Lord Tomlinson
Main Page: Lord Tomlinson (Labour - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Tomlinson's debates with the Ministry of Defence
(5 years, 4 months ago)
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Earl Howe
My Lords, my understanding from the trust is that that is exactly its intention. The overwhelming majority of the 22,442 names on the memorial will be British, but troops of 38 different nationalities will be commemorated. Predominantly they were from Commonwealth countries and Europe, but there is also provision to record the contribution of the Merchant Navy, French agents who were parachuted in to observe German movements and the SOE, as well as war correspondents.
Lord Tomlinson (Lab)
Does the Minister accept that as well as acknowledging and commemorating the valour of all those who died in the past, it is equally important that we safeguard the institutions of Europe which were devised to try to make sure that war like that never happens again? Will he therefore recommend to people who talk about recalling the valour of the past that they should not capriciously destroy the institutions of the European Union, which are there to prevent war happening again?
Earl Howe
My Lords, I have sympathy with the spirit of the noble Lord’s question but of course we now have the NATO alliance, which represents the values of all western nations. Although we are leaving the European Union, we are not leaving Europe in terms of the values that we share with our European friends and the defence of the international rules-based order.