Armed Forces Bill

Second Reading

16:05:00

Moved by

Lord CoakerThat the Bill be now read a second time. Scottish legislative consent granted, Northern Ireland and Welsh legislative consent sought .

The Minister of State, Ministry of Defence (Lord Coaker) (Lab)My Lords. I start by highlighting the interests I have declared: my son-in-law is an active reservist.

It is a great honour and pleasure to speak to the Armed Forces Bill, as I know it is for us all. We should be reminded that without the Armed Forces Bill, the current Armed Forces Act 2006—the legislation that provides a system of command, discipline and justice for His Majesty’s Armed Forces—could not continue in force beyond the end of this year.

Since 1688 and the Bill of Rights, it is a constitutional requirement that Parliament, rather than the King or the Executive, has the authority to exert control over our Armed Forces. It is Parliament, through our common consent and the act of renewal, that ensures that there remains a legal basis for the continued existence of His Majesty’s Armed Forces. As such, the Bill is for the Armed Forces, although it goes beyond simply providing the legal framework for them to continue to exist as disciplined bodies. It is an opportunity to renew the nation’s contract with those who serve.

This substantial Bill does much for our current and former personnel, and the Armed Forces community as a whole, to provide better support, housing and protections for victims of crime, and to provide greater resilience for the nation by increasing the size and availability of the strategic reserves. It does this by delivering meaningful reform across four key pillars.

The Armed Forces covenant—the pledge between the nation and those who have served—will be strengthened by delivering on the manifesto commitment to place it fully into law. Establishing the defence housing service will allow us to properly manage, develop and improve the defence housing estate and make it fit for purpose for our Armed Forces personnel and their families. Providing the service courts and the service police with new powers to provide improved victim support and protections will bring it in line with the 10-year strategy to halve violence against women and girls. Reforms to boost the size and availability of the strategic reserve will reinforce the UK’s defence forces at a time of increasing global threats and uncertainty.

I shall say a little more about each of the four pillars. The Armed Forces covenant was introduced 15 years ago and has made a real difference to many in the Armed Forces community. At its heart is a promise between the nation and those who serve, those who have served, their families and the bereaved, recognising the unique demands and sacrifices of service life. It has already helped to reduce disadvantage for our Armed Forces community across the areas of housing, healthcare and education.

We recognise, however, that it must go further. Clause 2 therefore delivers on the Government’s manifesto commitment to place the Armed Forces covenant fully into law. It does this by broadening the covenant legal duty to 12 policy areas and, for the first time, the devolved Governments of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, and UK government departments, will be subject to the duty. This means that, in addition to housing, healthcare and education, the covenant will also apply to areas including social care, childcare, employment, taxation, social security, criminal justice, immigration and citizenship, pensions, transport and Armed Forces compensation.

On defence housing, the Government have a moral duty to provide safe and decent homes to service personnel and their families. They have been previously let down by homes that are not fit for purpose, and we are determined to change that. Underinvestment in defence housing over decades led to record lows in satisfaction with defence homes. The 1996 sale of tens of thousands of defence homes to Annington led to taxpayers picking up the bill for maintenance and rent to the tune of £600,000 a day.

However, just six months after being elected, the Government transferred 36,000 defence homes back into public ownership, reversing a privatisation that the Public Accounts Committee described as “disastrous”. The next task is to bring homes up to a decent standard—a standard that our service personnel and their families deserve. The Government therefore commissioned an independent review and, in November last year, we published our defence housing strategy—our plan for the wholesale renewal of defence housing, backed by a £9 billion investment over the next decade.

Clause 3 delivers on one of the recommendations of the defence housing strategythe creation of a new stand-alone public body—the defence housing service. This will serve as a single point of accountability for defence housing, staffed by experts and with forces families represented as part of its governance. As such, it will put the needs of the forces and their families first. With a clear strategy, unprecedented investment and a dedicated organisation in the defence housing service, we will deliver on this once-in-a-generation opportunity to provide the safe and decent homes our forces and their families deserve.

Through the Bill, we will also deliver important reforms to the service justice system, especially in the area of victim support and protections. Clauses 5 to 10 provide a comprehensive package of protection measures, with Clauses 11, 12, 26 and 27 providing improved support and assistance to victims of offending. I add that, while these measures will strengthen the service justice system, we recognise that not all unacceptable behaviours reach the threshold of a criminal offence. That is why the Ministry of Defence continues to develop policies that seek to address unacceptable behaviours.

Through the Raising our Standards programme, we are tackling unacceptable behaviour and driving lasting cultural change across defence, with better training, clearer reporting systems and greater trust in leadership. The new VAWG prevention taskforce has been deployed to Catterick and to the south-west to assess lived experiences, tackle root causes of unacceptable behaviour and roll out effective interventions. Immediate initiatives are already being deployed, such as the recruitment of additional sexual assault referral nurses, who will cover the south-west, and the rollout of an independent legacy advocacy pilot that will support victims of sexual offences to understand their rights and what to expect when navigating the service justice system.

These policies, together with the separate service complaints process, now overseen by the recently appointed Armed Forces Commissioner, will also help ensure that unacceptable behaviour is challenged and addressed appropriately. I say to the noble Baroness, Lady Goldie, as well as the noble Baronesses, Lady Smith and Lady Kramer, that this improvement in culture also includes the whistleblower review. We will be meeting in due course before the publication of that review, which is now ready, subject to the noble Baronesses’ comments.

