Armed Forces Bill

Lord Craig of Radley Excerpts

Report stage
Tuesday 23rd November 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Craig of Radley (CB)]

My Lords, I support the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay of Clashfern, on Amendment 4, and I support his Amendment 17. He has brought to your Lordships’ attention an example of where due regard is necessary from the Secretary of State. When he did so in Committee, I said that I had another one, and I would like to take the opportunity to spell that out, because this cannot be devolved or left to local authorities to be dealt with.

Some servicemen recruited in Hong Kong were full members of Her Majesty’s Armed Forces, having taken the oath of allegiance and paid full UK taxes on their pay. They held British passports; some trained in this country or elsewhere to fit them for their role in Hong Kong; some were involved in jungle-style warfare training in Borneo; one large unit was sent to Cyprus to release further UK armed personnel for Operation Granby, the first Gulf War in 1991. Many in the Royal Navy Hong Kong Squadron served worldwide on Her Majesty’s ships. Now retired, they are still rightly classified as UK veterans and deserve fair treatment under the military covenant. But a few who served in those units that disbanded in 1997 missed out when allocations to retain their British citizenship were made in 1984. Some but not all of these servicemen were indeed allowed to retain their British passports and citizenships. Those that were missed out and overlooked have long been campaigning for a return of this right, which has been replaced by BN(O) status without the benefit of full British citizenship. This injustice occurred when they were still serving.

Their case was first raised in this House in 1986, over 35 years ago. It has been recommended by the Hong Kong LegCo and was strongly supported by Lord MacLehose, drawing on his long and distinguished tour as governor of Hong Kong from 1971 to 1972. The Minister who wound up that debate about Hong Kong replied:

“I hope that your Lordships will recognise that there are some complex issues to be considered here … But, again, I can assure your Lordships that we shall give this the most careful consideration.”—[Official Report, 20/1/1986; col. 102.]


Note that promise of careful consideration. Nothing happened. Nothing further was said or done. Regrettably, repeated assurance of careful, active consideration by the Home Office to this day still produces no decision. Surely these few veterans deserve better—a definitive answer, not just prevarication and stalling behind a misleading false promise of active consideration. How many more years of consideration do the Government require? Are the Home Office hoping that when the veterans are all dead the problem will be forgotten?

Following the enactment of the convenant in 2011, a small association, of which I am privileged to be honorary patron, was formed by some former members of the Hong Kong Military Service Corps to press their case again. I myself have repeatedly raised it in debates and Questions for Written Answer and written to the Prime Minister to support representations by those affected in Hong Kong. I am far from alone. Over the past nine years or more, many Members of both Houses have approached Ministers, Home Secretaries and Prime Ministers on behalf of these veterans, but over the past decade the response has been increasingly incredible and ridiculous—that is, that it is under active consideration.

Over 18 months ago, at their request, I forwarded 64 individual applications from those Military Service Corps veterans to the Home Secretary. None has been answered. There has not even been an acknowledgment from the Home Office. Understandably, the present situation in Hong Kong has strengthened the wish for this matter to be resolved and for those now few remaining individuals to be treated as full citizens. Will this Government at last do the right thing for these veterans?

Surely this is a further extreme example of the reason for a duty of care and due regard to be placed in statute on the Secretary of State. I am sure in future other issues affecting a group of veterans, not just individuals, will arise, which cannot be dealt with at devolved or local authority level. The Royal British Legion and other service charities have provided cogent arguments why it is not right to exclude central government from a statutory duty of due regard for veterans. I endorse that view based on their detailed and dedicated experience helping the veteran community. I strongly support this amendment.

[Lord Alton of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, I am very pleased to support Amendment 4, in the names of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay of Clashfern, the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, the noble Baroness, Lady Smith of Newnham, and my friend the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig of Radley. As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay, told us, his amendment gives us the opportunity to address specific injustices experienced by our ex-servicemen and he is absolutely right in telling us that the lead on this should not be local authorities but national government. That is why not only are we right to hang specific cases on this amendment, but the purpose of the amendment itself is also clear and right.

Over the past decade, my noble and gallant friend and I have knocked on the doors of Ministers and raised questions on behalf of Hong Kong veterans. I know how greatly he is admired and respected by that cohort for his dedication and commitment to their cause. We have also worked with Mr Andrew Rosindell, the Member of Parliament for Romford, who has put great energy into putting right what is a clear injustice. The treatment of Hong Kong ex-servicemen has not been commensurate with the Armed Forces covenant, and the noble and learned Lord and others are seeking to put it right.

