Oral Answers to Questions

Michael Tomlinson Excerpts

Monday 18th February 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

We want to enjoy the benefits of the Minister’s mellifluous tones. That was my only exhortation. It is quite understandable that a Minister looks back at a Member, but the rest of the House wants to savour the experience of hearing him.

[Michael Tomlinson (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (Con)]

14. What recent assessment he has made of the importance of NATO to UK national security.

[The Secretary of State for Defence (Gavin Williamson)]

Last week I joined NATO Defence Ministers to discuss progress made towards fairer burden-sharing and increasing the readiness of all our armed forces.

[Michael Tomlinson]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that, as we leave the European Union, we will of course continue to co-operate with our European friends and allies, but that it is NATO that is the bedrock of European security? Does also he agree that all talk of an EU army is an unhelpful distraction?

Oral Answers to Questions

Michael Tomlinson Excerpts

Monday 23rd October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Michael Tomlinson (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (Con)]

19. I was in Iraqi Kurdistan for the recent referendum and had the privilege of meeting troops from 2nd Battalion the Mercian Regiment who are training the peshmerga in the fight against Daesh. I am bound to say that I was very impressed by what I saw, but given the Secretary of State’s positive and welcome assessment of the campaign, what next for our armed forces in the fight against Daesh?

[Sir Michael Fallon]

It is important that we keep up the fight against Daesh until it has been pushed right up to the Syrian border in Iraq and defeated there, and that we then begin the process of stabilisation and reconciliation in the provinces of Anbar and Nineveh to ensure that all those people—Sunni and Shi’a—realise that they have a stake in the future security of Iraq.

Counter-Daesh Update

Michael Tomlinson Excerpts

Thursday 13th July 2017 Commons Chamber

[Sir Michael Fallon]

On the first point, of course we want Syria to move towards a new political settlement and we continue to encourage that. So far as the existence of moderate armed opposition in Syria is concerned, I am sure that the hon. Gentleman understands that the civil war would not be in its seventh year if there had not been formidable moderate armed opposition to the Syrian regime. Who does he think has been fighting Assad? It is important to recognise the progress that has been made since December 2015 in reducing Daesh and the amount of Syrian territory that it holds, in starting the battle to defeat it in its capital, Raqqa, and thus overall to reduce the threat that Daesh poses to the UK. I am only sorry that, although we had the support of 67 other countries throughout the world, we did not have the support of the Scottish National party.

[Michael Tomlinson (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (Con)]

I, too, welcome the Secretary of State’s statement. In particular, I welcome his comment about reducing the risk and the number of civilian casualties. Perhaps for the benefit of those who have just entered the Chamber he could repeat the number of civilian casualties there have been as a result of our actions and repeat his confirmation and assurance that he will do all he can to reduce further such risks?

[Sir Michael Fallon]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend but I am not sure that you, Mr Deputy Speaker, would welcome me repeating too much of the statement that I gave earlier. However, I emphasise that I believe it is because of the rules of engagement that we set, the careful use of intelligence and reconnaissance from the air, the skill of our pilots, and the precision of the weapons that are selected for each strike that we are able to say that, to the best of our knowledge, we have not caused significant civilian casualties on the ground.

Oral Answers to Questions

Michael Tomlinson Excerpts

Monday 10th July 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Ellwood]

That is absolutely the intention. The hon. Gentleman is right to look at the life satisfaction survey, which is one reason behind some of the initiatives that I have mentioned, including the various reviews that are taking place.

[Michael Tomlinson (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (Con)]

11. What plans the Government have to increase the defence budget in this Parliament.

[The Secretary of State for Defence (Sir Michael Fallon)]

Our defence budget for 2017-18 is £36 billion, and we are committed to increasing it by at least half a per cent above inflation every year of this Parliament. In addition, we are committed to continuing to meet the NATO guideline to spend at least 2% of our GDP on defence until 2022. Those two commitments will ensure that our armed forces can help to keep Britain safe.

[Michael Tomlinson]

The United Kingdom leads the way, with the biggest defence budget in Europe, but what more can be done to encourage other nations to play their part and increase their spending to protect our collective security?

[Sir Michael Fallon]

Since the Wales summit in 2014, defence spending by our allies in Europe has been increasing. Three more countries now meet that 2% target and more than 20 are committed to meeting it by a particular date. We continue to press those allies that have not yet met or planned to meet the target to do so.

Veterans Care Sector: Government Role

Michael Tomlinson Excerpts

Tuesday 25th October 2016 Commons Chamber

[Johnny Mercer (Plymouth, Moor View) (Con)]

Thank you very much, Madam Deputy Speaker, for granting me this debate. 

