Armed Forces Bill

Stephen Kinnock Excerpts

Consideration of Lords amendments
Monday 6th December 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

I remind the House that this debate finishes at 8.39 pm, so we do not have a lot of opportunity. Could Back Benchers please focus on pithy, short contributions?

[Stephen Kinnock (Aberavon) (Lab)]

It is truly an honour to be standing in front of you, Mr Deputy Speaker, in my new role as shadow Minister for the armed forces.

I pay tribute to my predecessor, my hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth South (Stephen Morgan), who recognised the essential contribution made by our armed forces to the safety and security of our country and who played such an important role in scrutinising this legislation.

In my previous role as shadow Minister with responsibility for Afghanistan, I recently stood at the Dispatch Box to commend the courage, dedication and professionalism shown by our armed forces in the most challenging of circumstances. Two weeks ago I was pleased to pay tribute to those who served in Operation Pitting when they visited Parliament. This House, our country and the free world owe a huge debt of gratitude to those service personnel who, for 20 years, prevented terrorist attacks from being launched from Afghanistan and who secured opportunities for women and girls that would never have been possible otherwise. I thank them for their heroic service.

I look forward to engaging with the Minister. I assure him that I will support him when his Department is doing the right thing, but I will also hold him robustly to account when the Government fail to stand up for our armed forces or to act in the national interest.

As the Opposition have noted throughout its passage, this Bill is a once-in-a-Parliament opportunity to tangibly improve the lives of our armed forces personnel, veterans and their families. I know they are held in the highest regard by Labour and by all on both sides of the House. For them and for all others who have served, we have a duty to make this legislation provide the very best.

Labour supports this Bill in principle, but we have consistently pressed the Government to ensure they match their lofty rhetoric with tangible action. As it stands, the Bill is a missed opportunity to deliver the laudable promises made in the armed forces covenant for all personnel, veterans and their families. That is why I am pleased that the amendments passed in the other place so closely mirror those that Labour pressed during the Bill’s Commons stages. I therefore hope the Government will take this opportunity to think again.

Lords amendment 1 would ensure that the most serious crimes, including murder, manslaughter, domestic violence, child abuse, rape and sexual assault with penetration are tried in the civilian courts when committed in the UK, except when the Attorney General has given consent. For too long, it has been clear that the investigation and prosecution of these crimes within the service justice system simply does not work. The latest Ministry of Defence figures show that, from 2015 to 2020, the conviction rate for rape cases tried under courts martial was just 9%, whereas the latest data available suggest that the conviction rate was 59% for cases that reached civilian courts, with considerably more cases being tried each year. More than three quarters of victims were women, and seven in 10 victims held the rank of private.

Lords amendment 1 directly addresses the treatment of women in our armed forces, which is rightly receiving public attention, and it is an issue that disproportionately affects women in the lower ranks. Until there is fairness, transparency and justice in these cases, the actions of a tiny minority will be allowed to tarnish the reputation of our world-class armed forces.

[Sir Robert Neill]

Those statistics bear out a significant concern that also exists in the civilian jurisdiction. There is a disparity in parallel authorities between victims and perpetrators. Does the hon. Gentleman think we should be particularly anxious to ensure that the same protection, the same support and the same procedural devices to protect witnesses—screens, special measures and so on—are available were any of these cases to be heard in a court martial setting as opposed to a civilian setting, where they would automatically be available? The position of the private soldier is not dissimilar from the position of the employee who is taken advantage of by her boss, for example, or something similar. There is a strong case for seeking to ensure equity, in whichever court a case is tried.

[Stephen Kinnock]

The hon. Gentleman’s expertise in this area is clear for all in this House to see. He is absolutely right that, given the chain of command, ensuring protection for witnesses and victims is essential. We clearly have more confidence in the civilian system to guarantee those. He asks whether the service system could provide those protections, but that seems a very odd way to go about it when the capacity and capability already exist in the civilian system. Why reinvent the wheel?

Will Ministers take this final opportunity to listen to the recommendations of a Government-commissioned, judge-led review, which expressed surprise that these cases were still being handled by courts martial? Will they listen to the expertise on their own Back Benches, as we have just heard, including the proposals made by the hon. Member for Wrexham (Sarah Atherton) in her Defence Sub-Committee report, “Protecting Those Who Protect Us: Women in the Armed Forces from Recruitment to Civilian Life”? Most importantly, will they listen to service personnel and veterans themselves?

