Mental Health Services: Serving Military Personnel

Lord Robathan Excerpts

Thursday 14th January 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Campbell-Savours (Lab)]

My Lords—

[Lord Robathan (Con)]

My Lords—

[The Lord Privy Seal (Baroness Stowell of Beeston) (Con)]

My Lords, we have plenty of time; we started early. I leave it to the two noble Lords to decide between themselves.

[Earl Howe]

My Lords, as someone who has returned to being a Defence Minister after a break of 20 years, there is no doubt in my mind that the Armed Forces have come a very long way in that time. They take the mental health of their personnel extremely seriously. As one would expect, the model adopted is one of best practice, prevention, early detection and the ready availability of evidence-based treatments. This applies not just during a deployment but pre-deployment and post-deployment as well.

[Lord Robathan]

My Lords, I am sure that the whole House would welcome the improved understanding of mental health issues in the Armed Forces, and, indeed, the improved provision for those who, sadly, develop mental health issues. But would my noble friend agree that most of the Armed Forces are not affected by mental health issues when they are serving and that there is a danger, by concentrating on this, that serving personnel are undermined because they feel that they are being pitied, rather than respected for the excellent work that they do?

[Earl Howe]

I hope that service personnel do not feel that way, and rather that they feel well supported, but my noble friend is right. It is notable that incidence of post-traumatic stress disorder, for example, is extremely low in the UK Armed Forces in numerical terms. One can attribute that, in very large measure, to the services and support that are now available to Armed Forces personnel, both in this country and on deployment.