2nd Battalion the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers

Ian Mearns Excerpts

Thursday 18th October 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Baron]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend, who is spot on. I shall come on to that point later. I for one, to answer the question from the hon. Member for Dundee West (Jim McGovern), am not pointing the finger at any other regiment. I am not asking for further cuts in the Ministry of Defence, but if the Government cannot make the right decision here and now about 2RRF, there is money outside the MOD budget, as my hon. Friend has highlighted, that could be used to reverse this bad decision.

If hon. Members will forgive me, I want to make a little progress before I take further inventions, as time is pushing on and I know that a number of Members want to speak.

The Government have been reluctant to justify their reasoning. In fact, getting information from the MOD has been like extracting teeth, and one can see why from the damning evidence that was eventually obtained. The House will remember that on 5 July the Secretary of State for Defence announced the Government’s Army 2020 proposals. As part of the proposals, five infantry battalions were earmarked for disbandment, one of which was 2RRF. The impression created in this Chamber—I and other Members were present—was that the decision was based in large part on military calculations of capability and sustainability, or, in other words, that military logic had prevailed.

Many of us know that 2RRF has not only a good recruitment record but sound demographics in its core recruiting areas. On 6 July, I tabled named day written parliamentary questions asking for the recruitment and manning figures for all battalions involved. Given that we had been told that the decision on which battalions were to be cut was in large part based on those figures, one would have thought that they would have been ready to hand. I did not get the answers until 3 August, a month later, when Parliament was in recess. While I was waiting, I pressed the Prime Minister and the MOD by way of e-mail and letter.

In my view, the initial response from the hon. Member for North Devon (Sir Nick Harvey), who was then Minister for the Armed Forces, skated over the logic and continued to suggest that the MOD had “used a methodical approach with objective criteria to select those battalions which had to be lost”, but did not tell us what those objective criteria were, despite the fact that I had specifically asked for that in my letter and questions.

I then finally received answers to my named day questions, comparing 10-year records of establishment and strength for each of the battalions being cut and the five battalions of the Royal Regiment of Scotland. The figures were revealing; they clearly showed that two battalions from the Royal Regiment of Scotland had worse recruiting records by far. On 14 August, I met the Secretary of State and the Chief of the General Staff, General Sir Peter Wall. On that very morning, after a number of phone calls from the MOD, I finally received a letter by e-mail from the Secretary of State. That letter finally admitted that on purely military grounds two Scottish battalions would have been axed. The letter clearly stated that 2RRF was the only one of the battalions being axed that was not initially earmarked for disbandment. In fact, the letter was quite specific. It made it very clear that the five least sustainable battalions are two battalions from the Royal Regiment of Scotland, one from the Yorkshire Regiment, one from the Mercian Regiment and one from the Royal Welsh Regiment.

The letter went on to explain that what did for 2RRF was the Government’s decision to limit regimental losses to one battalion each and to ensure that no cap badges were lost. The Government’s insistence that no cap badges are lost makes no sense when we think that, as Members will remember, only six years ago in 2006 four cap badges and six battalions were amalgamated to form the five battalions of The Rifles. That was held up as an example of best practice by many senior Army officers. The Government’s justification for capping regimental losses to one battalion also does not make sense or withstand scrutiny. Five-battalion regiments can more easily withstand the loss of two battalions, particularly if they are struggling to sustain them, than two-battalion regiments can withstand the loss of one. Single battalion regiments also find it harder to meet the operational flexibility required and to offer their officers and soldiers a varied and demanding career profile.

It is perhaps also worth nothing that contrary to Government assertions, no Scottish battalion is being cut. The letter made it clear that on military logic two should have gone, and we know that if the regimental losses had been limited to one battalion, one should have gone. However, the one that should have gone has not gone. All that has happened is that it has been reduced in size for ceremonial duties. No cap badges or colours will be lost north of the border.

[Ian Mearns (Gateshead) (Lab)]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way and securing this debate. I am proud to say that the Royal Northumberland Fusiliers, one of the bedrock regiments that form the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers, was my dad’s regiment. He served in Palestine and north Africa before the war as a regular soldier and was captured in north Africa in 1940.

Some of my constituents are in the Public Gallery today. Messrs Spalding, Gannon and Allen are welcome to London for this debate—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. Unfortunately, we are not meant to mention people who are in the Public Gallery. We can see that a good number of people are present, but we cannot get into mentioning individuals personally.

[Ian Mearns]

I apologise, Mr Deputy Speaker, but I am afraid that the damage is done.