More than 4,000 actively serving women and veterans contributed to that report and its recommendations. Today, a serving member of the Royal Navy whose court martial rape case collapsed due to a number of basic errors made by a service prosecutor called on the Government to back this amendment. She was one of three women who launched a judicial review of the Defence Secretary’s decision not to adopt the recommendations of the Lyons review. She says:

“The value of this amendment for women like me cannot be overstated… This amendment will make the process independent. It will encourage more service personnel to report crimes. It will mean we have some protection from the appalling consequences we suffer when we report rape within our units.

“I am urging the government to accept this amendment. As service personnel we are citizens of this country and we deserve justice just like everyone else.”

[Alicia Kearns]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that perhaps a sensible compromise might be to have this matter come back before the House in a year’s time, if the Bill does pass, to see whether cases are being properly prosecuted, whether we are getting the prosecution rates we need and whether women are being supported to get the justice they deserve when those senior to them commit the most abysmal and horrific of acts—acts that would be considered war crimes if they were done against a civilian but, because they are done by someone in the chain of command, somehow are considered a completely different situation?

[Stephen Kinnock]

I pay tribute to the hon. Lady’s experience and expertise, particularly in the field of foreign affairs. However, I think her proposal does not really make sense for where we are right now in this Chamber. We need to see a Government showing leadership. Those brave ladies who have come forward are showing that leadership, and I hope this Government will pay heed to it. The moment of truth is upon us, and we need to see that vote and that leadership now. These women have courage beyond their service to our country. They are showing this Government the way. I urge colleagues across the House to support the amendment.

I turn now to Lords amendment 2, which places the same legal responsibility to have “due regard” to the armed forces covenant on central Government as the current drafting requires of local authorities and other public bodies. This Bill piles new and often vague statutory responsibilities to deliver the covenant on a wide range of public bodies, but, mysteriously, those do not apply to central Government. In practice, this would create a farcical situation whereby the chair of school governors has a statutory responsibility to have due regard to the armed forces covenant, but Government Departments—including the Ministry of Defence—do not.

As the Royal British Legion has pointed out,

“many of the policy areas in which members of the Armed Forces community experience difficulty are the responsibility of national government or based on national guidance.”

Help for Heroes, Cobseo and other service charities know this too, as do Conservative Members, both in this House and in the other place. Ministers must not be allowed to offload responsibility for delivery.

How can it be that social care, pensions, employment and immigration are among the long list of areas we know will not be covered by this legislation? The exclusion of the Ministry of Defence from the responsible public bodies also means the Bill offers little to actively serving personnel. Our armed forces have gone above and beyond both to support our frontline response to the pandemic in the past year and, as I have mentioned, in Afghanistan. What a contrast between the selfless service of our military personnel and a Government who are missing this crucial opportunity to make long-overdue improvements to the standard of service accommodation, while at the same time handing most of them another real-terms pay cut this year.

[Stephen Doughty (Cardiff South and Penarth) (Lab/Co-op)]

I draw attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. My hon. Friend mentions immigration, health and a whole range of central Government Departments responsible for delivering the covenant for our armed forces personnel. Does he agree that there is a missed opportunity in this Bill to deal with the situation facing many foreign and Commonwealth veterans who have bravely served—alongside our Welsh regiments, for example? We know the contribution of Fijians in that regard. There is a missed opportunity here, but there are other opportunities coming up where these issues may be resolved; does he urge the Government to support them?

[Stephen Kinnock]

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend’s personal and political expertise in this area. He is absolutely right that this was an opportunity to right the wrong he has so eloquently set out. There will be an opportunity tomorrow—our Front Bench has tabled an amendment—and there will be other opportunities, but it is a moral point of principle, and I hope the Government will listen and do the right thing in the vote tomorrow.

Without this amendment, the Bill’s principles will not deliver practical action for the squaddie in dilapidated single living accommodation who is without basics such as heating and hot water, the veteran struggling with their mental health who has to endure waiting times for treatment more than twice as long as Government targets, or the dispersed service family who struggle with the cost of childcare and getting in to work. Ministers must not be allowed to offload responsibility for the delivery of the covenant to cash-strapped local authorities and other overstretched public bodies. Central Government must be held to the same measurable, enforceable, national standards as local authorities and agencies. Only then can we truly end the postcode lottery on the armed forces covenant.