I move on to the package of measures relating to the reserves. Clause 32 will enable regular personnel at warrant officer level or equivalent, and below, to seamlessly transfer into the Volunteer Reserve, and vice versa, without having to leave one force and rejoin the other. Clauses 33 to 37 amend the Reserve Forces Act 1996 in relation to call-out and recall liability, ensuring that it is fit for purpose. This will help ensure that defence has access to more people with the right skills and experience it needs at times of need. It will harmonise liability across the services, widen the pool from which we can draw resources, and allow us greater access to both our Volunteer Reserve and Strategic Reserve pool. It is good to see the noble Lord, Lord Lancaster—who heads up the reserves—in his place. I know how hard he has been working, as many other noble Lords have been, with respect to this.

Just to digress slightly, I know that many noble Lords across the Chamber are particularly concerned about resilience and homeland defence and all those sorts of things. I look forward to the debate in Committee on that aspect, as we move forward on how we make the best use of our reserves around all of that.

Clauses 33 to 37 will make it easier to mobilise personnel earlier ahead of the outbreak of any war and increase the maximum age—from 55 to 65—at which reserves can be recalled. I welcome that increase. There are many people who would be eligible for this who are 64 and they would be brilliant doctors, brilliant accountants, brilliant cyber analysts—brilliant in many ways that would be of interest. I am aware of some of the initial reporting when that announcement was made, but if you look at it in that light, you can see the significance of the contribution that many older reservists could make to the defence and security of our country. Looking at it from that perspective, one understands the importance of and the reasons for raising that age limit. I just wanted to reiterate that important point at the start of our discussions on the Bill. These measures align with the direction provided by the strategic defence review to allow for a whole-defence approach, to re-energise the relationship with the Strategic Reserve and, as I say, increase our readiness for war or potential conflicts.

Beyond these four main pillars, the Bill contains other important measures that cover such areas as protecting the defence estate from drone activities—again, something that I know has been of particular concern to many noble Lords—providing increased protections for military shipwrecks, and extending cross-border powers for the Ministry of Defence Police.

This Armed Forces Bill makes important and positive changes for the Armed Forces, their families and the wider defence community. I look forward to the detailed scrutiny the Bill will be given in Committee, and the challenge that there will be to some aspects of it, while noting the general support there was in the other place and that there is—as I know from conversations I have had—in this place. Such challenge and scrutiny can only improve the Armed Forces Bill and make it a Bill of which our Armed Forces and defence community can be proud—which is indeed what we all want. I beg to move.

16:18:00

The Earl of Minto (Con)My Lords, I thank the Minister for his engagement with me and my noble friend Lady Goldie on the measures in the Bill. I extend my thanks to the officials for their professional and insightful briefing on the Bill. I reiterate at the outset that His Majesty’s most loyal Opposition fully support the Bill. We recognise the legal requirement for the renewal of the Armed Forces Act 2006 for the continuation of our Armed Forces, and so I share with the Minister the desire to see the Bill reach the statute book promptly.

Before I turn to the substance of the Bill, I put on record our deep admiration for the men and women of our Armed Forces. Whether deployed on operations overseas, protecting NATO’s eastern flank or supporting the civil authorities at home, they continue to do an exemplary job. They do so at a time when resources, manpower and equipment are all being stretched to the very limit. Recruitment and retention remain a challenge, but time and again our gallant service personnel rise to meet the task they face. Whatever disagreements I may have with the Government about resource, I hope the Minister will accept that these take nothing away from our sincere respect for all those who serve.

However, I cannot ignore the elephant in the roomthis Government’s continuing unwillingness to properly fund our Armed Forces. The Government have spoken of making tough choices, but they have not—or at least not yet. Perhaps our NATO allies in Ankara will change minds. The defence investment plan is effectively unfunded. One-third of the extra money is to be allocated in the Autumn Budget, meaning it is not available now, and the rest of it is to be financed by as yet unknown efficiency savings.

Lord Beamish (Lab)I concur—and I am on the record as saying—that the defence investment plan needs the money: we need to get to 3% as quickly as possible. But does the noble Earl also agree that the coalition and Conservative Governments between 2010 and 2017 in fact cut the defence budget by 22% and made people compulsorily redundant? At least this action will increase the defence budget over the next seven years by 27%.

The Earl of Minto (Con)My Lords, we are dealing with a very different situation globally from what we were dealing with then. There was not a country in the western world that was not making savings on defence at that time.

Lord Beamish (Lab)Crimea?

The Earl of Minto (Con)Well, yes.

I was saying that the money is not available now and the rest of it is to be financed by as yet unknown efficiency savings. The departments that have apparently been required to reduce their capital spending have not yet identified what they will cut, and the Government have not yet told us what asset sales they will follow through with. It is all rather unconvincing and unsatisfactory.

There are of course ways to increase defence spending without more tax rises and more borrowing. The required funds could be found by a sensible and sustainable reduction in the welfare budget, scrapping the now discredited Chagos deal, appropriately reducing the size of the Civil Service or reprioritising some of the more extreme and costly net-zero projects. The depressing reality appears to be that this Government have not been willing to grasp the nettle and make the genuine hard choices to give our Armed Forces the funding they so desperately need—and are pleading for—to keep us safe.

I now turn to the Bill. This side of the House welcomes the further incorporation of the Armed Forces covenant into law. It was a Conservative Government, through the Armed Forces Act 2021 that my noble friend Lady Goldie took through your Lordships’ House, who first placed the covenant on a statutory footing, requiring specified bodies to have due regard to its principles in the fields of housing, education and healthcare. That was a significant and hard-won step, and I am glad the Government are building on it.

