Battle of Arnhem: 75th Anniversary

Jeremy Lefroy Excerpts

Monday 14th October 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mark Lancaster]

I can only say that I found the whole experience utterly terrifying and vowed never to repeat it. And that was without a single shot being fired at me.

I doubt that even the most starry-eyed historian would recall the Battle of Arnhem as an unmitigated success. Indeed, it is a curious quirk of British history that we tend to memorialise our defeats as much as our victories, from the charge of the Light Brigade to Dunkirk. But as we have heard, there are strong reasons why Operation Market Garden merits such an important place in our modern history.

First and foremost, Arnhem has become a byword for bravery. An extraordinary 59 decorations were handed out to the men who escaped from the carnage, while, as we have heard, five incredible individuals received the Victoria Cross. My hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) made the point earlier that maybe it should have been six. Among them was Major Robert Henry Cain, from the Isle of Man, who, on more than one occasion, single-handedly faced down enemy tanks, immobilising one vehicle and forcing others into retreat despite sustaining multiple wounds. But, in a battle where conditions were horrendous, where the food first ran out followed swiftly by the ammunition, all were heroes. We can only imagine what it must have been like for men such as Major Tony Hibbert watching in horror as German tanks roamed

“up and down the street, firing high explosive into the side of the building, to create the gap, and then firing smoke shells...as the phosphorus from the smoke shells”

burnt his comrades out of their positions. Yet still allied fighters persevered. In the words of veteran Tom Hicks—a constituent of the hon. and gallant Member for Barnsley Central and, I am very proud to say, a fellow sapper—they

“fought until they had nothing left”.

We are privileged that some of these hardy souls are still with us today. We should cherish them while we can, just as we should continue paying our respects to all the troops on both sides who fell.

Next, Arnhem is remembered because of the boldness of the enterprise. This was the largest airborne operation in history, with some 35,000 troops dropped behind enemy lines. Indeed, it was the biggest military operation on Dutch soil in world war two. Yet its ambition was greater still: to use paratroopers and glider-borne infantry to seize a series of nine river and canal crossings between the Dutch-Belgian border at Eindhoven, Nijmegen and Arnhem, then to employ allied tanks and troops to secure the great road bridge over the lower Rhine at Arnhem, and from there to drive straight into Germany. That was Field Marshall Montgomery’s plan. Had it worked, Arnhem would have shortened the war.

[Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)]

I am most grateful to my right hon. and gallant Friend. Does he agree that what is even more remarkable is that for many of the units—I include 2nd Battalion South Staffordshire—this came after they had been involved in the invasion of Sicily and Italy? Now they were involved in this tremendous operation. Many of these people had seen action almost continuously for several years.

[Mark Lancaster]

My hon. Friend makes the very powerful point that for many this was not a one-off operation, but the culmination of what had been an incredibly long and tough war. By the standards of today we can only begin to think about the mental impact on so many of those who had served for such a long period of time. We deal with exactly the same mental health issues today, but I hope we are in a much better position to be able to support our veterans today.

Even though Operation Market Garden proved a “bridge too far”, there is a third reason why it has passed into legend: it earned the UK the admiration of its allies. It set the stage for an unparalleled example of international partnerships as British forces worked hand in glove with their Polish and US counterparts. I absolutely agree with the hon. Member for Ealing North (Stephen Pound) about highlighting the role that the Polish armed forces played in this operation. Even today, as we continue to have a UK battle group as part of the enhanced forward presence in Poland, that relationship continues.

Eisenhower wrote:

“In this war there has been no single performance by any unit that has more greatly inspired me or more highly excited my admiration, than the nine days action of your division between 17 and 26 September”.

The hon. and gallant Member for Barnsley Central also highlighted the most poignant legacy of the friendships forged during those times. That can be found in the Netherlands, where local “flower children” gather each year, laying bouquets of flowers at more than 1,500 graves at Oosterbeek cemetery. He did not say, however, that in 1969, 25 years after Arnhem, some suggested that the ceremony should be cancelled. So vociferously was the proposal rejected that it continues unabated today.

Defence Industry: Scotland

Jeremy Lefroy Excerpts

Tuesday 30th April 2019 Westminster Hall

[Stephen Kerr]

The SNP cynically swallows the idea of being in NATO—a nuclear defensive alliance—because it knows that Scotland will never wear pacifism. It wants Faslane and the nuclear deterrent gone.

[Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that it is not just a question of defending the United Kingdom’s territorial waters and our contribution to NATO, but goes much further afield? We forget that the maintenance of a blue-water Navy is vital to trade. One only has to look at the Red sea. I used to ship coffee from the Port of Tanga through the Suez canal to Europe and around the world. Piracy around the Red sea was rife; ships were hijacked until the European Union force and others, led until recently by the United Kingdom, were there with ships built in Scotland.

[Stephen Kerr]

I would sign up to beating swords in ploughshares every day of the week, but the lesson of history is that we defend the peace by being strong. I am proud of the United Kingdom’s 2% defence spending commitment. We have obligations in the alliance, which we meet.

I recently had the privilege of attending the naming ceremony of HMS Taymar, the latest second-generation River-class ship, on the Clyde. It is a magnificent ship built in the best traditions of Scottish shipbuilding for the Royal Navy, by Scottish engineers, fitters, designers, programmers—a host of highly skilled professionals. The workforce spoke with such pride about their work, and they are fully justified in that pride, because they are making a massive contribution to the security of our country and our servicemen and women who sail in those ships. My hon. Friend the Member for Stafford (Jeremy Lefroy) outlined some of the other things that they do.

Scotland’s contribution to the defence sector and our Scottish servicemen and women are a matter of national pride for all of us. The men and women who serve alongside our service personnel are to be saluted. I will long remember the visit I made in my constituency to people who work for Babcock—mechanics and engineers who had gone to Afghanistan and Iraq to be there with our service people to service their armoured vehicles and to keep them on the road. They must not have their sacrifice traduced by an ideologically driven attack on a proud and vital industry.

A Better Defence Estate

Jeremy Lefroy Excerpts

Thursday 28th February 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Ellwood]

The hon. Gentleman, quite rightly and eloquently, describes the pieces of the jigsaw that make a successful garrison or Army unit in any locality: links with the community, operational purpose, and recruitment and retention. If we have areas that are high in those across the country, we certainly need to leverage that.

[Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)]

We very much value the presence of three regiments, the Royal Signals, the RAF’s tactical supply wing in Stafford and other units. I have not yet seen the details, as the letter about further changes has not reached me, but can the Minister assure me that the Ministry of Defence will work very closely, as it has done very well in the past, with Stafford Borough Council and Staffordshire County Council to ensure that the integration of any new units is conducted in the best possible manner?

[Mr Ellwood]

I can provide that assurance. My hon. Friend underlines the importance of a strong bond between the Defence Infrastructure Organisation and local authorities dealing with what can be the quite challenging changes we are introducing.

RAF Centenary

Jeremy Lefroy Excerpts

Monday 26th November 2018 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)]

It is a great honour to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Dr Johnson).

Stafford has been a centre for the RAF for 80 years. It was in 1938-39 that 16 MU, a maintenance unit, moved to the newly constructed RAF Stafford. It remained there for many decades, until the RAF base became a Ministry of Defence base in the mid-2000s. But we still have a strong RAF presence through the tactical supply wing, which is based at MOD Stafford. That wing goes all over the world to refuel rotary-wing helicopters— whether in the Falklands, Cyprus or Kenya, where I came across it a few years ago in Nanyuki on a training exercise with the armed forces parliamentary scheme.

I pay tribute to the Royal Air Force for all it has done for Stafford over so many years. We are greatly honoured to have large numbers of former and current RAF service personnel in my constituency. There are, of course, some other connections. There are airfields at Hixon and at Seighford, which was a back-up base for Wellington bombers during the war. Those airfields are no longer in use, although Seighford is still used for gliding. Of course, we also have the RAF Museum reserve collection, which I and the Secretary of State for Defence had a wonderful visit to. We saw such things as Douglas Bader’s artificial legs and Lawrence of Arabia’s record collection from when he served as an aircraftsman in the RAF. I hope that some of the exhibits can be put on public display. They are very well looked after in my constituency, but it would be nice for more people to see them.

I would like to conclude with a personal recollection or reminiscence. My grandfather, Benjamin Lefroy, was a Canadian, born in Vernon, British Columbia. He was in 43 Squadron, which my hon. Friend the Member for Stirling (Stephen Kerr) mentioned, when the RAF was founded 100 years ago. He joined the Army and then the Royal Flying Corps, and then became a Sopwith Camel pilot in 43 Squadron.