The Government are set to reject these amendments. Their majority means they may well win the votes, but in so doing the Conservatives will lose any credible claim to be the party of the armed forces. Service personnel will be asking why this Government’s manifesto pledge to put the covenant further into law delivers no improvements to their day-to-day lives. Veterans will be asking why they still face uneven access to services. Women will be wondering whether a career in the services is for them. These arguments will come back to the Government again and again—from this House, including from Government Back Benchers, from service charities, from armed forces communities and from the Opposition Benches, because Labour will always stand up for our armed forces.

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

As I rise to speak in this debate, I first pay tribute to the officials in the Department. I know this is a complex Bill and that with legislation such as this we must operate within the art of the possible. There are clearly areas where everybody would like to go further, but I understand the constraints and the dynamics at play, particularly around legislating for the armed forces covenant and so on.

However, there is one thing I am afraid I will not let pass without shining a spotlight on it: the issue of violence and sexual offences staying in the military justice system. I rise to speak with one purpose, and that is to resolutely support my hon. Friend the Member for Wrexham (Sarah Atherton) in the work that she has done in this space. She has worked tirelessly, initially against the current but then with some support, to highlight the totally unacceptable experience of females in the military.

Today is a really difficult day for my hon. Friend, and unnecessarily so. I understand differences of opinion, particularly in this space, but where the evidence does not point to the decisions being made by those on the Front Bench, I am afraid I will speak up time and again.

Unfortunately, I was in the room when this decision was made. The evidence did not support the Secretary of State at the time and the evidence does not support the Secretary of State today. I cannot vote against the Lords amendment; it is not the right thing to do. Let me be clear: when the Secretary of State made that decision it was against the advice of the officials in the Department and against the advice of his Ministers.

Conviction rates for rape are lower in military courts than they are in civilian courts. That is a fact. We can pull up the facts at different times and during different processes on the journey to a sexual conviction, but the reality is that the conviction rates for rape are lower. Over the past five years, the average conviction rate for rape in civilian courts, when using Ministry of Justice data, is 34%; over the same five years, using the same data—the MOD’s data—the average conviction rate for rape is just 16% in military courts. Using Crown Prosecution Service data, the figures are even worse. In practice, this means that a military woman is far less likely to get justice than she would in civilian life. We cannot accept that. We cannot accept that on the Government Benches.

The MOD accepts that the contested conviction rate at court martial is significantly lower than it is in the Crown court. The Department suggests that, because the numbers involved in the service justice system are relatively so much smaller, the comparison is of little value. That does not make sense—it is ridiculous and illogical. We have to be honest: there is no point coming to this place and railroading through legislation that we all know to be the wrong decision simply because one individual has his course set and refuses to back out of that alley.

Armed Forces Bill

Stephen Kinnock Excerpts

Consideration of Lords message
Monday 13th December 2021 Commons Chamber

[Leo Docherty]

I am grateful for my right hon. Friend’s contribution; that is a very good case in point, and points to circumstances—although the numbers may be very small—in which the British military has to deploy to ungoverned spaces, let us say. Of course, that is not the case with regard to Kenya, but there are definitely advantages to the expeditionary capability of our service justice system.

I move now to Lords amendment 2B, which would require a report to be laid within six months of this Bill’s receiving Royal Assent, setting out the implications of not applying the new covenant duty to central Government. The Government have already committed to reviewing the operation of the covenant duty to inform us on whether other policy areas or functions could be usefully included. Having listened carefully to the issues that have been so vigorously raised, and recognising the strength of feeling across both Houses, I can now commit to going further.

Indeed, we are going further than Lords amendment 2B in the scope of the review we have in mind. We will review the operation of the new duty across the UK and will consider whether it would be beneficial to add to its scope. That will include specific consideration of whether central Government and any of their functions could usefully be added. The Government will report on the review as part of the covenant annual report in 2023, 18 months after the new duty is expected to come into effect. That timescale is more realistic than the six-month timeline from Royal Assent suggested by their lordships, which in our judgment is too short a period for any meaningful review to take place.

Given that we expect to see the new duty standing up in law by the middle of 2022 at the earliest, we also need to allow for an implementation period to give local authorities time to adjust to their new responsibilities. We therefore believe that to conduct and publish a review at the 18-month point of the new duty having been in operation is most appropriate. However, given the level of interest in the new duty, we will provide an interim update in the covenant annual report in December 2022, some six months after the duty is expected to come into effect. At that point, we will be able to say more about the scope and methodology for conducting the review, and MPs will have the opportunity to assess and comment in the 2022 covenant report debate.