However, support in principle does not exempt the Government from scrutiny in practice, and I must ask the Minister a straightforward question: what assessment has been made of the impact on those bodies newly brought into scope, and what extra costs will this impose on national authorities, local authorities, education bodies and health bodies up and down the country? I have been assured that the cost implications of extending this legal duty are expected to be minimal. Although I am grateful for that reassurance, the House will forgive me for wanting it tested more rigorously as the Bill proceeds through Committee, particularly given the number of new bodies being brought within the statutory duty and the breadth of new subject matter involved. What financial consequences, if any, does the Ministry anticipate falling on the Ministry of Defence itself as a result of this expansion? Has Treasury sign-off been secured for any downstream costs that may arise?

I think—in fact, I know—that we are united across the House in our belief that those who serve our country should never have to live in substandard accommodation, regardless of their familial status. I think we can also all agree that the current state of much service housing ranges from below standard to abysmal and exposes the immediate need for significant structural expenditure and reforms to bring all forces housing up to the expected standard for the 2020s. It was my honourable friend the shadow Secretary of State for Defence, James Cartlidge, who initiated the buyback of the housing estate from Annington Homes, as the noble Lord has referred to. It is welcome that this Government have now completed that purchase, but I believe that there must be an acknowledgement of who started it.

Clause 3 and Schedule l give legislative effect to the second pillar of the Government’s defence housing strategy, published last November, by establishing a new body corporate: the defence housing service. I understand why the Government wish to create a dedicated body with the supply, availability and quality of defence housing at its heart, and a “forces first” approach to its work is one that these Benches can readily and fully endorse. But the creation of a new statutory body inevitably raises questions about what happens to the old arrangements. What precisely is happening to the Defence Infrastructure Organisation? What functions will be transferred to the new defence housing service? Will there be an overlap in responsibility during a transition period? If so, for how long and at what cost to the taxpayer? Clear accountability will be critical to the success of both organisations in the future.

Can the Minister also set out clearly how this new body differs in practice from the alternative that my party has proposed, which is the establishment of an armed forces housing association? This would be a private, independent but, crucially, not-for-profit organisation that would reinvest all revenues back into maintaining properties and building new homes. It would have an oversight board allowing for representation of those living in service family accommodation. It would allow service men and women to benefit from different property ownership models—for example, part-ownership—allowing those of all ranks to realise their dream of owning their own home. It would allow us to reduce the reliance of the MoD on private sector renting, which costs it £80 million a year. Before I leave this point, there is a widely circulated rumour that, to fund the DIP, investment in service housing is to be deferred. This matters. Can the Minister clarify the position?

I turn to a matter that does not appear in the Bill, but that this side believes to be fundamental to the war-fighting capabilities of our Armed Forces. The jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights has expanded the application of the European Convention on Human Rights so that it now applies extraterritorially, as this House will recall from the judgment in Al-Skeini v United Kingdom. There is absolutely no question that British troops must abide by the Geneva conventions and the law of armed conflict; that is not, and never has been, in dispute. We are not arguing for complete prospective immunity from legal accountability. However, we need to ensure that our troops feel confident in taking necessary action and must be clear on the limitations of that action in law. They must be on a level playing field with the enemy they face. To be in doubt, or at a disadvantage, could, in extremis, be fatal at the critical moment.

While the preference of my party is to leave the European Convention on Human Rights entirely, that is not within the bounds of the Bill, so we will be bringing an amendment in Committee to place a duty on the Secretary of State to derogate from the convention during armed conflict—a switch from “may” to “must”. I hope that the Minister will engage constructively with that amendment in the spirit in which it is offered: not as an attack on the rule of law, far from it, but as a recognition that our troops must be able to fight for and defend this country without the fear of endless retrospective litigation on decisions taken in the heat of combat.

I turn now to the provisions on the Reserve Forces, which these Benches broadly welcome. Clause 32 removes the requirement for a service person to formally leave the Regular Forces and re-enlist in the Volunteer Reserve, or vice versa, in order to move between the two. We are pleased about the greater flexibility that this clause allows for movement between the regulars and the reserves, and we hope that it will remove a genuine source of friction for service personnel who wish to serve in different ways at different points during their career. The strategic defence review, published last year, sets out the aim of increasing the Active Reserve by 20% when funding allows. That is a laudable aim; nobody on this side of the House would quarrel with the ambition to build a larger, more resilient reserve capability at a time of growing geopolitical uncertainty. But an aim is not a plan, and I must press the Minister on the timeline. By when does the Ministry of Defence expect to achieve that 20% increase? What recruitment targets have been set year on year to get there? Crucially, given the funding caveat built into the review’s own language, how do the Government intend to fund it, given everything I have already said about the state of the defence investment plan?

I suggest one way of doing this to the Ministerincentivise more people to join the reserves by introducing a tax-free reserve service, whereby the first 30 days of reserve service in any one year would be completely free of income tax. Such a measure would cost the Exchequer relatively little, it would send a clear signal that this country values the commitment reservists make alongside their civilian careers, and it might do more to improve recruitment. I hope that the Minister will take that suggestion back to his department, even if he cannot commit to it from the Dispatch Box today.

I have covered a good deal of ground this afternoon, and there is more in the Bill that we will wish to probe in Committee, not least the reforms to the service justice system. We support the principle of aligning the powers available to service police and service courts with those already available in the civilian criminal justice system, but there are questions to be asked about how these provisions will operate in practice, and my noble friend Lady Goldie will address those in more detail in closing.

