UK Parliament / Open data

Armed Forces Bill

Proceeding contribution from Chris Bryant (Labour) in the House of Commons on Monday, 22 May 2006. It occurred during Debate on bills on Armed Forces Bill.
I am absolutely sure that my hon. Friend is right in that, but the Bill is not the place to have that debate. This clause on desertion is not about the war in Iraq. [Interruption.] It is not. I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington and his colleagues would like to make it about that, but I honestly do not think that it is, for the very important reason that desertion is not just about the individual soldier or officer; it is about the collective; it is about responsibility one to another—again, an essential part of the training of a soldier or an officer—and it is vital that we do not send out a message that completely undermines that concept. My experience is that members of the armed forces today have an extremely developed sense of conscience and that they are encouraged to develop that sense of conscience, but it does not lead in just one direction. Conscience can lead, and I believe in the vast majority of cases has led, people to join the Army and to say, ““Yes, here’s a series of operations that I want to contribute to on behalf of my country, but also for the greater good.”” Whether we are talking about Bosnia, Afghanistan or Sierra Leone, there is a whole series of different interventions where people are going not because of some economic conscript situation that might apply in other parts of the world—they are not conscripts in any sense—but because of a sense of conscience and a desire to make their contributions to the world. So it feels as though amendment No. 8 is rather old-fashioned; either it is trying to fight the first world war again and deal with how people were treated when they deserted then, or it is trying to fight a war about a debate that was held in the Chamber some time ago. The final reason why I wholeheartedly oppose the amendment is quite simply that I believe that it would undermine the House. It effectively says that, in some circumstances, a soldier or an officer or a member of the other armed forces could desert, despite the fact that this country, through the House—its elected representatives—had decided that the war was legitimate and legal, and I do not think that we should go down that route.
Type
Proceeding contribution
Reference
446 c1222-3 
Session
2005-06
Chamber / Committee
House of Commons chamber
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