Afghan Resettlement Update

Debate between Johnny Mercer and Dan Carden

Wednesday 13th December 2023 Commons Chamber

[Johnny Mercer]

I do not accept that this individual will have had no support. There would have been a lot of money and support thrown at such individuals and communities as they came in. There is the £20,520 integration fund, which is specifically for that purpose. Clearly, we are balancing different competing pressures when it comes to individuals getting into jobs and using skills that they had in Afghanistan, and that work continues. That will be stood up again for the process that we stood up in the summer, to make sure that we get people out of hotels and into good, long-term accommodation. I fully accept that there is a job of integration to be done there, and that is what we are working to do, using the voluntary sector, the third sector, local authorities and everybody else who is willing to lean into this.

[Dan Carden (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

My constituent’s sister and 70-year-old mother, who were accepted on to the ACRS in January this year, have since been stuck in Pakistan alone and are now homeless, with the constant threat of being returned to Afghanistan. They cannot afford exit visas from Pakistan, and the UNHCR is not currently paying for exit payments. My office has contacted the Home Office on several occasions, receiving only template responses, so will the Minister take a look into this individual case and get back to me as soon as possible?

[Johnny Mercer]

The hon. Gentleman must be telepathic, because just this morning I have commissioned work to look at what we can do about visa fees. I do not want an extraordinarily complex and expensive programme set back by having to pay a £500 visa exit fee in Pakistan. We are looking at how we overcome that, but I am more than happy to look at his individual case as well.

Armed Forces Bill (Second sitting)

Debate between Johnny Mercer and Dan Carden

Wednesday 31st March 2021 Public Bill Committees

[Dan Carden]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend. We know that levels of treatment do not match the levels of addiction that we believe exist. I will finish on this point. Currently, there is a zero-tolerance approach to alcohol and drug misuse in the forces, and that approach lacks understanding and is outdated. Other professions, including our doctors, the police force, the fire service and pharmacists, provide occupational support for substance use, and our armed forces should follow suit. I hope the Minister will address that issue.

New clause 6 will ensure that these men and women have access to a pathway of support for problematic alcohol, drug and gambling use, and it will allow information on service personnel and veterans’ treatment, and the provision for it, to be included in the annual armed forces covenant report.

[Johnny Mercer]

This is a really important new clause, and there are some really good points in there. I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton for raising these issues, because addiction is something that is particularly close to my heart, and we as a society and a Government need to do more on it. He raised some important issues. I will not just read him the blurb of what is available, because he knows about that. I will address a couple of the points that he made. I cannot accept the new clause, but I will talk about what we can do to address some of these issues.

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for his lobbying in this cause. I know he has worked hard on it over a number of years. Tom Harrison House is a real beacon of support for those enduring substance abuse and addiction challenges, and I pay tribute to its work. When it comes to the responsibility for providing pathways for veterans, the difficulty that we have with the new clause is that, in this country, veterans are not an individual cohort on their own; they are civilians who have served, who were picked from society and will return to society. So, along the lines of what I have done with Operation Courage to ensure that there is a single front door and clear pathways that people can navigate, we must ensure that there are addiction pathways through these treatment services.

I ask my hon. Friend to come and see me in the Department, and perhaps we can visit Tom Harrison House. This has long been an issue for me. The third sector does amazing stuff in this field, but some organisations will not treat people until they have finished drinking, or whatever the addiction challenge may be, and we have to do more on that. I would like to visit Tom Harrison House and really listen to hear what the people there would do with the current situation. We have a sort of trailblazer going on in the NHS with Op Courage, and I do not see why we cannot do that with addiction services.

My hon. Friend talked about having a zero-tolerance approach in terms of people who have served. We do not have a zero-tolerance approach to those who are using drug and alcohol services; we provide support. I have seen that in units down in Plymouth, where people have received support for alcohol abuse. There certainly used to be a zero-tolerance approach to drugs, but there is not one now. We do what we can, cognisant of the way that society has changed. However, we are very clear that drug use is not compatible with service life, and that position has been upheld and proved time and again.

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[Johnny Mercer]

Yes, of course I will. I give a commitment to the Committee to work with my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton to design the pathways and report back in future on what we can do better. With those assurances, I hope he will agree to withdraw the motion.

[Dan Carden]

I thank the Minister for the way that he has engaged with these issues, and for the work that he has already done. One of the key problems that we have is the poor set of data, and I look forward to working with him to see what we can do in the Bill on those issues. In the light of the Minister’s commitments to meet and his offer to visit Tom Harrison House, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 7

Welfare of Operation Banner veterans

“No later than 12 months following the day on which this Act is passed, and every 12 months thereafter, the Secretary of State must publish a report which must include the number of Operation Banner veterans who—

(a) have contacted the Office of Veteran Affairs,

(b) are accessing mental health treatment,

(c) are in the street homeless population, and

(d) are within the prison population.”—(Mr Jones.)

This new clause will ensure that the Government offers consideration to the overall welfare of those service personnel that served in Operation Banner.

Brought up, and read the First time.

--- Later in debate ---

[Johnny Mercer]

Not at this moment, no.

I cannot rewrite history, and I cannot promise every last penny that was lost out on because people did not achieve their long service and good conduct. There is no mechanism possible to make that happen. What I will do, and what we are doing at the moment as part of cross-Government activity involving the Cabinet Office, the Ministry of Defence, the Office for Veterans’ Affairs and the Home Office, is find a mechanism, working with Fighting with Pride, Stonewall and others, to address the appalling injustice for this cohort of veterans.

I give a commitment today to write to the Prime Minister to ask him to reflect on my apology to the LGBT community last year, and to ask him to consider doing so at a national level. I know that will not correct it, but it will go some way towards alleviation. I saw the impact of my apology. It is easy for those who are not in that cohort to downplay an apology or not to want to do it, because of its ramifications, but apologies are important for the cohort that went through this experience. I will write to the Prime Minister on that issue today.

In light of those things, I do not want to duplicate the work that is going on at the moment, because I want to get a solution for all these people, like Fighting with Pride, with which I am in constant communication. With those reassurances, I hope the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton will agree to withdraw his new clause and to work with me to get to a place where this cohort is properly looked after and some sort of restorative justice takes place, in line with what I have done already. I hope he has confidence in what I have done already and in my commitment to go much further in future.

[Dan Carden]

I thank the Minister for his considered response and for committing to write to the Prime Minister. I will withdraw the new clause at this time. There is a long way to go in the Bill, and I look forward to working with the Minister. The fact that he is working with Fighting with Pride and Stonewall is very positive. This is an issue of such importance that I would like to see it dealt with on a cross-party basis, with some agreement, so that restorative justice is finally done for these servicemen and women. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

Schedule 1

Constitution of the Court Martial

Amendment proposed: 1, in schedule 1, page 38, line 11, at end insert

“or lower ranks after a minimum service of 3 years”.—(Martin Docherty-Hughes.)

This amendment would extend Common Law rights for people to be tried by a jury of their peers to be extended to those in the Armed Forces.