I know that this is a persistent cause of mine, and sometimes I feel that I should apologise to the Minister for bringing him to the House to discuss his portfolio. I want to say from the outset how impressed I and many others in this sector are by his personal commitment to this agenda, and my comments are in no way directed at him or any of his staff who work hard to try to tackle the challenge of veterans care within the envelope that he has been given by the Secretary of State for Defence and the Prime Minister.

It is not easy. The political world is chaotic at present and priorities are hard to define, but the truth is that in this sector the challenge of closing the gap between what we say so promisingly at the Dispatch Box and how it feels to the men and women who serve increases in severity the longer we leave it. The landscape is clear, with ever increasing demand—an ongoing cost, as it were—resulting from the recent campaigns that this country has undertaken in Iraq and Afghanistan, set against a declining interest in this agenda, both from the wonderful people of this country who have carried the torch valiantly in recent years, but who are experiencing battle fatigue now that operations have faded from view and, I regret to say, from Government too. 

Let me expand my argument. In January last year, I met the previous Prime Minister and presented a report that for the first time had almost universal support across the veterans care sector. It examined a sustainable veterans care model so that the United Kingdom could do its duty by those who serve. I also presented the report to the Secretary of State for Defence and others.

The paper was not my solution but that of many people involved in the arena: serving, retired, and third sector. It was our voice, and I was proud of it. It was greeted with warm words and encouraging lines about duty and responsibility, with a promise of a response, but regrettably, after a while, nothing materialised at all.

[Michael Tomlinson (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate, and on all he does in this field. Having looked at the paper, I recommend its proposal on having a single point of contact. May I invite him to read another paper on the armed forces community health and wellbeing team for Dorset by Andy Gritt, and see how it fits with his model?

[Johnny Mercer]

Absolutely; I should be delighted to have a look at that.

In the current political landscape, I fear that the can of veterans care has received another good punt down the road in the wake of Brexit. I strongly welcome and support the new Prime Minster, who is supremely equipped to tackle a job which, from my position, looks almost impossible—that of managing my party and granulating the United Kingdom’s exit from the European Union. I could not wish her more strength to her arm in these challenges, and I will support her to a fault, as she well knows. I believe that we achieve nothing on our own in politics, and the strength to tackle the challenges ahead is in the team on the Conservative Benches.

However, I must confess myself to be disappointed at first sight on this single issue. In July I challenged the Prime Minister in the leadership campaign, in front of my entire party, about her commitment to this agenda and her willingness to look at a new Government Department—or something similar—to finally match our words with our deeds when it comes to the 2.6 million veterans in this country. Her response was that she was not keen to restructure Government and create any new Departments beyond a Department for Exiting the European Union, which I entirely understood. The House can imagine my concerns over the summer about where veterans care ranked on her agenda, as she subsequently re-ordered Government to face the challenges ahead which, as I mention frequently, I entirely support, but she chose not to include this cause too.

I was further concerned that the veterans care agenda was being diluted when the Under-Secretary of State for Defence, my hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes North (Mark Lancaster), had his veterans care duties spread even more thinly with the addition of the reserves brief to his work—an increasingly enormous challenge as the military reconfigures its relationship with the reserves heading into 2020. For me this was a clear movement in the opposite direction to that which we were pursuing, which did not go unnoticed by those who strive to deliver this country’s duty to those who serve.

That is the current position—ever-increasing demand, a general and understandable decline in interest in this agenda now that the wounds of war are not visible on those flying back from Iraq or Afghanistan every week, and a Government challenged by unprecedented political demands.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mark Lancaster]

I intend to visit Northern Ireland shortly. For obvious reasons, I appreciate that there is a unique set of circumstances over there, and I am determined to do my bit to address them. Of course, communication is the key. I shall explain in a few moments how I believe we can help, but the key is making sure that support services are available and communicated. All too often, help is out there, but it is not clear how our veterans access it. I intend to say a few words about that if the hon. Gentleman will bear with me.

I informed the House earlier this year of a plan to improve the care received by the most seriously injured and highly dependent service personnel and veterans. Currently, this support is funded and delivered by a number of separate agencies, including the MOD, the NHS, local authorities and charitable organisations. As such, we have a pilot, which is ongoing, that sees care of this kind co-ordinated and delivered by a new integrated high-dependency care system—I think we need a better name. It produces a joined-up and improved system of care for the individual, reducing strain on local care commissioning groups. The early signs are that this is going well. I am happy, once it is established, to see how to extend it to a wider cohort of veterans.

[Michael Tomlinson]

On that very point, I invite the Minister to look at the Dorset model—I mentioned a few moments ago the work that Andy Gritt is doing in this area—to see whether it can feed into the model that the Minister has just mentioned.