On the first day of the battle of Amiens, the RAF, as the RFC had become, was trying to knock out bridges near Peronne. The RAF lost 60 aircraft that day, 8 August 1918—an astonishing rate of loss that shows just how much they were in a ground attack role; they were very exposed to enemy fire—and one of them was my grandfather’s. He later wrote—this is in the history of 43 Squadron and I am grateful to my step-uncle, Bob Lefroy, for some of this:

“I had done my work for the day, two sorties, and was reading my mail in the mess. An orderly came haring in and asked for volunteers as a pilot in A had gone sick. As the only person in the mess—it was me! The only machine I could get was ‘R’, the target practice machine, a slow and bad machine. My own Camel was being repaired, having collected some bullets on my previous sortie. Soon after coming out of cloud, we ran into fifteen German fighters. My engine was not good, and trying to get more out of it I ‘choked’ it. At this time, I saw Cecil King with a couple of German aircraft on his tail and so pulled up to give ‘em a squirt and down they came on me. The universal joint was shot off the joystick, my rudder wires cut and petrol was squirting all over the cockpit. With the throttle I kept pulling the nose up until, at 300 feet, I went into a spin and went in. I came to four hours later, in our barrage, with a German at my side. I had three bullet holes in me, both knees out of joint, fractured skull and fractured wrist—and of course was a P.O.W.”

As Germany began to fall apart at the end of the war, he was taken to hospital in Germany so that they could make a better job of repairing his wounds, for which I give great credit, but civil order broke down and an orderly, who believed he was doing the best thing for my grandfather, as he abandoned the hospital cut the traction ropes on his legs, and he was left for three days utterly immobilised and completely unattended. In the end, the British sent trains throughout Germany to collect such people at the end of 1918, many of whom were stuck without any care in hospitals. After the war, my grandfather stayed on as one of the Dominion scholars and then met my grandmother.

I want to finish by going back to Cecil King, whom my grandfather was up in the air with at that time. They were both 19 at the time. Cecil King was an RAF fighter ace—one of the real aces of 43 Squadron—who shot down 22 aircraft. He was awarded the Military Cross and the Distinguished Flying Cross as well as the Croix de Guerre from the French. He was killed in a flying accident in January 1919; he was just 19.

As we remember the huge heroism of the men and women of the RAF over the years, we remember those who survived into old age, like my grandfather, who died in his 80s, and those such as Cecil King, who died as a 19-year-old, hugely decorated.

Galileo Programme

Jeremy Lefroy Excerpts

Thursday 14th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Guto Bebb]

I sincerely hope that this decision will be reversed and, therefore, it will be a blip on the journey towards a sensible solution to the United Kingdom’s decision to leave the European Union. Again, we have made it very clear—the Prime Minister has made it very clear, as have Members across this House—that we are fully committed to security co-operation with our European partners. We want to be involved in the European Defence Fund. We want to remain involved in Galileo. We certainly want to continue to contribute to NATO in the way that we have over the years. Our messaging has been very clear on this issue, and it is hugely disappointing that the European Commission has responded in the way that it has. This issue will continue to be taken up by this Government, and I sincerely hope that good will will prevail.

[Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)]

Are there currently any non-EU member states that participate in Galileo and whose companies have access to contracts from Galileo?

[Guto Bebb]

My hon. Friend makes an important point, but of course, there has not previously been a country that has been so heavily involved in Galileo and committed to the project being threatened with exclusion. The key issue is this: do we have more to contribute to Galileo? The answer is yes. Do we want to carry on making that contribution to Galileo? The answer is yes. Do we have the capability to develop on our own if we need to? The answer, again, is yes. The decision is now clearly one for the European Commission. In my view, it made the wrong call yesterday—the wrong call for the security and prosperity of Europe—and I think it is absolutely essential that we move forward very strongly in partnership both with those countries within the European Union and with those partners within the system who are not currently in the European Union.

Oral Answers to Questions

Jeremy Lefroy Excerpts

Monday 23rd April 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mark Lancaster]

After the success of the pilot project, which has been funded for three years, I am delighted to report that we will indeed be doing exactly that and will be expanding the programme to two more wildlife parks in Malawi. That sits exactly within the priorities of Her Majesty’s Government’s Africa strategy, which runs across three Departments.

[Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)]

Has the Minister also had discussions with the Government of the United Republic of Tanzania, where huge numbers of elephants have been lost over the past 20 years, particularly in the Selous game reserve? If he has not had such discussions, perhaps they could be offered to the United Republic of Tanzania.

[Mark Lancaster]

Indeed, poaching is responsible for the deaths of approximately 20,000 elephants every year, which is why I am delighted that the pilot project seems to have made such a positive impact over the past year. As I have already mentioned, we will be looking to expand the project as part of the Government’s Africa strategy.

Oral Answers to Questions

Jeremy Lefroy Excerpts

Monday 5th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Ellwood]

Our joint ventures included agreements put forward ahead of time to make sure that if one partner was to step back, the other would continue to work, and that is exactly what has happened right across the MOD.

[Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend pay tribute to UK peacekeepers in South Sudan and elsewhere across the world?

[Gavin Williamson]

I would very much like to pay tribute to the amazing peacekeeping work that our armed forces do in so many areas, South Sudan being a perfect example. It goes to show what an amazing impact our armed forces have in projecting Britain’s influence in all parts of the globe.

National Security Capability Review

Jeremy Lefroy Excerpts

Monday 15th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Gavin Williamson]

Our commitment was to maintain the size of the armed forces, and we absolutely stick by that commitment.

[Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)]

On Saturday, together with my hon. Friend the Member for Lichfield (Michael Fabricant), the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Ruth Smeeth) and several other colleagues, I had the honour to be at the laying-up of the colours of 3 Mercian, the Staffords, in Lichfield cathedral. It was a great privilege to be there and to recognise their service, but at the same time it was a reminder of the difficult decisions that had to be made. I agree with colleagues that 82,000 is an absolute minimum for the Army, and we must go higher—possibly to see the return of 3 Mercian—and certainly not lower.

[Gavin Williamson]

I would very much like to reintroduce the Staffordshire Regiment as part of any changes, and that is something I would like to look at going forward—I may have some more battles to win before I get to that stage. However, I take on board my hon. Friend’s comments, and I am very conscious of the important role that the armed forces—especially the Royal Signals—play in Stafford, of how they are so involved in the local community and of how important the money we spend on our armed forces is to the economic prosperity of Stafford and Staffordshire.

Lariam

Jeremy Lefroy Excerpts

Thursday 27th October 2016 Westminster Hall

[Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)]

It is a great privilege to speak under your chairmanship, Mr Rosindell. I congratulate the Defence Committee, under the excellent chairmanship of my right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis), and all previous speakers in this debate.

I declare an interest as chair of the all-party parliamentary group on malaria and neglected tropical diseases and as a trustee of the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine. I have a large MOD base in my constituency, MOD Stafford, which has three signals regiments and the RAF’s tactical supply wing. Many members of those units spend quite a lot of time on deployment in countries where malaria is a problem.

Malaria, as my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Moor View (Johnny Mercer) said, is a killer. It used to kill well over 1 million people a year, but thankfully that figure is now down to 438,000 a year, according to the World Health Organisation in 2015. I hope the figure is still falling, but it is an awful lot of people. I have had friends die from malaria, which is a serious disease.

It is absolutely right that the Ministry of Defence should take every precaution to protect its personnel from the depredations of malaria, but the question, of course, is how to do it. I had experience of Lariam when I lived in a tropical country. I took it when I was diagnosed with malaria—I took it not as a prophylactic but as a curative—and they were four of the worst days of my life, and not because of the malaria. Lariam produces extraordinary dreams that leave those who take it completely debilitated. The next time I had malaria—I have had malaria four times—I took a different drug, artemether, and the experience was quite different. Within 12 hours I was back on my feet, back at work and able to continue. The side effects were almost zero.

We are talking about Lariam as prophylaxis, but several alternatives are mentioned in the report. There is Malarone, which for many years was quite expensive, but it is a lot cheaper now that it is off patent—that is the one I use whenever I go to tropical countries. There is doxycycline, which is effective and cheap, and of course chloroquine and proguanil, which have been used for decades. Those two drugs have some side effects, particularly proguanil, which can cause mouth ulcers if taken over an extended period—proguanil is also an ingredient of Malarone.

On the curative side there is Lariam, but artemisinin-based combination therapies are also incredibly effective and are the recommended curative drugs for malaria across the world—I will talk about those in my conclusion.

The Committee’s recommendations for using Lariam are spot on. First, the MOD should find out whether service personnel are unable to tolerate alternatives. Secondly, individual risk assessments should be conducted and, thirdly, the patient should be aware of alternatives. I am delighted that the Committee has come up with those recommendations, which are all absolutely right, but they need to be put into effect. I am delighted to hear that the Ministry of Defence has taken the report seriously.

I finish by issuing a warning. We think that we have come a long way with both prophylactic and curative drugs against malaria, and that is indeed the case. All the research funding over the past decade and a half has partially resulted in halving the number of deaths, although a substantial part of that is also due to the use of mosquito nets. Has the Committee looked at how many service personnel are provided with insecticide-treated mosquito nets? A recent study by Oxford University found that almost two thirds of the reduction in deaths from malaria since 2000 is the result of insecticide-treated bed nets, not the improved drugs.

