Marines—pretty much the same age as my son. They were extraordinarily gentlemanly and none of them commented on whether my hon. Friend or I snored.

[Mr Speaker]

It is always useful to have a bit of additional information.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mark Lancaster]

Forgive me, but my comments were to ask for evidence. If that is the evidence the hon. Lady is providing, I look forward to seeing it, but of course there are many sources of evidence. I am concerned about the general point: we need to be careful in the House not to paint a particular picture of our veterans as a cohort in our society. There have been some disturbing newspaper articles recently suggesting that employers should not be employing veterans. We should be careful in the House not to fall into a trap—I would not dream of accusing the hon. Lady of doing so—but rather to spend as much time as possible talking up our veterans community and dispelling some of the myths. Otherwise, we could fall into an awful trap.

Questions were raised earlier about the ability to track our veterans. The health service might be one area where we have that opportunity. Work is ongoing to ensure that the electronic record system used in defence medical services matches that used in the national health service and—I would imagine—NHS Health Scotland as well, so that there can be a seamless transition of our service personnel’s records once they move out of the armed forces. Effectively having a marker on those records might be one way to begin that process of helping to track veterans.

On housing, the Department for Communities and Local Government has extended the period within which ex-service personnel and surviving partners are given priority for Government-funded shared ownership schemes from 12 to 24 months after service, and we have allocated £40 million of LIBOR funding to projects that provide veterans’ accommodation. When it comes to both health and housing, we are using the Cabinet Office-chaired covenant reference group to link up health, DCLG, the local government authorities and the devolved Administrations, so that covenant principles, particularly with regards to veterans’ access to healthcare and social housing, are applied consistently and correctly across the United Kingdom. I hope that that addresses one of the questions from the hon. Member for Llanelli (Nia Griffith).

On employment, which was raised by several hon. Members, we are working with business to offer ex-service personnel job support. Our career transition partnership provides one-to-one guidance, training and employment opportunities to about 15,000 service leavers. Its success rate is significant: 85% find a job within six months of leaving the armed forces, compared to a 73% employment rate in the rest of the UK population. So our ex-service personnel are achieving a better employment rate than the average in the UK. All personnel—without exception—are eligible for this support. Furthermore, the employment support available to our service leavers through the CTP continues for two years after their date of discharge.

Separately, we are using the covenant to raise awareness of the benefits of hiring service personnel. Where else can business get highly skilled, highly motivated team players with leadership attributes tested in the most challenging of environments? Already, more than 1,200 businesses have signed the covenant and are offering veterans everything from skills training to guaranteed interviews.

We know, however, that we need to do more—we all absolutely accept that. With the end of the era of enduring campaigns and the drawdown from Germany coming to its conclusion, we can expect the numbers of veterans to increase in the short term. So we are making sure support is in place by using £2 million from our annual £10 million covenant fund to set up the veterans gateway. This will be a single point of contact, open 24 hours a day, that can give veterans the advice they need, wherever they are located.

Finally, we are keen to learn more about all those veterans who fail to make a smooth transition to civilian life. We need to know who they are, so that we can help them. As the Royal British Legion points out in its “Count them in” campaign, and as my hon. Friend the Member for Torbay said, after the 2011 census, we knew more about the Jedi population of the UK—or indeed about the fact that Rushmore in Hampshire has the highest concentration of Buddhists—than about those who have served in our armed forces. That is ridiculous, but true. So I am working closely with the Office for National Statistics and the chief statistician to include a question on veterans in the national census. As I mentioned earlier, we do not have the power to force Mr Pullinger to do that, but I hope that he is listening to this debate and gets the very clear message that it is this House’s will that that question be included on the next census.

[Mrs Trevelyan]

Does the Minister agree that it is not only the veterans that we need to identify, but their direct families as well? The covenant is very clear that it supports the families against disadvantage and that it is important to identify the spouses and the children who will carry forward that military family—they need to be identified forever.

[Mark Lancaster]

My hon. Friend makes a powerful and reasonable point, and I will ensure that it is conveyed. The more we do to show that veterans are well looked after, the more we will encourage a future generation of soldiers, sailors and airmen and women to come through our doors.

That brings me to the second element of this debate. In the years to come, our armed forces will face an increasing challenge to recruit the people in the face of increased competition from companies that offer more money and more flexible ways of working.

That is why we are determined to transform the MOD into a modern force that does not provide its people only with modern equipment, but with better accommodation, better terms and conditions and even greater flexibility. We fully recognise that the current offer that we make to our servicemen and women is not keeping pace with modern needs, which is why we are committed to changing and improving it better to reflect the realities of today’s society.