Northern Ireland Troubles Bill: Armed Forces Recruitment and Retention

Debate between Neil Shastri-Hurst and Al Carns

Monday 5th January 2026 Commons Chamber

[Al Carns]

The reality is that the last Government’s legacy Act made promises that could not be kept, and explaining why to our veterans community is exceptionally difficult, and I will not lie on that. On the same hand, we have been clear that inquests that were started by the last Government, but stopped—such as Loughgall in 2014—must continue and come to their rightful conclusion. We must ensure that throughout that process, all our veterans are protected as we progress.

[Dr Neil Shastri-Hurst (Solihull West and Shirley) (Con)]

The Minister has more experience than most with the global threats facing this country. In those circumstances, we need to be recruiting the brightest and best to our armed forces and retaining them. He has set out current retention levels with certain detail, but that is before the Bill passes through Parliament and, as the Government hope, becomes enacted as law. Does he not recognise that the inequality of arms under the legal system for our veterans is likely to have a significant impact upon retention?

[Al Carns]

This Government have an exceptional record on supporting our veterans. We put more money into veterans than any other Government in the past 10 years. We put £50 million into Valour. We have enhanced the Op Restore programme. Op Courage on mental health has now got £21 million and has rolled out. Our career transition partnership is second-to-none. On housing, we have got Op Fortitude. We have had 4,100 referrals and more than 1,000 veterans supported. We are doing a fantastic job for veterans. We must ensure that they are protected as we go forward.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Neil Shastri-Hurst and Al Carns

Monday 8th September 2025 Commons Chamber

[Dr Neil Shastri-Hurst (Solihull West and Shirley) (Con)]

For many veterans, hearing loss is one of the hidden scars of service, and in a number of cases, it has been linked to defective 3M hearing equipment. Will the Minister use their arts of persuasion on the Prime Minister to ensure an independent inquiry, so that we can find out the extent of this, and see whether any other equipment is involved and how we can prevent it from happening again?

[Al Carns]

Anyone with hearing loss from equipment can absolutely apply for compensation through the war pension scheme or the armed forces compensation scheme. Broader work is happening on those specific bits of capability outside this place.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Neil Shastri-Hurst and Al Carns

Monday 24th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Al Carns]

As part of our future veterans strategy, a women veterans annexe will provide specific guidance on females wanting to leave the armed forces. It is also important to mention that we are not just setting up the violence against women and girls taskforce; we have the sexual harassment survey going out, the tri-service complaints system, the review of our zero-tolerance policy by a KC to move to 100% action, an international culture and behaviours conference to learn best lessons from our international partners, and the modernisation of our military appraisal system to ensure that people who get involved in unacceptable behaviour are tracked through the system so they can be held to account.

[Dr Neil Shastri-Hurst (Solihull West and Shirley) (Con)]

8. What discussions he has had with his NATO counterparts on increasing defence industrial capacity across the alliance.