I simply say this in conclusion. This is a Bill these Benches support, because the renewal of the Armed Forces Act is a constitutional necessity, and because much of what sits alongside that renewal—the covenant, the housing reforms, the modernisation of the service justice system and the flexibility of our reserves—represents sensible and positive progress. But support for the Bill is not the same as satisfaction with the Government’s record on defence. Our Armed Forces deserve a Government willing to match warm words with hard funding decisions. Until this happens, this House will continue to ask the difficult questions the Government would rather not answer, and I look forward to the Minister’s response and to the scrutiny that lies ahead in Committee.

16:31:00

Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)My Lords, I find it rather rich that the noble Earl, Lord Minto, has attacked the Government for not spending enough on defence when the Conservative Party is still calling for tax cuts, as well as economies in other areas, and we are still discovering just how thin our Armed Forces had become in the last five years and more, and how much now needs to be done to repair where we are. The message of the strategic defence review last year, now 12 months ago, was that we are now in a different situation. We are facing more serious threats to this country of different sorts, and we need political leadership from the highest levels of government in a national conversation to carry the public with it, and explicitly to spend more money on defence. That is a painful message, and it is undermined by those who are still calling for tax cuts without quite explaining how those cuts will be paid for.

Others on these Benches will address housing, military justice and other aspects of this Bill. I want to focus on the issues covered in Clauses 32 to 38: the Reserve Forces, their role, recruitment and retention, and conditions of service. The emphasis in the Bill appears to be primarily on regular veterans as the key to a strategic reserve, even into their 60s. I am conscious that there was a long history of Britain’s peacetime forces undervaluing volunteer reserve units. Our Army and Navy were designed for long-term deployments on other continents, not for defence of the homeland, neighbouring waters and countries, but, as the SDR clearly sets out, we are now facing different threats, many of them very close to home. As it states in chapter 6, we need to integrate homeland defence with Britain’s contribution to the defence of our continent, which is now again the chief priority.

Another of the traditional arguments for Regular Forces, as against short-term service reserves or volunteers, has been that it takes a long time to train an effective soldier. Again, the SDR questions this with its comment that the finance sector, civil society, academia and others all have much to contribute to countering the hybrid threats we now face. This is not new. I recall 15 years ago, when I was in government, the Ministry of Defence worrying about how to attract into the forces personnel with digital skills to combat the development of cyber warfare, and then discovering that one service unit, the Honourable Artillery Company, already contained a large number of workers in the financial sector with the advanced skills that were needed. I note the impressive contribution of one Territorial Army officer, Tom Tugendhat, in Iraq and Afghanistan, a volunteer officer whose language and other skills proved invaluable.

The experience of the Ukraine war has confirmed that civilian skills can now be immensely valuable in wartime circumstances. Hybrid threats must be faced with hybrid skills, many of which are often to be found more easily in civilian life than in the traditional military. We have also seen in Ukraine how quickly people can be trained to high effectiveness in fields where existing skills add value. The Armed Forces Bill in this respect falls far short of the vision set out in the SDR. It prioritises extending obligations for existing reserves up to the age of 65, rather than expanding and transforming the reserves for the defence of our homeland and UK waters and transforming the relationship between reserves and our broader national society. The cautious phrase that the reserves might usefully be expanded

“by at least 20% when funding allows, most likely in the 2030s”

declares how limited a role is still foreseen.

I have gathered some impressions about current dependence on reserve personnel from association with the London Scottish, a territorial unit in which my father served a very long time ago and which has now been transformed into the reserve company of the Scots Guards. I was struck when invited some years ago to a unit dinner by its honorary colonel, the noble Lord, Lord Robertson of Port Ellen, by how many of its members had been mobilised individually for short periods to fill the ranks in Iraq and Afghanistan. It is a sign of the current shortage of regular soldiers that individual reservists are also mobilised to make up the numbers for ceremonial events, including Trooping the Colour. One of our doorkeepers was marching round Horse Guards Parade 10 days ago.

I understood Chapter 4 of the SDR to be saying that the authors would have loved to recommend expansion and greater integration between regulars and reserves but hesitated to push that very far, given more urgent priorities for limited funding. They praise the Australian military’s gap-year model for short regular service with continuing reserve commitment. They note the positive relationship between skills training for military service and for civilian tasks and suggest that military partnerships with further education colleges could provide a way forward in civil and military apprenticeships. That should become a major part of the Government’s reskilling agenda through cross-departmental co-operation, and I would welcome the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, saying more about how that is to be implemented. Chapter 7 recommends that

“the Royal Navy should adjust its personnel balance to include greater numbers of Reservists to generate efficiencies and release Regulars for front-line and operational roles”.

That seems a highly practical way of reinforcing defence of our maritime waters.

So far as I am aware, little follow-up has been taken on any of this in the 12 months since the SDR was published. There has been nothing on the whole-society approach to defence that should more closely associate civilian skills and responsibilities with military. The authors recommended the national conversation to alert the public to new threats and how they might share in responding. The noble Lord, Lord Coaker, told us recently that he has been designated the responsible Minister for the national conversation. No offence to him, but it should be the Prime Minister who leads this, and perhaps the new Prime Minister will realise that he must. The IISS, for example, has just published a report detailing Russian use of drones to overfly British military installations and airports, but it should have been Ministers who told us that to alert the public that we are facing real new threats and we need to respond.

