Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Chris Bryant and Andrew Murrison

Monday 3rd February 2014 Commons Chamber

[Dr Murrison]

I am pleased that the hon. Gentleman is supporting that because museums large and small are extraordinarily important. As he will know, the Ministry of Defence supports the National Army Museum at one end of the scale, but he is right to say that regimental museums at the other end are also vital. I hope that the good work he has described will continue. Out of interest, I would—of course—be more than happy to meet that charity, but as he will understand, I must be cautious about providing monetary support, which is probably better sourced elsewhere.

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

Some 9% of those in our armed forces come from Wales, yet the population of Wales is only 5% of the UK population. We therefore take a strong interest in the future of our armed forces. The Minister said there will be redevelopment at St Athan. I presume that does not mean that there will be a defence training academy, but what exactly is he going to redevelop there?

[Dr Murrison]

The hon. Gentleman is right to say that Wales has provided a disproportionate part of our Army, and I pay tribute to it for that. As he will know, St Athan is of great interest to the Welsh Government, who want to develop an aerospace business park there. The MOD is working closely to reconcile our continuing MOD defence needs for that site with the need to advance the prosperity agenda and the Welsh Government’s requirement to ensure that jobs are sustained and supported there in the long term.

First World War Commemoration

Debate between Chris Bryant and Andrew Murrison

Thursday 7th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Dr Murrison]

I am absolutely delighted that the right hon. Gentleman has raised that point. As he would expect, we have spent a great deal of time in debate with Dublin on this matter. As I have been going through this work, it has been something of a revelation to me as I have understood fully the great work that Her Majesty the Queen did when she visited Dublin. Ever since then there has been a huge appetite in both countries to improve the relationship between the two countries, which has been extraordinarily uplifting. Of course the Republic of Ireland is engaged in its decade of commemoration, within which falls the centenary of the great war. I can tell the right hon. Gentleman that I have had extraordinarily positive feedback from Dublin regarding their engagement with this period of shared history and I look forward, as part of the legacy of the centenary, to moving the relationship a little further forward, with all the sensitivities that it of course contains. However, I see this very much as an opportunity and I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for raising that point.

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

Many of the Irish nationalist Members of this House fought in the war, which they never thought they would be doing, on behalf of the united Great Britain and Ireland, including, most famously perhaps, Willie Redmond. He has a shield in the House, but one Irish nationalist MP who died in active service who does not have a shield is Captain Esmonde. Will the Minister make sure that he gets one?

[Dr Murrison]

I suspect that that is a matter for Mr Speaker rather than for me, but I suspect that Mr Speaker will have noted the contribution of the hon. Gentleman. I know that the House itself is working hard to determine what it will do to mark the centenary of the great war and no doubt the hon. Gentleman will be able to reinforce his point with the appropriate authority.

Armed Forces Bill

Debate between Chris Bryant and Andrew Murrison

Monday 10th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

It is particularly appropriate that we are debating this Bill on the anniversary of the treaty of Versailles coming into operation in 1920 and the first meeting of the United Nations in London in 1946. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Milton Keynes North (Mark Lancaster). When I was a Minister, I tried to do business with him in as friendly a way as possible in relation to the armed forces and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. His comments about the reserve forces were absolutely right, because it is true to say that the operations that this nation have been involved in over the past 15 years could not have been conducted without the support of the reserve forces, many of whom have, I suspect, had to go into theatre far more often than they or their employers expected when they signed up. We therefore owe them “a debt of gratitude”; those words are often bandied around this Chamber, but he made a very fair point about the importance of the reserve forces. I know from my constituency that they are an important part of the contribution that is made.

The hon. Member for South West Wiltshire (Dr Murrison) was absolutely right to say that it would make more sense to stick with the term “military covenant”. I am often more pedantic than is good for my friendships—[Hon. Members: “Surely not”.] I thought that it was you heckling me, Mr Deputy Speaker, but as you have not had a drink yet, it probably was not. He is right to say that this phrase is now common currency and is used generally. I suppose that people who were being pedantic might say, “That merely applies to the Army”, but language changes and he is right to say that trying to reinvent a concept of an “armed forces covenant” is inappropriate. I hope that the Minister will respond accordingly when considering the way forward for this Bill.