I also pay tribute to Roger Ching, the chairperson of the HKOR Benevolent Association, and who says of the treatment of Hong Kong’s ex-servicemen that

“The attitude of successive Governments towards servicemen and women and veterans is appalling.”


In 2014, my noble and gallant friend and I met with the late James Brokenshire when he was a Home Office Minister. He was characteristically courteous, but neither he nor a series of successive Home Secretaries have been able to correct the signal injustice faced by Hong Kong’s ex-servicemen.

It is worth recalling that, from 1857 until 1997, more than 40,000 Hong Kong men lost their lives protecting our interests and the interests of the Crown. In the Great War, 100,000 British-Chinese soldiers served on the Western Front, and by the time of the Armistice the Chinese Labour Corps numbered nearly 96,000 men. In subsequent conflicts, they served alongside British servicemen: in the Second World War, in Korea, in the Malayan anti-communist campaigns and elsewhere, as the noble and gallant Lord has told us. In this month of all months, we should not only honour that contribution but do something practical to show that with memory of past sacrifice comes contemporary engagement with a long-running failure to honour the past.

In July 2006, the United Kingdom granted full British citizenship to all British Gurkha soldiers and their dependants who had served in Hong Kong. It was a generous and good decision. But why has there been such a different treatment for all but a handful of Hong Kong veterans? When Hong Kong was handed back to the Chinese Communist Party in 1997, a points- based system meant that only 159 of the 654 soldiers who applied to live in the United Kingdom were successful.

Campaigners responded to that clear injustice, and one group, 38 Degrees, even set up a petition which gathered more than 117,000 signatures. Yet the response since right of abode was set up in 1997 has failed to bring a settlement, with successive Home Secretaries repeating the mantra of which my noble and gallant friend has reminded us this afternoon: that the applications are “under consideration”. For how much longer are we to be given this unsatisfactory, stalling response?

Last year, Rosie Laydon, a presenter and reporter for Forces TV, was in touch with me. She said:

“British Hong Kong veterans do not feel the current Government offer of visas to those with BNO status offers adequate recognition of their service. They have told me that they believe they should be granted British citizenship unconditionally”—


and I agree. They also told her that, as former members of the British Armed Forces, under Chinese national security laws, now imposed on Hong Kong, they are liable to be charged with spying for the United Kingdom Government.

Here I should declare that I am a patron of Hong Kong Watch, a vice-chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Hong Kong and sanctioned, along with the noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy of The Shaws, by the CCP after taking part, in my case, in an international team monitoring the district council elections in 2019. Since then, we have seen the enactment of the CCP’s draconian national security law, and I should like to hear from the Minister, for whom I have enormous respect, as she knows, what assessment she has made of the implications of loyal service to the Crown for the safety of our ex-servicemen in Hong Kong. We need to see this matter is a question of honour, but we also need to see it as a question of safety and security.

Recently, the noble Lord, Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon, told me in a Parliamentary Answer:

“The National Security Law is being used to systematically stifle rights and freedoms, not protect public security.”


He also wrote:

“The UK is deeply concerned about the situation in Hong Kong and the systematic erosion of rights and freedoms and the high degree of autonomy enshrined in the Sino-British Joint Declaration.”


Perhaps when the Minister replies, she can tell us when the United Kingdom is going to do anything more to hold the People’s Republic of China to account for the destruction of the basic freedoms of Hong Kong.

Meanwhile, I point out to your Lordships’ House that the Times has reported that the Foreign Secretary, Liz Truss, says that the CCP is “committing genocide” in Xinjiang—something that the House will return to on Thursday. In the context of Xinjiang, Tibet and Taiwan, I may add that there have been more than 150 sorties trying to intimidate Taiwan in the course of just five days. In Xinjiang, we have heard the United States Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, say that

“the forcing of men, women and children into concentration camps”—

his words—

“trying to, in effect, re-educate them to be adherents to the ideology of the Chinese Communist Party, all of that speaks to an effort to commit genocide.”

Is it any wonder, then, that loyal servants of the Crown fear for the consequences of being abandoned in Hong Kong? The CCP has imprisoned lawyers, dissenters, pastors and journalists, such as the young woman, Zhang Zhan, tortured and jailed for four years for shining a light into the origins of the Covid pandemic in Wuhan. On Friday last, concerned for her deteriorating health, the United Nations called for her release.

In this context of arbitrary arrest, imprisonment, torture and re-education—even genocide—who can seriously doubt that Hong Kong’s ex-servicemen, like Afghan interpreters or judges, will be primary targets as “two systems, one country” becomes “one system, one party, one ideology”? Recall that this is the same CCP responsible for the massacres in Tiananmen Square and for the enormities of the Cultural Revolution—and the deaths of 50 million Chinese people.