When I asked which government department would be responsible for the proposed homeland defence force—a new iteration of what the Territorial Army was originally organised for—I had the impression that Ministers did not know before they told me that it was most probably the Cabinet Office rather than the MoD, which I suspect is a mistake. I hope the noble Lord, Lord Lancaster, will be able to cheer me up by telling me that I am underplaying what has so far been done and that cadet forces and others are already helping to build a new relationship. I was rather struck the other week when talking to one of Britain’s major public schools about how political education will be adjusted when votes at 16 come in to be told that it had abolished its cadet force some years ago because of the cost and the feeling that it was not a vital part of its educational process. On my reading, this Bill confirms that the Government have not reflected on the changing value of reserve and volunteer forces or followed the recommendations of the SDR. They have not learned the lessons of the Ukraine conflict or the changing nature of hybrid threats. Veterans in their early 60s will do their best to fill the ranks when called on, but there is so much more that should be done to recruit and mobilise reserves to contribute to national resilience and security and to link our Armed Forces more closely to our civilian national community.

16:40:00

Lord Craig of Radley (CB)My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire. We share the honour of having fitted a military covenant report into the Armed Forces Act 2006 in 2011.

This Bill deserves credit for finally setting out a more adequate statutory treatment of the military covenant, but it has been a long, slow process. Nearly 20 years ago, in 2008, a Command Paper first introduced an undertaking to treat the military covenant in statute. Three years later, as I have mentioned, the Armed Forces Bill of 2011 was the start. It introduced a single minimalist clause entitled “Military Covenant Report”.

While welcoming its inclusion, I objected to its being inserted towards the tail end of the miscellaneous sections of the 2006 Act as lacking appropriate prominence. I also said that its insertion as new Section 359A of the Act, immediately following Section 359, implying in a contents list that the two sections were related, would be an unfortunate juxtaposition. Why? It was because Section 359 granted pardons to veterans executed in World War I for desertion and other disciplinary offences. The Government accepted these criticisms and, after further discussion, proposed a whole new part—Part 16A—on the covenant report. The Minister, Lord Astor of Hever, kindly invited me to put my name to their formal government amendment and to be the first speaker to introduce it.

Only in later Bills was the concept of due regard by some local authorities introduced, initially in a much-restricted way. Attempts by myself and others in 2021 to require due regard by national authorities were resisted, but an agreement to consider this further was given by Ministers to get the Bill passed in time. This brings us to the present Bill, which will now require due regard by national authorities when appropriate. In other words, the covenant is finally being brought fully into national as well as local law.

I am pleased also to note that in new Section 343AZA(2)(c) a significant consideration is now present—namely, that special provision for servicepeople may be justified by the effects on such people of being a member or former member of the Armed Forces. So far, that is good news. However, the Royal British Legion and other charities have a number of issues and queries about details yet to be resolved, such as care home responsibility for “due regard”. I sense too that there will be inevitable disagreements between local and national authorities about which should be responsible for taking action, and a temptation to play ping-pong over it. Were this to occur, it might be for the Armed Forces Commissioner or a veterans’ commissioner to resolve. The Minister might like to comment on this possibility.

The issue of removing immigration fees for close dependants of non-UK personnel granted leave to remain because of their former service in the Armed Forces will be an amendment to return to in Committee. The 2024 manifesto commitments by the three parties undertook to waive the current and increasing immigration fees that families of non-UK Armed Forces personnel are required to pay before being allowed indefinite leave to remain in the UK with their spouse. Two years have passed, but there is still nothing but empty assurances that this waiver is to be honoured. It is time for action to correct this unfairness.

I am saddened that there is no further attempt to deal with the incompatibilities between this Act and human rights, frequently exposed in examples of lawfare, or further consideration of some form of better combat immunity for service personnel on operations. I sense, however, that this is not a field this Government wish to enter, and it may be rather fruitless to raise it now.

I will also repeat a complaint—some might call it a whinge—I have made at Second Readings of previous Armed Forces Bills: about the way the constitutionally important Armed Forces Act 2006 has to be renewed. Like its 2011, 2016 and 2021 predecessors, the present Bill is, in effect, a 150-page Marshalled List of amendments to the 2006 Act, which itself has almost 350 pages. I commend the efforts of officials to produce in the Bill before the House a masterclass in amendments to the 2006 Act and many other Acts, but unless a major change of approach is found, our successors will be dealing with Bills whose size is measured not by page numbers but in kilograms.

One issue covering more than 32 pages—some 10%—of the 2006 Act is defence housing and other property. Noble Lords will be aware of the Government’s commitment to improve living accommodation for service personnel. This is clearly meant as a key step towards achieving that ambition. The defence housing service is being given wide powers in new Section 343F, with Treasury consent being required only if the housing service is to borrow money. Other functions, such as entering into contracts or agreements, or forming or investing in a company or partnership, do not appear to need Treasury agreement. Such freedom does seem to me to be unusual.

Is the MoD to be responsible for the size of this service and paying for it? Have the Government made any estimate of the cost of and manpower required for this new organisation? Bearing in mind the difficulties facing the MoD because of the shortfall in defence investment planning funding, and the expectation that living accommodation expenditure will fall to the back of the queue, what rate of improvement is to be expected from the new defence housing service? Has the Minister any figures for the House?

16:49:00

The Lord Bishop of NorwichI thank the Minister and his officials for their work on this Bill. It is a privilege to follow the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig, and I look forward to hearing further contributions from noble and gallant Lords with their wealth of experience. When I read in Hansard the record of the Second Reading debate on this Bill’s predecessor five years ago, I could not help but notice that the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, and the noble Baroness, Lady Goldie, will simply be swapping places when they come to sum up this debate. In my remarks, I will focus on three areas: first, the Armed Forces covenant; secondly, the whole-society approach to civil preparedness; and thirdly, some niche comments related to the service police powers.

