Veterans Care Sector: Government Role

Debate between Johnny Mercer and Rebecca Pow

Tuesday 25th October 2016 Commons Chamber

[Johnny Mercer]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention and absolutely support what he says. We are reaching a point where demand is going up and the mindset of war is declining, and the moneys are in decline as well. If we do not get this right now, it will be far too late to do so in 2020.

[Rebecca Pow (Taunton Deane) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making a very passionate case, as always. Go Commando, a charity in Taunton Deane, does great work to support not only veterans, but their families, which is so important. Initiatives such as children’s centres, holiday vouchers, days out and the provision of emotional and practical help could be very good models for the Government to incorporate into all the things that my hon. Friend is suggesting.

[Johnny Mercer]

Absolutely. I thank my hon. Friend for her intervention. We are not asking for the moon on a stick; there are some brilliant practices out there—not only in this country, but internationally—that we could learn from quickly. The services are there, but the Government have a job to do to bring everything together.

The third sector remains deeply challenging, and that is the reason for this debate. There are almost 2,500 military charities and funds in the UK today. Okay, many are regimental or sub-unit funds that are not in day-to-day use, but that figure gives a picture of the chaos. I would not have called this debate if I thought that every single one of those charities was doing good. This is an awkward conversation, but if we did not have it we would be doing a disservice to those whom we are trying to help.

Some charities struggle with financial management; some are plainly criminal. Some practise evidence-based therapies or treatments; some are a vehicle to further their own unproven treatments, however well-meaning they may be. Some are run professionally, with complaints structures and staff management routines; others are a disaster.

We must now sort out that problem, for as time goes on the Iraq and Afghanistan generation of warriors will fade from memory. We will be on the same pages as the Falklands and the Gulf war, and in the same chapter as the Americans in Vietnam. Moreover, the public will stop giving, and understandably so. The income of some of our major charities is down by a third this financial year. No organisation can sustain that. The LIBOR funding that has sustained us for so long will eventually run out. Yet the duty to our veterans will only increase as the scars of our recent wars reveal themselves in communities up and down this land. Referrals to Combat Stress are up 71%.

Now is the time to have this fight—this dirty fight—of sorting out the third sector. I cannot help feeling that most of the sector would thank us for it. They loathe the criminal charities as much as I do, and they feel as sick as I do when, as they struggle like everyone else, unproven methods or groups attract Government funding. They curse the lack of a common needs assessment, which means that they have to start each case from scratch, causing more trauma to the individual using their services. If we do not have this fight—the Government are the only ones who can do it—it will look like we do not care and do not want to have this conversation because it is too difficult, too dirty, for us to get involved.

I am afraid that this comes back to what I discussed at the beginning, namely duty. This Government have a duty, not to always deliver, for the charities do that better than we ever could, but to ensure the provision of veterans care in this country. That includes ensuring that it is accessible to all, particularly our most vulnerable communities, perhaps through a single point of contact; too many have no idea how to access some of the brilliant services provided by our third sector. It also means ensuring that the care is of a standard and safety applicable to those who have served—and, indeed, to any other UK citizen—and that it is evidence based and correctly staffed by qualified personnel. We also need to ensure that cases are managed and individuals guided through the enormously complex treatment pathways, and that the great British public, who have carried this torch for so long, do not get ripped off by individuals raising money for a cause to which they will never stop giving.

Charities: Veterans Care Sector

Debate between Johnny Mercer and Rebecca Pow

Thursday 24th March 2016 Commons Chamber

[Rebecca Pow (Taunton Deane) (Con)]

I really do congratulate my hon. Friend on his impassioned speech, and on his research. I, too, would like to say that we must remember the families of the veterans. I pay tribute to Go Commando, the charity in my constituency, which does so much for veterans. The families left at home have raised money to do such good work for 40 Commando and all the marines and their families, to give them holidays and days out, and to give them children’s centres and help and support.