The Government are committed to ensuring that parliamentarians from both Houses can contribute and give their views as part of the review process. I put on record my thanks and appreciation for the contributions of Lord Mackay of Clashfern and Lord Craig of Radley. They, like us, want to see good law put in place to support our armed forces. In the light of the commitment that I have given, I urge the House to support the Government in resisting Lords amendment 2B.

[Stephen Kinnock (Aberavon) (Lab)]

In February, my right hon. Friend the Member for Wentworth and Dearne (John Healey), the shadow Defence Secretary, set out the Labour party’s core principles for our defence and national security, which are based not on party politics but on Britain’s strategic national interest. They are: an unshakeable commitment to NATO; non-negotiable support for our nuclear deterrent; a resolute commitment to international law, universal human rights and the multilateral treaties and organisations that uphold them; and a determination to see British investment directed first to British industry not just because of how we think about defence and national security but because we seek to build a more resilient economy and a country that can stand more firmly on its own two feet. At the heart of those four principles lies a commitment to our armed forces personnel: the men and women who are the lifeblood of our defence and national security; those who serve to protect us.

The Conservative Government have been complacent when it comes to our armed forces and our national security more widely. Just as threats against the UK are increasing, the Prime Minister decided to break an election promise and cut the size of the Army by 10,000. Under the Government and this Prime Minister, our country is becoming less safe and our brave service personnel increasingly undervalued and under-rewarded.

I was only recently appointed to the shadow Defence team, but standing at the Dispatch Box to highlight the weaknesses that sit at the heart of the Bill is already starting to feel like groundhog day. The Bill is a missed opportunity. It was a one-in-a-Parliament opportunity to ensure that our world-class armed forces are supported by world-class legislation, but glaring gaps at its heart mean that it will fall short and fail to live up to its full potential. If the Government had chosen to support the Lords amendments, we would have been guaranteed a more robust approach to dealing with serious crimes committed by service personnel, and we would have had clear accountability and transparency about the role of central Government in delivering the armed forces covenant.

Labour supports the Bill, but we have consistently pressed the Government to ensure that its content matches the ambition. As I set out last week in this Chamber, the Bill is a missed opportunity to deliver on the laudable promises made in the armed forces covenant for all personnel and veterans, and their families. To that end, we have worked closely with hon. Members in this place, noble Lords in the other place and service charities to amend the Bill in the interests of our service personnel.

[John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)]

Can the hon. Member help the House by explaining what he thinks the Government might be able to do but could not if the Bill had the protections that he wanted over central Government action?

[Stephen Kinnock]

As I will address a little later in my remarks, the huge disconnect here is between the level of accountability that local government will be held to compared with that for central Government. So we end up in an absurd situation where a school governor has a greater level of accountability for the covenant than the Defence Secretary. I am not sure what the right hon. Member for Wokingham (John Redwood) thinks about that, but it appears to be a bizarre state of affairs.

I pay particular tribute to Lords Mackay, Thomas and Craig for their efforts in working with us in our attempts to improve this legislation. Mr Deputy Speaker, you will know that the Labour party has been pushing the argument strongly that the most serious crimes, including murder, manslaughter, domestic violence, child abuse, rape and sexual assault with penetration, should be tried in the civilian courts when committed in the UK. The case for that is overwhelming, because the investigation and prosecution of those crimes within the service justice system simply does not work.

The latest Ministry of Defence figures show that between 2015 and 2020 the conviction rate for rape cases tried under court martial was just 9%, whereas the latest data suggest that the conviction rate was 59% for cases that reached civilian courts, with considerably more cases being tried each year. Moreover, more than three in four of the victims were women, and seven in 10 held the rank of private. By rejecting Lords amendment 1B in lieu, the Government are not only letting down women in the lower ranks, but undermining their own policy of seeking to recruit more women to the armed forces. The Army has committed itself to a 30% target by 2030 for female recruits, but has not yet produced a clear plan of how that will be achieved. The Government therefore need to think carefully about the message they are sending by resisting this amendment, because until there is fairness, transparency and justice in these cases, the actions of a minority will continue to tarnish the reputation of our world-class armed forces and will continue to have a chilling effect on female recruitment.