I particularly wanted to speak in this debate because this country’s mining constituencies have produced many members of the armed forces. A large number of men and, increasingly in recent years, women have joined the Army, rather than the Navy or the Royal Air Force. When a survey was carried out in recent years of the preferred career of choice in mining constituencies or former mining constituencies, as mine must now be considered, the armed forces came out on top by far, followed by the police. I am sure that that is partly because of a tradition that there has been in many of these constituencies—there is a deep respect for the traditions of the armed forces, and people have wanted to follow in the footsteps of their fathers, grandfathers and so on—but it is also because of the economic circumstances.

At its height, a single industry in my constituency employed 130,000 men working underground, and when it disappeared and a large number of people were, in effect, left on the scrap heap politically, many of those young men felt that the only career open to them was one in the armed forces. They have managed to take a great deal of pride from such a career. They have been able to give to the armed forces and the armed forces have been able to give back. I was delighted that the Ministry of Defence decided to open a combined cadet force in Treorchy comprehensive school. In the main, cadet forces had previously been attached only to public schools—fee-paying schools—so it was a great delight to see a new one start in Treorchy a few years ago.

[Dr Murrison]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman entirely on that. What does he make of comments by the National Union of Teachers to the effect that it was wrong for the previous Government—and, presumably, now for this Government—to encourage the involvement of uniformed men and women in our armed forces in areas of deprivation, where there is high unemployment, because they may be preying on people there? I utterly refute that assertion and I hope that he does too.

[Chris Bryant]

When I have heard those accusations, as I have when political opponents in my constituency have attacked me ferociously on these issues, I have wholly deprecated them. If we examine the work that the armed forces do in schools, we find that it is not about preying on young people who, in some sense, might not have other opportunities in life. Often such work is about giving people the confidence in themselves to go on to do something that has nothing to do with the armed forces. It is about giving them a structure in life, and a sense of discipline and opportunity, which is of value to the wider community. I know that some teachers at Treorchy comprehensive were sceptical about the combined cadet force coming to the school, but since it has been in place they have been entirely supportive and have found it to be an entirely beneficial operation.

Emerging Economies

Debate between Chris Bryant and Andrew Murrison

Monday 14th June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Chris Bryant]

Yes, of course I do—and I am looking forward to welcoming the hon. Gentleman to the Opposition Benches as well. Whether he will have to transfer his allegiance or we will have to change the Government in order to achieve that is another matter, but he makes a very fair point. I would, however, gently say to him that of course I accept that there will have to be cuts in the coming months and years, but I also believe that we must prioritise those industries where we can make the most dramatic difference and where we can maximise our chances of succeeding in the emerging economies.

The second thing we need to do is to learn some lessons about modern foreign languages. The Minister of State was rather complacent about the facts that India now uses English as its business language and many people in China learn English, rather than French as in the past. Unless we have a cadre of young people, and not only those working in the Foreign Office—[Interruption.] I think “cadre” is now a sufficiently anglicised word to be allowed in a debate and not to be out of order. Unless we have a sufficient number of people who speak modern foreign languages, and not just the useless modern foreign languages such as French, but the—[Interruption.] I have said that to the French; I think they realise there are problems.

[Dr Murrison]

Is the hon. Gentleman aware that not only has he just insulted the French, but he has also insulted a large swathe of the Maghreb, which has not been mentioned at all in the debate so far? That is a bit of a pity, in particular because one of our major trading partners in north Africa is, of course, Morocco, where the diplomatic language is French.

[Chris Bryant]

Yes, but I think that one of the things that has changed over the past 30 or 40 years is that whereas French used to be the most useful language because it was, for the most part, the diplomatic language around the world, that is certainly no longer the case. The most useful languages to speak at present are Mandarin, and Spanish and Portuguese because of Latin America, and we need to focus on Arabic as well.

My biggest concern is that the effortless British superiority with which we stride around the economic world means that all too often we are the only country that presents business people in other countries who do not speak even the rudiments of a foreign language. That is a big problem. [Interruption.] The Minister of State refers to the Deputy Prime Minister, and it is a delight that he speaks so many foreign languages, but I just gently say that it is important that the Government focus on this.

We did not get it right, and ever fewer people in the UK are learning foreign languages. My experience in the Foreign Office was that the number of people who spoke foreign languages has diminished, and the number who can confidently speak them is pretty low.