Oral Answers to Questions

Jim Murphy Excerpts

Monday 22nd October 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hammond]

As my hon. Friend will know, the excellent report produced by my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary is being taken forward by the Government. We will continue to work closely with the Department of Health and others to look at how best we can implement the remaining recommendations in that report.

[Mr Jim Murphy (East Renfrewshire) (Lab)]

May I congratulate the new ministerial team who have found their places on the Front Bench today? It is only a shame that that comes at the expense of their dedicated and highly effective predecessors, who deserve the thanks of everyone in all parts of the House.

Many of our armed forces are currently being made redundant. One of the worries is that the Ministry of Defence seems to be trying to save money by sacking experienced people very close to their full pension entitlement. I have been contacted by angry and disappointed family members who feel very let down by this approach. Will the Secretary of State confirm that in future rounds of service redundancies he will take into account proximity to pension qualification when deciding whom to make redundant?

[Mr Hammond]

I am extremely grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for his generous comments on the retiring ministerial team, and I am sure that he will appreciate that my new Front-Bench colleagues will give him an equally hard time in future.

As the right hon. Gentleman knows, proximity to pension point is not and cannot be a determining factor in selection for redundancy. Wherever we set the bar—we have made some reductions in the immediate pension point for those being made redundant—some people will, unfortunately, fall just short of it and it is inevitable that they will feel a sense of injustice. The legal advice that I have received is that it would not be appropriate—we would be subject to challenge—if we used proximity to pension point as a criterion in redundancy selection.

[Mr Murphy]

There will be disappointment at that answer, not least in the pension justice for troops campaign, one of whose high-profile supporters is Sergeant Lee Nolan, who served our country in Iraq, Bosnia and Kosovo, and who was sacked just 72 hours before qualifying for his full pension. So disgusted is he that he has returned all six of his medals to Downing street in protest. Will the Secretary of State at least enter into all-party talks, with the aim of guaranteeing that no one currently serving in Afghanistan will be affected in this way? It is simply wrong and not good enough for someone who has served our country bravely and for many years in Iraq, Afghanistan or any other theatre to be sacked so close to qualifying for their full pension entitlement.

[Mr Hammond]

Before the right hon. Gentleman climbs any further on his high horse, I remind him that we are having to make reductions in the size of our armed forces to deal with the legacy that we inherited from the Labour party. Nobody who is serving on operations or who is on post-operational leave is eligible for selection for redundancy. The right hon. Gentleman knows that we are deeply sympathetic with regard to those very difficult cases in which people missed their immediate pension point by a very short period, but I assure him that the legal advice is unambiguous on the issue.