[Mark Lancaster]

I would be delighted to look at that model and see whether we can learn any lessons from it.

The aim is that this system will provide confidence for a small number of individuals and their families that their clinical, health and social support needs will continue to be met when they leave the armed forces and for the rest of their lives.

On the point about a single point of contact for veterans, I have good news for my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Moor View. The armed forces covenant fund has £10 million each year to support the covenant by funding projects that address specific priorities, one of those being the creation of a veterans gateway. The aim of this initiative is to provide a single point of contact via a fully transactional website and one telephone number, together providing an information clearing house that takes into account the needs of all veterans, wherever they may be located. An announcement will be made very shortly on the preferred bidder for this contract, with this facility being launched during 2017. Further to that, there is the armed forces covenant website itself, which both serving and former serving personnel may access.

I am the first to recognise that the support of our veterans and the services that are provided for their welfare are not perfect. Nothing is, but I, like my hon. Friend, and indeed all hon. Members here tonight—it is a very good showing for an end-of-day Adjournment debate—am determined to do more. For example, the Department for Communities and Local Government is doing important work on supported housing, ensuring that local authorities have afforded priority where it is due. The DCLG has also introduced various measures to improve access to social housing for members of the service community, including veterans. That includes changing the law to ensure that local authorities always give seriously injured service personnel and veterans with urgent housing needs high priority in the provision of social housing. As for health, NHS England is introducing new initiatives in mental health services for veterans, the details of which contain expert input from MOD officials. Those are just a few examples of the collaborative work that we are undertaking throughout the Government.

Ministry of Defence Future Accommodation Model

Michael Tomlinson Excerpts

Wednesday 19th October 2016 Westminster Hall

[Mrs Anne-Marie Trevelyan (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the Ministry of Defence’s future accommodation model.

It is an honour to have you in the Chair for this debate on a most important subject, Mrs Moon. I asked for this debate to bring clarity and reassurance to our armed forces personnel and their families about their future accommodation provision. There is a Government commitment in the armed forces covenant to providing personnel and their families with good-quality accommodation, in the right location and at a reasonable price. I receive correspondence daily from families who are deeply anxious about the direction of the future accommodation model—FAM. There is a strongly held view among military families from every rank, in every service, that the Ministry of Defence intends to allow the present system, and its poor provision of existing service family accommodation, to degrade, so that the options put forward by FAM will seem less unpalatable.

The stated reason for looking at a new, more modern accommodation model is that service personnel want more choice over where, how and with whom they live, and greater support for those who would like to buy a new home. According to the MOD, FAM

“is aiming to provide a flexible system that meets different needs at different times—not dictated by rank”—

rank is not a factor now—

“age or marriage.”

Given those stated aims, which are laudable and forward-thinking for the modern family, will the Minister tell us why the MOD is not simply looking to expand the accessibility of service family accommodation—SFA—to that new, wider service personnel audience? The MOD states that FAM is designed to save costs, because the way accommodation is now provided means that there have to be a large number of vacant homes at any one time to allow for rotation, which means greater costs for the MOD, but in the same breath, it states that FAM will not reduce the total pot of money used to subsidise housing.

[Michael Tomlinson (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this important debate; given the interest in it, perhaps a longer debate would have been worth while. She makes her case well, and I invite her to extend her view to cover veterans. In the light of her interest in the military covenant, will she challenge the Minister on that angle, too?

[Mrs Trevelyan]

I thank my hon. Friend for that point. That is a wider debate; we will see whether we can persuade the authorities to allow us to have that wider conversation.

Armed Forces Covenant Annual Report

Michael Tomlinson Excerpts

Thursday 7th January 2016 Westminster Hall

[Mrs Trevelyan]

I thank my colleague for his intervention. I agree wholeheartedly and hope very much that in the months and years ahead we will be able to achieve that across the UK, including in Northern Ireland.

In world war one, my relation was acting as a lookout for the French army and he was sent up a church tower because he had great eyesight, but he was immediately spotted by German troops because he was wearing a very bright, shiny uniform—you have to wonder. That story has always stuck in my mind; I was first told it when I was four years old. The reality is that if all efforts at diplomacy have failed and war breaks out, we ask our young men, and now our young women too, to go into harm’s way to protect us, our country, our values, our families and our way of life. We ask our armed forces to defend their nation without regard to their own safety, and I am continually in awe of every one of those people who choose a military career.