“Covenant” is an ancient word with deep resonances in Judaism, Islam and Christianity. It is about gifts offered and received, about commitments made and honoured, lived in mutual reciprocity. When we ask much of our Armed Forces—and, God forbid, we might need to ask more of them and their families in the years to come—pledging a commitment to what they can expect in return for all that they give and, for veterans, have given, is the mark of a grateful society.

“Gratitude” is perhaps an old-fashioned word these days, but when we lose it, recruitment drops, morale drops and retention drops. At its heart, the Armed Forces covenant seeks to embed gratitude—not special favours or a jingoistic patriotism, but a simple commitment to understanding, fairness and opportunity. That is why I am pleased that His Majesty’s Government are proposing in the Bill to enshrine the Armed Forces covenant fully in law, by extending it to central, devolved and local authorities, and expanding the issues to which these and certain public bodies must have due regard.

So much flows from thatmutual responsibility, protecting the vulnerable, providing hospitality and integration, and including appropriate housing at a good standard. Although the focus is rightly on family housing, I hope the new proposed defence housing service will also ensure that single persons’ accommodation is of a standard that can create a sense of home. I hope consideration will also be given to fitting housing with good insulation and solar panels, so reducing energy costs and contributing to His Majesty’s Government’s net-zero commitments.

The Armed Forces covenant was signed on behalf of the Church of England by the then Archbishops of Canterbury and York in February 2015. Since then, a number of English dioceses have also signed, working in partnership with local veterans, reservists and military bases. I confess that the diocese of Norwich needs to catch up, though I value my own engagement with RAF Marham, with the Queen’s Dragoon Guards at Swanton Morley, and those who serve at the STANTA. At the latter, I have witnessed the valuable work being done by the British Army, in collaboration with forces of other nations, in training Ukrainian conscripts to fight for the freedom of their country against Putin’s tyranny.

I believe that churches and Church schools have a particular role to play in supporting the 124,000 children of military families, who are likely to have to move school more often than others and to have parents away on deployment, sometimes for long periods with limited contact. It strikes me that the conversations around signing the covenant, the engagement that involves with His Majesty’s forces, and the prompt that this gives to think more through the eyes of service personnel and veterans, is of as much importance as the ceremony of signing. Through good conversations, understanding is fostered, and the gift of concern and care can be extended.

I imagine that I am not the only father of a soldier who has stood at the central memorial at the National Memorial Arboretum in Staffordshire and run his hand over those panels of carved names on Portland stone, only to reach our contemporary era, where the stone becomes smooth: smooth stone awaiting chiselling—the names of those who will be prepared to pay the ultimate sacrifice in defence of our nation in whatever will unfold in the years to come.

There are other people, each also treasured by God, who carry or will carry the scars of conflict and war in body, mind and soul long into the future, often impacting those around them. Among those who support and care for them are our Armed Forces chaplains—men and women, both regulars and reservists, whose calling is to serve alongside, being with and being there at both joyous and tragic moments, offering hope, peace and prayerful presence, and being the bearers of spiritual, moral and pastoral support. The Armed Forces covenant is, in a sense, a continuation of that pastoral care shared by us all in wider society.

My second point is about whole society preparedness. The recently published Global Peace Index 2026 found that

“the world has continued its longstanding trajectory of deteriorating peacefulness … There are now more active state-based conflicts than at any point since the end of the Second World War, while the number of countries involved in external conflict has nearly doubled since 2008”.

Given the troubling and dangerous times we live in, the Church of England’s General Synod has been considering how we might be called to be the Church in a time of war. Last July, we heard from the Lutheran Archbishop of Tallinn, Urmas Viilma, about how their preparedness is significantly advanced. This does not sit easily with the Jesus that I encounter in the gospels proclaiming peace-making and that most difficult of commands about love of neighbour and love of enemy.

I note that Bishop George Bell in November 1939, faced with a terrible impending European war, said:

“It is the function of the Church at all costs to remain the Church”.

The Church’s task is therefore to work and pray for peace, and to shape and form peacemakers, peacebuilders and peacekeepers. I would argue that, while not scaremongering, we need also to prepare for the threats we face. The Church and other faith groups would play a key role in supporting communities in the event of a major conflict. Resilience, community solidarity and hope are all key Christian virtues that people have valued in previous wars and would be much needed in any future conflict. As St Paul’s letter to the infant church in Rome put it:

“Hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good”. Will the Minister outline what preparations are in place and what resources are being made available to meet the strategic defence review’s goal of a “whole-of-society approach” to the review’s implementation, including

“widening participation in national resilience”?

My final point, and I declare a familial connection with the Royal Military Police, is a concern that under the Armed Forces Bill, service police will not be able to authorise pre-charge custody for Schedule 1 offences—that is, for battery, even when there is a domestic context. This is because the legislation is drafted for all serious offences to be in scope, which does not include Schedule 1 offences and does not articulate the context of domestic abuse offences. The issue of commanding officers dealing with domestic abuse offences was brought up by the Centre for Military Justice in its evidence in response to the Armed Forces Bill. It recommended an amendment to the relevant schedules to prevent commanding officers dealing with any domestic abuse matter at summary hearing. Although the Royal Military Police has a strong policy position that, where there is a domestic abuse context to offences, the commanding officer could investigate, it is very clear that such cases should always be referred to the relevant policing authority so that it can consider investigating. This is not articulated in legislation. Will the Minister commit to look at that please?

