I am grateful for the opportunity to speak in this important debate about how we should best look after veterans who have given so much in the service of their country.
It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Llanelli (Nia Griffith), who is acknowledged by the House as someone who knows a lot about this subject. We are grateful for her remarks. It is a particular pleasure to participate in a debate with a Minister who is passionately committed to the support of veterans and who is respected across the House of Commons as a result. We know where his heart lies and we respect him for it.
I offer apologies to the House for my right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis), who chairs the Defence Committee. Ordinarily he would have spoken in such a debate, but unfortunately he had an unbreakable commitment today. He has asked me to a make a particular point in his absence about war widows. There is a key flaw in the current policy around war widows, which is that if someone’s spouse died or left military or war service after 31 March 1973 and before 5 April 2005, and the widow remarried or cohabited, they were required to surrender their war pension or compensation. A majority in that group are the widows of soldiers who were killed during the troubles. They have had to deal with not only the loss of their spouse, but the financial hardship that has been caused to many widows who have wanted to move on with their lives in new relationships. On behalf of my right hon. Friend, I sincerely ask the Minister to give us a commitment that he will at least reflect on this issue and see whether there is more that the Government can do.
I have also been asked to pass on apologies from my hon. Friend the Member for South West Wiltshire (Dr Murrison), who cannot be with us today. I think that the whole House would acknowledge that he has done a tremendous job as the Prime Minister’s representative for the commemoration of world war one. My hon. Friend has asked me to make a brief point in his absence about the new centre for conflict wound research. He knows a lot about that subject, because a few years ago he undertook a report for the Prime Minister on the treatment of those who have suffered injuries, particularly to their limbs. The new centre for conflict wound research opened on Tuesday at Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham. It has been sensibly located close to the Defence and National Rehabilitation Centre at Stanford Hall, which has absorbed the old Headley Court in Surrey.
The case for moving Headley to the midlands was underpinned by the promise of closer NHS and defence medical services collaboration, so that military and civilian patients and researchers could benefit holistically from complex trauma experience. However, the NHS has not fully engaged with the same enthusiasm as the military, which means that the original vision is falling short. Will the Minister liaise with his colleagues in the Department of Health to see whether something can be done to put this right? The more we learn about treating such wounds and the better we become at dealing with prosthetics, the more that that will benefit civilian NHS patients, as well as, obviously, veterans. It is literally a win-win.
In many ways, this is a timely debate, not least because it comes a few days after the nation paid tribute to its war dead and wounded in the centenary of the armistice, to which the Minister rightly referred in his excellent speech. I believe that this event really captured the
imagination of the British people, with ceremonies held the length and breadth of the United Kingdom—from the ceremony at the Cenotaph right down to individual commemorations in villages and parishes around the nation in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. In my constituency of Rayleigh and Wickford, I attended four services that day, including the lighting of a centenary beacon in the evening, and I know that many colleagues on both sides of the House will have done the same. As an aside, I know that the weather was variable around the country, and that therefore a number of MPs were prepared to get quite wet in the rain to pay their respects, unlike some other prominent people on the world stage.
In Rayleigh, people across the community have been working for many months to produce 12,000 knitted poppies, which were put together to create a waterfall effect around Holy Trinity church in the town centre. People came from far and wide—much to the delight of local traders—to see this wonderful tribute. Let me take this opportunity to place on record my sincere appreciation to all those involved from my constituency and beyond, including the redoubtable Rayleigh women’s institute, the Hockley and Hawkwell day centre, and the mother of my PA, Adele Jacquin—it is always good to read your staff into the record, Madam Deputy Speaker—who lives in Cheltenham and also knitted poppies for the display. I have often been proud to be the Member of Parliament for Rayleigh and Wickford, but I do not think I have ever been as proud as when I saw that commemorative waterfall unveiled.
At the Remembrance Sunday service, our local rector, the Rev. David Oxtoby, chose to read an extremely fitting poem, “It is the Soldier” by Charles M. Province. It is a brief poem, so I will share it with the House because I think it is apposite:
“It is the Soldier, not the minister
Who has given us freedom of religion.
It is the Soldier, not the reporter
Who has given us freedom of the press.
It is the Soldier, not the poet
Who has given us freedom of speech.