[Johnny Mercer]

Yes, it comes back to what I said about these groups, which, often out of a sense of duty, or as a result of identifying a gap in their local area, just step up and do it, for no other reason than to deliver care to our servicemen and women. We are very lucky to have that as a country.

Over the years, matched by this gratitude in many of us, there grew an increasing bewilderment at the MOD’s reticence to genuinely commit to the care of our men and women when they return home. I say “genuinely commit” carefully. Efforts have been made—of that there can be no doubt, but the truth is that we must measure the success of those efforts not simply by what we have put into them, but by the experience of those going through the system, readjusting to life after service, or finding a suitable quality of care for complex injuries suffered on the battlefield.

Now is the time to do this. In 2014, the UK ended combat operations in Afghanistan. That ended over a decade of two very intense and very public conflicts, which inspired the great British public to donate. Those days are now gone and we will not see them return anytime soon, such is the global political appetite for large-scale interventions of that type. This end of public operations and subsequent awareness of it, is conversely matched by a huge increase in demand for veterans services across the United Kingdom. In just the past year, referrals to Combat Stress went up 28%. The hidden wounds programme run by Help for Heroes has seen 500 referrals from a standing start a year ago. Regrettably, there is little evidence of a Government Department attempting to gauge the true scale of the needs of the veteran, serving and military family community as a whole. Nor is there evidence that the Government are trying to track progress against that need. How do we, as a nation, know, year on year, whether we are doing a good job or a bad one in this area? There were no universal measures of lives rebuilt or lives yet to be rebuilt that accommodate the good work that is already being done by the Ministry of Defence, the NHS, the Department for Work and Pensions, charities, British businesses and volunteers. Without strategic and structured measures implemented in a timely manner, therefore, a lack of action now will ultimately cost the nation more in the future in terms of the healthcare we offer to our veterans and their families and the finance required to maintain a fundamentally unsustainable model.

Mental Health (Armed Forces Veterans)

Debate between Johnny Mercer and Rebecca Pow

Wednesday 14th October 2015 Commons Chamber

[Johnny Mercer]

Mental health and the time lag involved is increasingly well publicised, and people are becoming more aware of it, but we have a long way to go on that and we see that on a daily basis.

Our British public have in the latter part of the last decade been the knight in shining armour flying over the horizon and rescuing some of our most war-scarred individuals. They have given millions upon millions of pounds, and donated time, effort, blood, sweat and tears to looking after our boys and girls. They are, quite simply, what makes Britain great, and what make us, when we are away, so proud, and fight so hard for the country we love.

Similarly, now this Government have for the first time been elected on a manifesto that explicitly stated a parity between mental and physical health—the first time in history that has occurred. Similarly, we now have waiting time target lists for mental health, again for the first time in history. This Government get it, and I am proud to be a part of it, and I thank the Minister personally for his valiant efforts in this regard. There is so much further to go, however, to win what I would call part of an internal “generational struggle” of ours in veterans care.

Finally tonight I wanted to guard against a misunderstanding of the problem. The vast majority of servicemen and women in this country make a stable and successful transition back to civilian life. They are cornerstones of our communities—directors of companies, nurses, doctors, shopkeepers, lawyers and manufacturers.

Our job in this place is to look after the 10%, those who through no fault of their own find life a daily struggle, those who with a bit of bad luck or a couple of poor decisions could be any one of us and, in particular tonight, that refers to those who have often given their best years in the service of the nation, but have found returning to a civilian life the hardest fight of all.

[Rebecca Pow]

We should always mention the families because they are often deeply affected and we need to support them.

[Johnny Mercer]

I agree.

So let us now win this fight and take our place as a country at the vanguard of contemporary veterans care. In five years’ time it will be too late. The momentum in the battle will be lost, and we will simply be fighting fires. The politics of good intentions and at times tokenism is finished; we must get this right, and I look forward to it being prioritised as such in the forthcoming strategic defence and security review.