I had the pleasure of attending the Remembrance Day commemorations in Belfast at the weekend, and I took the opportunity to visit a veterans charity and to speak about how we can activate and invigorate the covenant over there. I also met some of the hon. Gentleman’s Northern Ireland colleagues, and I will be going there very soon to bring stakeholders together, because I appreciate that there is a different picture over there. We need to work closely at the grassroots level, but we will create a plan to implement the strategy in a way that meets Northern Ireland’s specific needs.
I am pre-empting the Opposition spokesperson, but we need better data. We need to know who our veterans are and whether our GPs are helping them, and we need to understand particular challenges such as suicide and so forth. We are now looking at ways of making that happen and working with the Ministry of Justice so that we can better track what is going on. We check with our veterans 12 months after they have departed the armed forces, and they already go through a transition package, often lasting two years, to make sure they are equipped. As I well remember, moving from the armed forces, where one feels part of a family, a unit, a community, a tribe, and into the wide open world is quite a culture shock, and we need to be there for veterans. We cannot just give them up. Some 90% of those who go through the transition service are in education or employment within six months of their departure.
I hope that I have illustrated my passion, and that of the ministerial team I am pleased to see here supporting me, for the veterans strategy. The Defence Secretary shares that passion and very much wants it to work. We are advancing our support for the armed forces community. To those thinking of a career in the armed forces, I say: I encourage you. You will do things you never thought you would do, you will learn things about your character you never thought you would learn, and when you march on the parade square for the very first time, you will make your mum and dad very proud as you begin to represent the nation. To those serving, in both the regulars and reserves, and to their families, I say: thank you for your service. You allow us to say we have the most professional armed forces in the world. And to our brave veterans—I mentioned Kitchener saying 100 years ago, “Your country needs you”—I simply say: your country owes you. We owe you a debt of gratitude and support for the rest of your lives.
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