We do, however, welcome the fact that the Minister has today acknowledged the need to publish data on all the offences listed in this amendment—murder, manslaughter, domestic abuse, child abuse, rape and sexual assault with penetration; for that data to include under-18s for the first time; and for that data to cover both investigations and prosecutions at all stages of the service justice system, including reports of incidents, how many are referred from service police to service prosecution authority, how many the service prosecution are able to prosecute, how many go to court martial and how many convictions there are. But I must tell the Minister that Labour remains committed to moving these serious offences into civilian courts, and we will continue to push the Government on this issue.

This matter is not closed; our concerns have not been allayed. There remain many unanswered questions, so I ask the Minister: what will the Government do if conviction rates for one or more of those serious crimes is concerningly low? Will the Government reconsider this approach? Why will they not commit to a performance review, based on this data? We view this issue as unfinished business, and we know where the weight of opinion lies in this House. As the Conservative hon. Member for Plymouth, Moor View (Johnny Mercer) clearly stated last week in this Chamber:

“Conviction rates for rape are lower in military courts than they are in civilian courts. That is a fact…The MOD accepts that the contested conviction rate at court martial is significantly lower than it is in the Crown court.”—[Official Report, 6 December 2021; Vol. 705, c. 104.]

We therefore hope that Ministers will reflect again on the recommendations from the Government-commissioned Lyons review, as well as the proposals made by the hon. Member for Wrexham (Sarah Atherton) in her Select Committee on Defence Sub-Committee report, “Protecting Those Who Protect Us”. We must improve conviction rates, and moving these offences into civilian courts offers us the best chance of doing so.

Perhaps the most unfathomable aspect of this Bill is the Government’s decision to offload responsibility for the armed forces away from central Government and on to overstretched local authorities—it is utterly illogical and indefensible. The Bill piles new and often vague statutory responsibilities to deliver the covenant on a wide range of public bodies, so it is impossible to understand why on earth those responsibilities should not apply to central Government. We are faced with a farcical situation whereby the chair of school governors has a statutory responsibility to have “due regard” to the armed forces covenant, but Government Departments, including the Ministry of Defence, do not.

As the Royal British Legion has pointed out, many of the policy areas in which members of the armed forces community experience difficulty are the responsibility of national Government based on national guidance. Organisations such as Help for Heroes, Cobseo and other service charities, alongside Members from both sides of this House and in the other place, have lined up to criticise Ministers for shirking their responsibilities.

The Bill was an opportunity for the Government to lead by example and to demonstrate that credible leadership depends on accountability and on practising what they preach, but they appear to be intent on palming off all the responsibility to local government. Social care, pensions, employment and immigration are on the long list of areas not covered by the legislation, and the exclusion of the Ministry of Defence from the responsible public bodies means that the Bill offers little to actively serving personnel. The Government are already hitting many servicemen and women with a real-terms pay cut this year.

As I said at the Dispatch Box last week, we are left with a Bill that will not deliver practical action for the squaddie in dilapidated living accommodation who is without basics such as heating and hot water; the veteran struggling with their mental health and waiting times for treatment that are more than twice as long as Government targets suggest they should be; or the dispersed service family who struggle with the cost of childcare and getting into work. Central Government must be held to the same measurable, enforceable national standards that local authorities and agencies are held to. Only then can we truly end the postcode lottery on the armed forces covenant.

The Government’s concession of a review of the operation of the duty and whether central Government should be added is welcome, but ultimately, it is a recognition that the Bill is drafted too narrowly. How will parliamentarians be involved in the review? I recognise that the Minister mentioned that, but we need a clear assurance about it. Knowing the strength of feeling on the issue, I encourage him to ensure that parliamentarians from both Houses and the Chairs of relevant Select Committees are involved in and can give evidence to the review. We will keep a close eye on the review process, but we still believe that the due regard principle should be broadened to cover all areas of potential disadvantage for servicepeople.

The Opposition have been clear throughout the process that the Bill must become statute, not least because we must provide our armed forces with the solid and stable legal basis that they require to be able to operate. Although we welcome the concessions that the Minister has promised today, we remain profoundly disappointed that the Government have continued to resist the Lords amendments, thereby running the clock down. Let me be clear that it is unfinished business.

The Minister knows full well that there is deep unhappiness about the way that the Government have handled the process and profound concern about the way in which the weaknesses in the Bill will ultimately lead to it failing to serve the best interests of our services personnel. I therefore assure the House that Labour, as the party of the armed forces, will robustly hold the Government to account. I put the Minister on notice that he has not heard the last from us on these matters.