It is the Soldier, not the campus organizer
Who has given us freedom to protest.
It is the Soldier, not the lawyer
Who has given us the right to a fair trial.
It is the Soldier, not the politician
Who has given us the right to vote.
It is the Soldier who salutes the flag,
Who serves beneath the flag,
And whose coffin is draped by the flag,
Who allows the protester to burn the flag.”
I humbly submit to the House that when we are talking about veterans, that is a fitting tribute.
As well as those who fell in battle, we must remember those who survive and are now veterans of their military service. The question we must ask is: are we doing enough for these people, to whom we owe so much? The Defence Committee is in the middle of an inquiry into veterans’ mental health, to which the hon. Member for Llanelli referred. It is constructive to compare what we do for the physical rehabilitation of veterans with what we do for their psychological rehabilitation.
For physical rehabilitation, we have world-class facilities—formerly at Headley Court, and now at the Defence and National Rehabilitation Centre at Stanford Hall. In addition, veterans who have lost their legs can now be fitted with the Genium prosthetic—arguably the most advanced prosthetic limb in the world—following a grant of more than £6 million from Her Majesty’s Treasury to equip all those veterans who lost their legs either in Iraq or in Afghanistan. I am proud to say that I had a little to do with that when I served in the Minister of Defence.
In mental health services for veterans, however, we are not world class, and there is much further to go. For example, on Tuesday the Committee took evidence from academics and health professionals from around the UK that revealed, among other things, that in parts of Wales and Northern Ireland, it takes almost a year for a veteran who is identified as suffering from mental illness to begin to receive appropriate treatment. That is bad enough for anyone, but for those who have served their country in uniform, it is completely and utterly unacceptable.
One of the challenges in that sphere arises from what could be described as conflict between two different philosophies—the hon. Lady mentioned this as well. On the one hand, we have the armed forces covenant, the two key principles of which are enshrined in law within the Armed Forces Act 2011. The second key principle is that of special treatment where appropriate, especially for the wounded or bereaved. Under that principle and the broader armed forces covenant, veterans should receive priority treatment under the national health service. However, when one asks the NHS, one gets a very different answer: patients will be treated strictly in accordance with clinical need.
A little while ago, we took evidence from the Under-Secretary of State for Defence, my right hon. Friend the Member for Bournemouth East (Mr Ellwood), who opened the debate, and from his opposite number in the Department of Health and Social Care, my hon. Friend the Member for Thurrock (Jackie Doyle-Price). Unsurprisingly he backed the covenant and she backed the NHS. We need to resolve that dilemma and we need to do so soon.
As well as the NHS, a number of charities do important work in this field, including the Royal British Legion, Help for Heroes, SSAFA—the Armed Forces Charity, and Combat Stress. As part of our inquiry, the Committee plans to visit a residential centre run by Combat Stress early next month.
Another charity that does very valuable work is Care after Combat, which was founded in 2014 by Jim Davidson OBE, a notable comedian who has given a great deal of his personal time to an extremely serious subject. Care after Combat provides struggling veterans who have fallen into the prison system with a mentor, who is usually a veteran themselves, which ensures that they have access to someone with understanding in their final year in prison and then their first year outside. The mentor is often able to have conversations that a GP or probation officer simply would not. They are able to spot mental health warning signs and other issues through more regular contact than a clinician would have, and then to report back accordingly. I would like to see more Government support for what that vital charity seeks to achieve, and I ask the Minister to make a note of that.
I regret to say that there is one area in which the Government are letting down veterans very badly indeed, and that is the whole area of “lawfare” and the legal witch hunting of predominantly Army veterans by others for political or financial gain. This applies to veterans who served in Northern Ireland, Iraq and Afghanistan. In the case of Iraq, my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Moor View (Johnny Mercer) led the Defence Sub-Committee’s inquiry into the Iraq Historic Allegations Team, the revelations of which were so appalling that the then Secretary of State, my right hon. Friend the Member for Sevenoaks (Sir Michael Fallon), had the team shut down.
However, the Ministry of Defence then effectively created a son of IHAT, which has continued to inquire into Iraq veterans. We now know that one law firm specialised in bringing cases from Iraq. The ironically named Public Interest Lawyers went so far as to completely fabricate cases against veterans, basically to try to make money out of them. That firm has now mercifully gone bust—no one laments its passing—and its lead lawyer, Mr Phil Shiner, has been struck off.
