First World War: Centenary

Lord Jones Excerpts

Monday 4th March 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Jones]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend for the debate, and my noble friend Lord Maxton for his pertinent speech. Here today in our safe, gilded, gothic palace, one can only be humbled and astounded by the loyalty, gallantry and resilience of Britain’s World War 1 regiments, of her naval fleet, of the Royal Flying Corps and the army of resourceful women who sustained British industrial production.

I have attended moving remembrance events at our village high school in Hawarden—Gladstone’s Hawarden. The students gave a lead of compelling dignity and sincerity, quoting from the novel All Quiet on the Western Front, reading World War 1 poetry, playing ancient films and offering the simplest of prayers. I hope the Department for Culture, Media and Sport will consult with our high schools concerning commemoration. They have a lot to offer.

Erich Maria Remarque’s novel is the story of a lost generation, of a modern and mechanised war. It is about terror—either waiting for death or trying desperately to avoid it, even if it means killing a complete stranger to avoid it. It is a depiction of the terror of heavy shelling, of losing a leg, of crawling blinded into No Man’s Land, and of being gassed. It is about the stench, the filth, the mud, the vermin and the blood and bone of all-out war. I just hope that the 2014 commemoration will ultimately be a hymn of praise for that war’s poor bloody infantry.