Overseas Operations (Service Personnel And Veterans) Bill

Dan Jarvis Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading: House of Commons
Wednesday 23rd September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Dan Jarvis (Barnsley Central) (Lab)]

It is a great pleasure to follow my friend the hon. and gallant Member for Tonbridge and Malling (Tom Tugendhat). It is a great strength of the veterans community, both inside and outside this place, that we can debate these important matters and take a different view but do so with decency and humility.

I should declare an interest as a veteran. I know very well, and we have heard in the House today, the strength of feeling and the very high regard that Members from across the House have for those who serve in our armed forces. No one, whether they have served in the military or otherwise, deserves to be repeatedly investigated without good cause. If we allow that abuse to continue, we fail collectively in our lifelong commitment to support those who have sacrificed themselves for our country.

This Bill seeks to address such abuses, but however well-intentioned it is, it does require significant improving, otherwise it will be potentially damaging both to Britain’s standing in the world and to the reputation of our armed forces.

First, I wish to address the definition of “relevant offences” as laid out in clause 6. Subsection (3) states that an offence is not relevant

“if it is an excluded… by virtue of Part 1 of Schedule 1.”

The offences excluded are largely sexual offences. Although that is, of course, welcome, it is worrying to see the omission of other crimes against humanity and war crimes. I heard what the Secretary of State said earlier, but let us take torture as the obvious example. The prohibition of torture is absolute. There are no exceptions. Its use is illegal under numerous international treaties to which the UK is a signatory, including the Geneva convention.

[Bob Stewart]

Speaking as a commanding officer who has gone into the field, may I point out to the House that it is not just this Bill that we have to operate under? Let us take, for example, torture. Article 17 of the Geneva convention specifically prohibits torture, and we can be charged for that. I certainly used to make great emphasis of this point in training troops to go into the field. It is not just this Bill under which we operate.

[Dan Jarvis]

My friend the hon. and gallant Gentleman raises a very important point. The reality is that, despite what we have heard from some Members today, if this Bill is passed in its current form, a decision to allow a prosecution to proceed following an allegation of torture after five years had elapsed would be made virtually impossible due to the threshold imposed by the triple lock. This is not the way to rebuild our reputation on the international stage. It would mean the UK reneging on our international legal obligations and could well put us at odds with the ICC. At a time when we are witnessing an erosion of human rights and leaders turning their backs on international institutions, it is more important than ever before that we uphold our values and standards and not undermine them.

Through this Bill, the Government are seeking to right a wrong, but not by addressing the root cause of the issue. In an interview last year—we have heard the quote already, but it is worth hearing again—the Minister for Defence People and Veterans said that one of the biggest problems with this was

“the military’s inability to investigate itself properly and the standard of those investigations. If those investigations were done properly and self-regulation had occurred, we probably wouldn’t be here today.”

The Minister is absolutely right, and the underlying problem is how we have ended up at this point, but nowhere in the Bill does it mention the need to review how military investigations are conducted. If we had a credible investigatory system that dealt with allegations in an effective, impartial and timely manner—one that allowed us to refer back with confidence—we would not be in the position that we are in now.

There is, though, plenty of support across this House for measures that will protect members of our armed forces. We all know, and I am sure we all agree, that historical prosecutions of our veterans is an emotionally charged subject and one that urgently demands a solution, because nobody—surely nobody—wants to see a repeat of the decades of legal wrangling, the delay and the misery that are still ongoing following investigations into the troubles.

I conclude by saying that the overwhelming majority of members of our armed forces serve with distinction and honour, and they follow the rules, but no one—not one of us—is above the law, and that principle remains true whether or not somebody wears a uniform. One of the best ways to protect our troops is to ensure that we apply the rule of law in every instance. There is much work to be done to improve this Bill, and I hope very much that Ministers will listen to the concerns that have been expressed today and work constructively to improve it in Committee and beyond. I hope that we all agree that we owe the brave men and women of our armed forces—the people who serve our nation—a massive debt. Diminishing their hard-won reputation by reneging on our legal and moral obligations is not the manner in which to repay it.