I am involved in many ways as a campaigner, and now as the local MP in north Northumberland, with serving military personnel, their families and veterans of all ages, for whom the covenant’s pledge has not always been a reality. I am acutely conscious of the fact that although many citizens agree with the covenant’s ideals and direction, far too many are not really aware of it and do not consider how they can make it a reality in their working lives or how their local community might be able to support the needs of military people and their loved ones. I am also aware that many of our serving and veteran personnel are not fully apprised of the commitment that the covenant gives to them and their families.

The Government’s commitment to all who serve and have served in our armed forces is clear: they and their families should face no disadvantage compared with other citizens in the provision of public and commercial services. Special consideration is appropriate, especially for those who have given most, such as the injured and the bereaved. The covenant is clear about the areas in which it should apply. It covers healthcare, education, housing, deployment matters, family life, benefits and tax impacts, the responsibility of care, particularly during defence policy change periods, voting rights and support in transition and in life after service. It covers so many aspects of personnel’s lives, and every year since 2011 we have seen new projects and support being built to meet our covenant commitment and reported by the MOD to Parliament.

[Michael Tomlinson (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing the debate, but also on setting up the all-party parliamentary group on the armed forces covenant. In relation specifically to no disadvantage and to special consideration, a number of our constituents, and mine in particular, have concerns about housing. Perhaps she will touch on that and invite our hon. Friend the Minister to comment on it in his closing remarks as well.

[Mrs Trevelyan]

Yes, I will cover that some more. It is a big area where work is beginning to develop, but we need to do a lot more to join the dots.

Colleagues here, as well as others, have raised many issues with me. They want to discuss areas of the covenant that are of concern to their constituents. I want to mention a few areas where I believe that commendation for progress made already is due and some concerns about areas where I believe the Government and MPs could take a lead to improve the current state of play.

First, and not only because I am an accountant, but because the exceptional work to support the covenant undertaken by many charities could not happen without it, I—

Oral Answers to Questions

Michael Tomlinson Excerpts

Monday 23rd November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Paul Scully (Sutton and Cheam) (Con)]

12. What plans he has to strengthen the armed forces covenant.

[Michael Tomlinson (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (Con)]

18. What plans he has to strengthen the armed forces covenant.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence (Mark Lancaster)]

The covenant came into force under the Armed Forces Act 2011. Since then, the Government have undertaken a range of actions to build the covenant. Our fourth annual report to Parliament is due to be published in December 2015 and that will detail the progress we have made during the year. The Government are committed to continuing to honour our pledges and encouraging wider society to think about their contribution.

[Mark Lancaster]

I, too, am grateful for the support that councils, including Sutton, have demonstrated to our armed forces community. All have signed the community covenant and many are extremely proactive. I recently had a meeting with the chair of the Local Government Association and the Minister for Housing and Planning to discuss what more we can do to encourage local authorities as they look to support our armed forces community. As a result, I understand that the housing Minister intends to write to all local authorities setting out examples of best practice and reminding them of the need under the covenant to honour their commitments.

[Michael Tomlinson]

A veteran in my constituency suffers from mental health issues as a result of military service. He is on the local council housing list, but is one or two steps away from priority status. May I urge the Minister to beef up the military covenant to ensure that our veterans are given priority status for housing as a matter of course?

[Mark Lancaster]

The Government are determined to honour the commitments made by the armed forces covenant to ensure fair treatment of veterans and their families in need of social housing. That is why this Government changed the laws so that seriously injured serving personnel and veterans with urgent housing needs must always be a high priority for social housing. It is, however, for local authorities to make judgments about the competing housing priorities in their areas, but if my hon. Friend writes to me with the details of this case, I will of course raise it with my Department for Communities and Local Government colleagues.

Oral Answers to Questions

Michael Tomlinson Excerpts

Monday 13th July 2015 Commons Chamber

[Michael Fallon]

I have already made it very clear that no books are going to be cooked. Anything that is included has to meet the NATO guidelines. Where there is expenditure on defence intelligence which comes out of the defence budget, it is right that that should be included in our defence totals. The NATO figures will be there for everybody to see.

[Michael Tomlinson (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (Con)]

T8. Does the Minister share my concerns that a number of our ex-servicemen and women, having served our country with distinction, end up suffering from mental health issues, family breakdown and homelessness —yes, even on the streets of Dorset? What steps can be taken to help to prevent this?

[Mark Lancaster]

Naturally, I want the very best for our entire armed forces community and I must emphasise that the vast majority of our service leavers make a smooth transition into civilian life. The Government have put in place a great deal of support for those who find the process difficult, including the allocation of £40 million to a veterans accommodation fund. The best evidence available suggests that the mental health of veterans is as good as that of the civilian population, but where problems do occur the highest standard of support is made available, and over £13 million from the LIBOR fund has been awarded to programmes.