Armed Forces Commissioner Bill

Lord Hardie Excerpts

Consideration of Commons amendments and / or reasons
Wednesday 11th June 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Goldie (Con)]

My Lords, having dealt with the technicalities of process, I once again thank all noble Lords from across the House who supported my amendments to the Bill on Report, and I thank all those in the other place who also gave their support.

Throughout the passage of the Bill, the Official Opposition have approached it in a constructive manner: we have challenged the Government when necessary, but we have also sought to be supportive. In that vein, I have tabled my Amendments 2B and 2C, in lieu of the Government’s Amendment 2A made in the other place.

In the debate on my initial amendments in the other place, the Minister for the Armed Forces said that the amendments,

“while well intentioned, are unnecessary because the Bill is already designed to provide a voice for armed forces personnel and their families outside the chain of command”.—[Official Report, Commons, 3/6/25; col. 188.]

Indeed, the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, has just repeated that argument. I agree that the Bill provides a voice for Armed Forces personnel outside the chain of command and that is fundamental to the role of the commissioner, but this does not mean that my amendment is either unnecessary or irrelevant.

All Governments go through a black cloud and search for a silver lining. I am handing the Government a silver lining on a plate, because with my amendments the Bill puts the Government and our Armed Forces personnel in a good place. Let me explain why. As I argued on Report, and my right honourable friend Mark Francois argued in the other place, “whistleblowing” is a recognisable term. It is recognisable in law, in the Police Reform Act 2002 and in the Armed Forces Act 2006. Most importantly, it is recognisable by the thousands of Armed Forces personnel who know exactly what whistleblowing means and who would benefit from this enhancement.

If Parliament has already deemed it appropriate to give the Service Complaints Commissioner a function to investigate concerns raised by whistleblowers about the military police, how can the Government argue that their new Armed Forces commissioner should not have a similar function? This is a question of consistency and fairness. This is not a two-tier system, as the Minister was arguing. I am offering a Rolls-Royce version of what is already in the Bill.

That is why I disagree with the Government in their Amendment 2A, which will place a duty on the commissioner to ensure that the reports do not contain any information which could be used to personally identify a person who requested that an investigation take place. This is a welcome first step. It is at least a tacit admission by the Government that the Bill as originally drafted did not go far enough in safeguarding individuals making a confidential disclosure. But it is just that: a first step. The Government’s amendment in lieu does not go far enough. It also does not accept the unique meaning of whistleblowing, as the noble Baroness, Lady Kramer, so eloquently stressed on Report. I thank her especially for her support.

I therefore propose a new amendment, Amendment 2C, as a reasonable compromise between what I have set out to do and what the Government have proposed. It seeks to insert a new clause which contains the same definition of “a whistleblower” as the original but with two important additions. First, in proposed new Clause 340IC(2) I have included a duty on the commissioner to

“take all reasonable precautions to ensure the anonymity of the whistleblower”

when the commissioner is investigating a whistleblowing concern relating to general service welfare matters. Secondly, in the spirit of constructive engagement, which I have endeavoured to reflect throughout the passage of the Bill, I have listened to the Government’s suggestions and included new subsections (4) and (5), which provide for the commissioner to produce a report once they have completed an investigation into a concern raised by a whistleblower, with a requirement that the report

“must not include information which identifies the whistleblower or enables them to be identified, except with their consent”.

As noble Lords can see, this new amendment therefore includes both my and the Government’s proposals for whistleblowing. I hope that the Minister can see that I genuinely want this to operate in the most effective manner. I hope, perhaps in vain, that he can support this improved amendment. His remarks this afternoon indicate the contrary. I have taken on board his previous reservations and sought to allay them.

Let us not forget how vital it is to improve the treatment of our service personnel. I have mentioned before the horrifying case of Jaysley Beck, who was sexually abused and tormented relentlessly before taking her own life. On Report, I referred to the BBC Wiltshire reports of the horrific accounts of alleged rape and sexual assault from three women. One of them was in the Navy, another was in the RAF and the third is still serving in the Army. Just last week, we saw the tragic case of Lance Corporal Bernard Mongan, who was found dead in his bedroom at Catterick Garrison in 2020. The inquest into his death heard that he was consistently degraded and undermined by his superiors, with a friend saying that bullying would be an “understatement”. Another friend told the inquest that communication is an issue and a failing—the system should have worked.

The system has not been working. It is not working. We have an opportunity to do our bit to rectify this. I hope that the House agrees and supports Motion A1. I beg to move.

[Lord Hardie (CB)]

My Lords, I have listened carefully to the noble Baroness’s response, but I wonder if she could help me to understand a point raised by the Minister. It appears from proposed new subsection (1) that if a whistleblower is involved with the commissioner, the whistleblower controls the investigation. The whistleblower can stop any investigation by the commissioner, even if the commissioner has information from other sources. Does the noble Baroness think that that is a reasonable approach?