Be that as it may, it is vital that research into improved drugs continues because, unfortunately, we are beginning to see resistance to the artemisinin-based combination therapies—ACTs are the best drugs available at the moment—in south-east Asia, particularly on the Myanmar-Thai border. The worry is that resistance to all the previous effective antimalarials, first chloroquine and then sulfadoxine-pyrimethamine, started in that same area. The fact that resistance to ACTs is starting there gives us great cause for concern. The Department for International Development is putting a lot of effort into research on that subject, which I welcome, but it is important that we continue to focus research on antimalarials both as prophylaxis and as curative.

I am grateful for the opportunity to speak in this debate, and I thank my hon. and right hon. Friends on the Defence Committee for their excellent work, which I hope results in better treatment for our servicemen and women across the world.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Lewis]

That is probably the single strongest point that one could make in the course of this entire debate. Particularly in the macho military environment—I use that term in a non-sexist way—people are unlikely to disclose mental troubles in their past, meaning that either they may take a drug that is inappropriate for them or they may throw it away, rendering themselves vulnerable to contracting malaria.

[Jeremy Lefroy]

Did the Committee have any idea why there is such a particular emphasis on Lariam when other drugs are available, such as doxycycline or Malarone, that many of us take whenever we go to countries affected? The emphasis on Lariam seems to me extraordinary. I absolutely applaud my right hon. Friend’s point about the importance of encouraging Roche to continue its research in this area; we do not want it put off. Roche has been excellent in its clarity about what Lariam is about and what precautions need to be taken.

[Dr Lewis]

Other Committee members may correct me, but I have a feeling that we never quite got to the bottom of why the MOD is so fixated on that particular drug. What I am about to say is sheer speculation, but it could have something to do with the relative cost of different types of drug, or with concern about compensation claims. If the drug were given up completely, it might be easier to bring claims on that basis: “You don’t prescribe this drug at all now, so therefore you were wrong ever to have prescribed it.”

We sought to give the MOD a bit of wriggle room, for want of a better term, by saying that all we wanted it to do was designate Lariam as a drug of last resort. I do not see why it should not do that. It is obviously a drug of last resort, because the MOD accepts the fact that it should now be issued only under the most strictly defined conditions. What is that if not making it a drug of last resort? So why does the MOD not say so?

Similarly, there has been reluctance to acknowledge the experience of other countries. The MOD asserted that Lariam was

“considered by US CDC”—

the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which is the US equivalent of Public Health England—

“to be equally suitable (with an individual clinical assessment) as each of the other drugs”.

However, Dr Remington Nevin—one of the two doctors to whom we owe a great deal of gratitude for their consistent campaigning on this issue and for the evidence they brought to the Committee—described that as a “misinterpretation of CDC’s position”. The section entitled “Special Considerations for US Military Deployments” in chapter 8 of the CDC’s publication “Yellow Book” states:

“The military should be considered a special population with demographics, destinations, and needs that may differ from those of civilian travelers.”

In respect of the use of Lariam in other states’ armed forces, Dr Nevin argued that

“many of our Western allies have all but abandoned the use of the drug”,

and that the US and Australian military use it only for

“those rare service members who cannot tolerate…two safer and equally effective alternatives”.

That is why we made the point that Lariam should really be used only for such people, because we are not convinced that there is any geographical area where some other drug could not be used.

Dr Nevin also referred to the US Army Special Operations Command having taken the

“very wise step of banning it altogether”.

He said that the decision by the US military was made

“primarily on clinical grounds”

and was intended to

“decrease the risk of negative drug-related side-effects”.

The MOD’s response commits merely to updating the information held on the use by our allies of Lariam and other antimalarial drugs, including the extent to which Lariam is used and the circumstances in which it is supplied. It still does not appear to accept that its policy on Lariam is increasingly out of step with that of our allies.

We have made considerable progress by focusing on the terrible situation in which a drug designed for very specific issuing to very specific people after a very specific interview was doled out en masse as a routine prophylactic to our service personnel who were about to go to malaria-infested areas. That really was a scandal, and it would be another scandal if it ever happened again.

Yemen: Cluster Munitions

Jeremy Lefroy Excerpts

Tuesday 24th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)]

My hon. Friend mentioned the investigations the Saudi Government have agreed to undertake into strikes in civilian areas. Could he give us a timetable for when he expects to hear the result of those investigations?

[Mr Dunne]

We are looking at all the allegations made by the various bodies mentioned in the Chamber, and we have the opportunity to indicate to the Saudi military that these incidents are worthy of investigation. This is an ongoing process, and we have had opportunities to encourage the Saudis to speed up their investigations. However, at this point, I am afraid that I cannot put a timetable on it.