Through the Armed Forces covenant, we have the opportunity to demonstrate that we will not abandon loyal servants of the Crown, that we do not forget our debt of honour and obligations and that Parliament will go on supporting my noble and gallant friend until this wrong has been put right. It is for those reasons that I strongly support the amendment placed before your Lordships’ House by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay of Clashfern.

--- Later in debate ---

This is bizarre and it is an anomaly. It really must be addressed favourably and in a short timeframe. As the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig of Radley, said earlier, this issue, particularly in relation to Hong Kong, has been raised time and again, not year after year but decade after decade. The time to solve this one is now. I very much hope that the noble Baroness and the Government will move quickly on this issue. It is high time to do so.

[Lord Craig of Radley (CB)]

My Lords, I support Amendment 26. I believe that, until the issue of citizenship is resolved in favour of the few remaining veterans of the Royal Navy Hong Kong Squadron and other military members of Her Majesty’s Armed Forces recruited there, they deserve de minimis to benefit from this financial concession on the grounds of their full status as veterans. I have already in Amendment 4 explained the full background to these claims. Let us see whether the Government are finally able to make up their mind in favour of these long-standing requests. What response will the Minister make now—and please will she not just respond that it will be actively considered?

--- Later in debate ---

I have nothing more to add today. Bearing in mind everything that I have said about these weapons systems in the past, I have made my position plain. I do not think the issue is going to go away. The way the amendment has been formed has been interpreted as a one-off event but I have to make it clear to Parliament, the House and the Minister that this is not my intention. The review that I think has to take place, which has to be reported on to Parliament by senior Ministers, who must come and explain it in a way that makes it clear that they fully understand these weapons and why they have made these decisions, is just the beginning of a long-standing process. This is an issue that will be with us for a long time, and we need to start thinking, in a relationship between the Government, Parliament and the country, about where we want to be with these weapons systems.

[Lord Craig of Radley (CB)]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Browne of Ladyton, has given us a very thoughtful, well-researched and deeply troubling series of remarks about the future in this area. I wanted to concentrate on a rather narrower point. Those who are ordered to fight for the interests of this country must do so—now and in the future, as more novel technologies find their way into kinetic operations—in the certain knowledge that their participation, and the way in which they participate, is lawful in both national and international jurisdictions. As has become evident in some of the asymmetric operations of recent years, there is real evidence that post-conflict legal challenges arise, and future operations may prove impossible to clear up quickly and comprehensively unless we have thought deeply about it.

Risking one’s life is a big ask, but to combine it with a risk of tortuous and protracted legal aftermath is totally unacceptable. I support the simple thrust of the amendment to demonstrate that the Government indeed have this matter under active review, as one must expect them to. It is infinitely better that the answers to these issues are there before a further operation has to be waged, not after it is over, when issues that should have been foreseen and dealt with press on individuals and others in our Armed Forces. Should the protection of combat immunity not be brought into the frame of discussion and resolution of this seriously troublesome issue?

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Browne of Ladyton, and the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig, in supporting Amendment 29, which the noble Lord introduced so persuasively, as he did a similar amendment on the overseas operations Bill that I signed and in Grand Committee on this Bill—I apologise for being unable to support him then. Since we are on Report, I will be brief, especially given the hour. Of course I do not need to explain to the Minister my continuing interest in this area.

We eagerly await the defence AI strategy coming down the track but, as the noble Lord said, the very real fear is that autonomous weapons will undermine the international laws of war, and the noble and gallant Lord made clear the dangers of that. In consequence, a great number of questions arise about liability and accountability, particularly in criminal law. Such questions are important enough in civil society, and we have an AI governance White Paper coming down the track, but in military operations it will be crucial that they are answered.

From the recent exchange that the Minister had with the House on 1 November during an Oral Question that I asked about the Government’s position on the control of lethal autonomous weapons, I believe that the amendment is required more than ever. The Minister, having said:

“The UK and our partners are unconvinced by the calls for a further binding instrument”


to limit lethal autonomous weapons, said further:

“At this time, the UK believes that it is actually more important to understand the characteristics of systems with autonomy that would or would not enable them to be used in compliance with”


international human rights law,

“using this to set our potential norms of use and positive obligations.”

That seems to me to be a direct invitation to pass this amendment. Any review of this kind should be conducted in the light of day, as we suggest in the amendment, in a fully accountable manner.