Other firms acting in this field—not necessarily illegally in any way—have made a great deal of money out of pursuing veterans. One of those is Leigh Day. The Committee hopes to invite representatives of that firm to give evidence to our ongoing inquiry into veterans and “lawfare” to justify their actions to Parliament. If we are successful and they have the courage to appear, I am told that half the Ministry of Defence will take the morning off and come to sit in the Public Gallery—we will need the Boothroyd Room at least. By the way, if they do turn up, they will not receive a fee.
I am afraid that this is also the case in Northern Ireland, where the Northern Ireland Office and the Police Service of Northern Ireland now propose to go right back to 1968—50 years ago—and reinvestigate every single killing that took place in the course of the troubles. The process would be entirely one-sided, because members of the IRA have been given so-called letters of comfort by Tony Blair, meaning they are effectively off the hook. As far as I am aware, no one who has been given a letter of comfort has ever been successfully prosecuted for terrorist offences. I do not say this lightly, but the Northern Ireland Office, which is one short of its complement today, should be ashamed of itself.
Conversely, there are no letters of comfort for Army veterans, only the prospect of being investigated and, in some cases, hounded for things that happened nearly half a century ago. For instance, an inquest has now begun into killings in Ballymurphy in the 1970s. I understand from press reports that pro-republican lawyers are likely to summon up to 100 soldiers to give evidence. That would take an extremely long time and no doubt cost a vast amount of public money. Let us call this what it is. It is a racket, and it has to stop.
As a result, a couple of weeks ago I and a number of ex-Army colleagues in the House helped to organise a letter from 104 Conservative Members of Parliament, supported by some Opposition Members and 50 peers, including General Lord Dannatt and four previous Chiefs of the Defence Staff. The letter, which we delivered to the Prime Minister at No. 10 Downing Street, called on her to put an end to this outrage that has continued on her watch. I am pleased to say that, as a result, we have now been offered a meeting with the Attorney General early next month.
There are now essentially three strands of potential progress. The first is the Defence Committee inquiry, which is ongoing and will probably report sometime in the new year. The second is the specialist team that has been established within the Ministry of Defence by the Defence Secretary—the Minister will be very familiar with it—which is also looking into this issue. The third is the initiative led by the Attorney General, who I am pleased to say has been tasked by the Prime Minister with trying to sort out this problem.
I and other members of the Defence Committee very much hope, perhaps by some combination of these three strands, that we will be able to find a solution so that people who have bravely served their country in uniform will not be hounded in this way in the future. They are people such as Corporal Major Dennis Hutchings, who served several tours on Op Banner in Northern Ireland during the troubles. He is now aged 77, and he is dying of terminal cancer. Unfortunately, it is likely that he will die before his trial for events that were all investigated thoroughly at the time takes place.
There is also the case of Royal Marine David Griffin who, at the age of 77, is facing reinvestigation over an incident in 1972, when someone was killed during an ambush in the middle of the night. The nature of the attack he was under means that Mr Griffin has no idea whether it was he or one of his colleagues who was responsible. An investigation was held 46 years ago, yet Mr Griffin now faces further reinvestigation. And they knew where to find him, because he is a Chelsea Pensioner in the Royal Hospital Chelsea.
We now face a situation in which alleged IRA terrorists, with letters of comfort, are away scot-free—they are laughing at us—while we go after Chelsea Pensioners instead. That is, quite literally, outrageous, and it is happening on this Government’s watch. The public, veterans, serving personnel, their families, over 100 MPs and over 50 peers of the realm all believe the same thing—enough is enough! I call on the Government to stop this outrage, and to stop it quickly.
In summary, the centenary of the armistice is a strong reminder of the vast debt we owe our veterans of the past century, and we should give our veterans and their families the best possible support once they have left the service of the Crown. Although, as the Minister rightly said, there has been good progress in many areas, of which the whole House can be proud, there is also one burning injustice: we now seem to be treating terrorists more favourably than Chelsea Pensioners. I ask the Minister—I believe he is with us in spirit, although he cannot say so—to talk to his colleagues in government and for God’s sake make this nonsense stop.
3.19 pm