More broadly, I raise the issue that the additional requirements of meeting the threshold of a serious offence will add additional bureaucracy for service police during the arrest of suspects. This could be reduced by giving complete authority to authorise pre-charge custody to the provost marshals. The definition of a serious offence is noted as being similar to, but different from, the definition of a serious service offence in Part 1 of the Armed Forces (Powers of Stop and Search, Search, Seizure and Retention) Order 2009. The added complexity of this definition will inevitably slow down the processing of suspects in arrest and risk incorrect authorisations of pre-charge custody. Giving the provost marshals authority to authorise pre-charge custody in all offences would reduce these risks and give the service police greater parity with its civilian counterparts, who can authorise custody in such cases.

I have been made aware that service police currently have no specific legal protection against impersonation, either by civilians or by persons subject to service law. As the service police as forces are not constituted under the Police Act 1996, the offence of impersonating a police officer and the linked offences in Section 90 of the Police Act do not create an offence of impersonating a service police officer; nor are service police currently protected by the enhanced sentencing powers of the Assaults on Emergency Workers (Offences) Act 2018. Service police officers are regularly assaulted on duty yet are not given the same respect and protections afforded to civilian police officers and other emergency workers.

Will the Minister commit to looking at these anomalies around impersonating and assaulting service police so that there can be parity with their civilian counterparts, with a view to potentially introducing a government amendment to bring clarity to these current anomalies? I look forward to engaging with the Bill as it progresses through your Lordships’ House.

17:01:00

Baroness Penn (Con)My Lords, it is a real pleasure to follow the right reverend Prelate. This is my first contribution in this House on the matter of defence. The reasons it has come now are twofold.

The first reason is the time we are living through. In my time in government, in the Home Office and No. 10, we dealt with terror attacks, the Novichok poisonings, cyber attacks, and the use of chemical weapons in Syria. But the scale of the threat, and the response we need, are of a different order of magnitude today. As we have heard in the debate, that means a whole-society response. We need to widen the debate that we have in this House and the people who engage in it, not least on the question of funding. Meeting 3% and 3.5% of GDP towards defence will be incredibly challenging, but it is important that we get there. I do not envy the current Government in trying to do it, but it is a long-term task. The trade-offs are real, and we should not pretend that they are not. That means a wider conversation about what we have to sacrifice to meet those funding commitments.

The same is true when we think about the contribution that we want people to make to our defence beyond our Armed Forces. We need to hear more about that national conversation. I encourage the Government—again, it is a difficult conversation to have—to try to be more open in how they tackle and approach this question. It is not something we have done for a very long time, and I do not think we can come up with the answer behind closed doors without an ongoing period of engagement.

The second reason I am speaking now is my participation in the Armed Forces Parliamentary Scheme, which has given me much greater insight into the people who serve in our Armed Forces—particularly the RAF, the branch through which I am doing the scheme this year. It is clear that we will deliver on our commitments in the SDR and the defence investment programme only if we deliver for and through our people in the military. Therefore, I welcome the measures in the Bill that will improve conditions for people: the measures to strengthen the Armed Forces covenant, to take further action on housing and to strengthen and expand the role of reservists.

Given the premium that the military places on experience, retention—as well as recruitment—will be more important than ever. In that context, I will raise two issues that I think touch the lives of Armed Forces families in particular.

The first is paternity leave for dads in the military. In the UK, we give dads two weeks’ full-paid paternity leave; in Australia, it is eight weeks; in Canada, it is a share of up to 35 weeks; and in the US, that well-known bastion of parental rights and pay, it is 12 weeks at full pay. The US example is pertinent, because this is about a hard-nosed approach to what we need in order to retain the very best people in our services. I have made the case before about changing our statutory provision in the civilian world and how it is good for dads, mums and kids, but all those reasons are magnified in a military setting because of the demand that we place on the people serving in our military and the absences that they often have from their families. That opportunity early in a family’s formation to spend time together, to bond and to establish ongoing relationships is even more important.

It is also worth reflecting on the dynamic for couples who are both in the Armed Forces. At the moment, mums get 26 weeks at full pay under their occupational provision, and dads get two weeks, so think about the effect that that has on the career of both those people as they have each additional child and how the balance of how they approach care is different.

I recognise that members of the Armed Forces are not employees with traditional employment rights in this sense, that the provision for the occupational scheme is different, and that leave needs to be and is subject to operational demands. Nothing that I would propose in changing it would change that fact, but I think we can and should go further.

I would also like to raise a specific case with the Minister of an Army Reserve sergeant who was denied statutory paternity pay after his mobilisation to support Ukraine was treated as a work break from his civilian job. My understanding is that this is not how the current system is meant to work, but this issue affecting a particular member of the reserves has not been resolved and we do not know whether others are also being affected by, perhaps, a misunderstanding of the rules. I hope the Minister can commit to looking further into this and getting it resolved. If we are going to expand the role of reserves in our country, we need to make sure that the move between mobilisation and deployment and civilian life is smooth and works for them.

The second area I would like to raise is that raised by the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig of Radley: the fees for indefinite leave to remain for family members of service personnel with service of four years or more. Removing these fees is a Labour manifesto commitment, and it is supported by the Royal British Legion. In the other place, it had a very vocal supporter in my colleague Ben Obese-Jecty, who tabled an amendment to this Bill in the Commons to introduce those changes that are a government manifesto commitment. Sadly, it was voted against in the other place; the Minister responded by saying that work is under way, but no timescale has been given. As the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig, said: it is two years since the election. In that time, the fees for indefinite leave to remain have risen by almost £350. For a family of four to get indefinite leave to remain will cost well over £10,000 and the increase for that family is over £1,000 since 2024.

