Armed Forces: Reserve Forces

Lord Bishop of Wakefield Excerpts

Thursday 1st November 2012 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Bishop of Wakefield]

My Lords, the loss of two more soldiers in the past two or three weeks—to whom I pay particular tribute—reminds me of the price that the people of Yorkshire in particular have paid in terms of losses in Afghanistan. Scenes of grieving families outside our cathedral in Wakefield before and after military funerals have become all too frequent. In the light of this, I am particularly proud that two priests in the diocese of Wakefield are reservists. I hope that the noble Lords, Lord Freeman and Lord Lee, and the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Stirrup, will consider the Church of England to be a model employer in these circumstances. Each priest has served a three-month tour in Afghanistan, and one is likely to serve there again in the not-too-distant future. I have kept up with issues of morale and resources through one of the priests; he briefs me regularly. He is involved in training reservists at York, Catterick and elsewhere.

The strategic defence and security review, with which I engaged previously in this Chamber, has already had an impact in these areas. There is an understandable pressure on reservists to play an ever more important role in the UK Armed Forces by providing a greater and more integrated proportion of total manpower. This means that there ought to be an urgent strategic review of the welfare, healthcare and support needs of both serving military personnel and their families. Not long ago, I attended an excellent briefing by the Ministry of Defence on our military reservists and on the strategy for the future. I give particular thanks to the Minister for arranging that and a number of other excellent briefings over the past two years.

Clearly, the Future Reserves 2020 report is central to the plans of Her Majesty’s Government for increased reliance on reservists. It makes crucial reference to increasing welfare support to these people and their families while they are engaged in operations. However, it provides virtually no plan or strategy for precisely what is required or how it should be achieved. This stands in contrast to the conclusions of the 2009 Ministry of Defence report on the strategic role of reserves, where again the argument about the need for improved support was made.

It is perfectly clear that we will need to rely more and more on people giving freely of their time in the naval, Air Force and Army reserves. Our resources are stretched severely because of the fragility of the international situation in any number of different theatres. I hope that as a result of this important debate—for the securing of which I thank the noble Lord, Lord Freeman—Her Majesty’s Government will assure us of a proper level of support such as that for which I have argued, and also of proper resources and back-up for the operations in which they are to be engaged.

We owe all of our military an enormous debt at this time, as ever. Furthermore, our reservists, of course, give of their time entirely through their own generosity. Theology has had a bad name among politicians going even back to the time of Harold Wilson’s premiership, so I have avoided theology thus far. However, I must describe this extraordinary and courageous generosity as an outpouring of grace. I wish to give thanks unreservedly—excuse the pun—for the graciousness of these people and their continuing demonstration of that through their service.