I have talked to colleagues in the regiment and note that the creed of the battalion includes the words:

“I will never accept defeat nor let down my mates or my regiment.”

We should take that on board as regards 2RRF.

[Mr Baron]

I completely agree. Once a fusilier, always a fusilier and despite the odds we will carry this campaign to the end.

I shall wind up shortly, as I am conscious that a number of Members wish to speak, but I must add that the letter from the Secretary of State was revealing in another sense. I have talked about history and recruitment, and some might say, “Well, that is history. What about the future?” The letter, however, cast doubt on the demographic sustainability of the regiment, which I suggest is utter and complete nonsense. The regiment recruits from the three largest cities in the United Kingdom: London, Birmingham and Manchester.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jim Dobbin (Heywood and Middleton) (Lab/Co-op)]

Let me say at the start that despite the dulcet tones hon. Members are listening to and the agreement across the House there should be few or no cuts across England and Scotland, I have an English constituency and am therefore an English Member of Parliament—except, of course, when we are playing football.

Since this decision was announced in July, a large number of constituents have contacted me, asking me to speak in defence of the 2nd Battalion the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers. As part of the Fusilier family, the Lancashire Fusiliers recruit heavily from my constituency, and other constituencies across Lancashire. It was in July this year that the Secretary of State decided on these heavy cuts to the regular Army, which included the dismantling of the 2nd Battalion the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers. That is happening at a time when the world is very unstable, so the cut is serious.

May I convey the feelings and views of my constituents? I will not name them, but present in the Gallery are a representative of the reserve armed forces, the chairman of the Lancashire Veterans Association, and a number of other people from my patch. They told me first hand this morning that they are very proud to be taking part in the first march on Parliament since soldiers demonstrated in the Bishopsgate mutiny of 1649, when 300 members of the new model army protested against Oliver Cromwell’s orders to send them to Ireland.

This is also the first time that the British Army has taken to the streets in protest—I met some of its members—since it was formed in 1707. That year is famous for the union of the Parliaments, so it could be said that it was around that time that my ancestors became British. Hon. Members will no doubt hear throughout the debate of the regiment’s illustrious history, but more recently the Fusiliers were the first regiment into Iraq, fought the longest battle in Afghanistan, and have had more service in Northern Ireland than any other regiment.

The Ministry of Defence website states:

“The Second Fusiliers are a superb, operationally hardened Light Role Infantry Battalion”,

but 2RRF is the only infantry battalion to be cut for political rather than military reasons.

[Ian Mearns]

My hon. Friend makes a powerful point, which I want to magnify. Exactly what type of battalion should we keep in this day and age other than battalions that can, as the Army website states,

“deploy quickly and adapt to any operational scenario”?

[Jim Dobbin]

My hon. Friend makes the point very clear and I agree with him.

As the hon. Member for Basildon and Billericay (Mr Baron) has said, 2nd Battalion the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers is the only infantry battalion to be cut for political rather than military reasons; otherwise, the more poorly recruited Scottish battalions would have been axed. In my view, that is outrageous. Is it prudent to interfere politically with the collation of Future Force 2020 with regards to the Army?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Blunt]

It becomes an issue about identity in the end. With parts of the United Kingdom such as South Yorkshire providing the recruits for the Fusiliers or the north-east providing recruits for the Light Dragoons and so forth, there is an important issue of identity and then of wider public policy in relation to having a recruiting regime in another country, bringing Nepalese soldiers into the British Army. That was fine when, frankly, the Gurkhas were cheap. They were paid less than their equivalents—their pensions cost less, too—and there was a deal. It meant that these soldiers went back to Nepal, highly trained to be really good citizens of enormous value to Nepal. We have changed the rules through sentiment. In my judgment, we now have the most expensive infantry in the British Army supporting a training organisation in Nepal, which is quite limited in what it can do in comparison with British line infantry whose future we are debating today. That poses real public policy problems that we should be brave enough to address; we need to be brave enough to work through the sentiment. Of course there is enormous sentimental attachment to the Gurkhas.

[Ian Mearns]

For the information of the House, much as I want to save the 2nd Battalion the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers, the Gurkha regiments have been recipients of the Victoria Cross on no fewer than 26 occasions. I think the hon. Gentleman maligns the Gurkhas with his words today.

[Mr Blunt]

I am not maligning them, and I am not maligning their historic contribution. I am acknowledging that contribution. However, our public policy is now to support the right of Nepalese families to come to the UK as a result of their service to the Crown.