Armed Forces Commissioner Bill

Dave Doogan Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 18th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Dave Doogan (Angus and Perthshire Glens) (SNP)]

It is interesting to be taking part in a debate that has such an outbreak of consensus—indeed, it is a bit unsettling in this particular Chamber. However, the Scottish National party will be doing nothing to rock the boat given that we welcome the role of Armed Forces Commissioner, especially their authority to investigate welfare complaints from our armed forces. This has been a long time coming. The welcome superseding of the Service Complaints Ombudsman with a vital element that allows servicemen and women recourse to a functioning complaint system outwith the chain of command is only going to be good news, and will be in step with the ambitions of many right hon. and hon. Members.

I take this opportunity to commend the foresight of my friend and colleague, the former Member for West Dunbartonshire, Martin Docherty-Hughes, who brought forward his Armed Forces Representative Body Bill in 2019. If that Bill had been supported, it would have achieved many of the same aims as this Bill but five years earlier. Nevertheless, a key development now is the ability of the commissioner to visit defence establishments unannounced and commission reports on what they find there. That is a central and vital improvement over the demonstrably inadequate powers of the ombudsman. The reports will face the scrutiny of colleagues in this Chamber and of the Defence Committee, which is welcome. I know that that scrutiny will be applied with rigour.

The Bill should go a long way towards shining a light on the manifold circumstances in which many in our armed forces and their families have been treated poorly by successive UK Governments. Much of that has been caused by disastrous privatisation misadventures pursued for short-term gains at the expense of long-term value; our men and women in uniform, together with their families, pay the price for that suboptimal policy in their daily lives and routines. We should also note that the issues facing armed forces personnel are already extremely well known, documented and understood within and outwith this Chamber. What the commissioner must reveal, therefore, is the depth and scale of these issues. As has already been touched on, that will necessarily make difficult reading for the ministerial team. I salute their ability to leave themselves open to that scrutiny.

A key factor driving the poor experiences of armed forces personnel is the perpetual misallocation of funding and a lack of political will to establish a verifiable balance between the demands of the state on the armed forces to deliver defence and security, and the vote of funding allocated to the armed forces by the same state to deliver against that priority. Everything has an upper elastic limit, and if the Government do not get their act together on allocating 2.5% of GDP for defence, I greatly fear that our armed forces will exceed their upper limit very soon—commissioner or not. From the junior ranks to the Chief of the Defence Staff, they are asking for nothing other than long-term clarity to allow them to deliver long-term stability.

A key performance indicator of any large organisation, especially one with such an unenviable relationship with recruitment and retention, is morale. That is a key reason why people are leaving in such huge numbers, at tremendous cost to defence in financial and operational ways. The solutions to many of these problems are fairly straightforward, but expensive. They include properly maintained housing stock, better mental health support, better support for families when people are deployed, and decent pay—all of which are outwith the remit of any commissioner. The Bill represents a welcome stride forward, but it is no silver bullet to fix life in the UK armed forces.

As we have already heard, almost 60% of personnel report low morale. Only a third are satisfied with the welfare support that their family receive when they return from deployment, and many personnel live in poor accommodation. Perhaps most importantly for the commissioner, only 23% of serving personnel think that leaders will take meaningful action to address issues identified in the continuous attitude survey. That is not a great report card for this or the previous Government, but it is certainly a starter for 10 for the commissioner.

[Peter Swallow (Bracknell) (Lab)]

Would the hon. Gentleman like to welcome the 20 hours of wraparound childcare for service personnel serving overseas that the Government announced this weekend, which will save serving families £3,400?

--- Later in debate ---

[Dave Doogan]

Yes. What’s not to like? I am very happy to support that.

I have two questions that I hope the Minister will address in his summing up. Will the commissioner have the power to investigate the challenges faced by serving personnel within the nuclear enterprise, or will personnel in this service have to continue to suffer in secret?

Scotland, as usual, is out in front with our veterans commissioner, so what learnings will the UK commissioner for serving personnel be able to take from their Scottish counterpart? How does the Minister envisage the commissioners working together? Moreover, given that Wales and Northern Ireland also have veterans commissioners, and that the commissioner proposed by the Bill will not have responsibility for veterans across the United Kingdom, what is the timeframe for veterans in England to enjoy the same benefits as those in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland?

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Judith Cummins)]

I call Alison Hume to make her maiden speech.