I recognise that this requires work with the Home Office. Both the Minister and I have worked in the Home Office, and we know that on occasion it can be hard to get things done in that very great department, but two years is long enough. We change our Immigration Rules twice a year. The next changes are due in October, and it would be fantastic to hear from the Minister that the fulfilment of Labour’s manifesto commitment in this area will be contained within those changes. There is the old saying that you recruit a soldier but retain a family. I hope that, alongside the measures in the Bill, the Minister can signal some progress on both of the issues that I have raised today.

17:10:00

Baroness Lane-Fox of Soho (CB)My Lords, I am very happy to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Penn, because I too have been trying to understand defence, both personally and professionally, over the last year. I declare three interests that have helped me. Like her, I am taking part in the Armed Forces Parliamentary Scheme, so ably chaired by the noble Lord, Lord Stevens, who is in his place, but as part of the Navy. In parallel, I have become the proud sponsor of HMS “Achilles”, the last of the new Astute class nuclear submarines being built in Barrow. Finally, I am an adviser to the Lakestar resilience fund, which invests in defence and societal resilience technologies.

Therefore, I am lucky enough to have spent time on bases and in ships, in classrooms and in boats, and in service accommodation. I feel as though I have met hundreds of servicepeople, but I have also been thinking about the technologies that sit beside our national resilience. The two experiences are different, but they reinforce the same thought: when we talk about defence, we often talk about platforms, procurement and capability, yet much of our resilience depends on more practical questions. Can we recruit and retain talented people? Can they build a stable family life? Are they learning quickly enough to keep pace with technology? What happens when they take the uniform off?

Until recently, perhaps like many people in this country, my understanding of what our Armed Forces actually do was embarrassingly shallow. I could not have explained what we ask a submariner to endure on a nuclear deterrent patrol or what it means for a Royal Marine to operate in the High North, where a minor mistake can become life threatening. That has changed through my time with the Royal Navy: it has put faces and human cost behind phrases that I once skimmed over. It is with these perspectives that I approach the Bill. I will focus on two areas—housing and skills.

The contrast in housing between what is often expected at entry and what some individuals still experience is striking. I have seen good accommodation, but I have also seen damp, broken heating and long waits for basic repairs—and heaven forbid there should ever be any wifi. The creation of the defence housing service is one of the Bill’s biggest changes. The real test is simple: will life improve for the families living in those homes? I would like to understand how Parliament will know whether these arrangements have worked three or five years from now. What standards will the new service meet? How quickly will repairs be fixed? Will performance be published? How will servicepeople influence the system if it is not delivering? Poor housing affects morale, retention and families. If we ask people to serve their country, we must ensure that they have a decent place to live.

The second area is the Armed Forces covenant. As we have heard, every five years, it allows us to ask whether we are keeping our side of the bargain with our armed services. I welcome the Bill’s decision to strengthen the covenant and extend the statutory duty more widely, but it raises a wider question: what does “no disadvantage” really mean in 2026? The world of work has changed irrevocably. AI technology is reshaping recruitment, jobs and skills. Every year, thousands leave the Armed Forces and enter the labour market. The Armed Forces are exceptionally good at teaching people how to learn under pressure. In a world of constant technological change, that ability may be one of the most valuable things that our servicepeople leave with. Judgment, teamwork, adaptability and leadership are becoming more valuable, not less, and are qualities that the Armed Forces develop every day. Perhaps the Minister could say how the Government see the covenant evolving alongside these changes. If the labour market is shifting, should “no disadvantage” include helping people to develop their skills more during service, making it easier for employers to recognise them?

The Bill also updates arrangements for reserves and recall, recognising that the skills of former personnel remain valuable long after full-time service. If we value those skills enough to maintain that relationship, are we also doing enough to help people keep them up to date—especially as we face the hybrid world which the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, talked about earlier? To me, that is part of what conditions of service now means. They still include pay, housing and family support, but they could also include the chance to keep learning and moving confidently into civilian life. I do not suggest that the Bill should become a workforce strategy, but it is reasonable to ask whether the covenant, transition support and reserve policy reflect the world that people who leave the Armed Forces now go into, including the impact of AI and automation. One of the privileges of spending time with serving personnel has been seeing the skill and determination across the forces. We invest heavily in developing those qualities while people are in uniform; we should be just as determined to ensure they continue to benefit after they leave.

We should all welcome and support the Bill, and, as the noble Baroness, Lady Penn, said, make sure it is widely supported outside this House and part of a national conversation. If, in a few years’ time, we can look servicepeople in the eye and say that they are living in better homes, that veterans are finding it easier to build good civilian careers and that people feel better supported to keep learning throughout their careers and beyond, the Bill will have done something significant alongside its constitutional importance.

17:15:00

Baroness Brinton (LD) [V]My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Lane-Fox of Soho, who spoke eloquently about the need for improved housing for service men and women and their families. I am grateful, too, to my noble friend Lord Wallace of Saltaire for his introduction to the Bill.

In my contribution today, I want to focus on protection from sexual and violent behaviour and domestic abuse, stalking and harassment, in Clauses 5 to 10; support for victims of service offences, in Clauses 11 and 12; service courts, in Clauses 21 to 27; and Schedules 2 and 3. These clauses and schedules all have a direct impact on the victims of offences perpetrated by service men and women. I have some concerns that, as they stand, the proposals do not give parity with the non-military administrative police and court systems. I also want to ask some questions about the protocols on visiting forces, in Clauses 41 and 42, in the light of the recent case in Cambridge.

My Front-Bench portfolio of victims and vulnerable people is more usually found in home affairs and justice legislation, and it is good to work with the noble Baroness, Lady Penn, again. It is also good to see the Bill trying to strengthen the arrangements inside the military criminal justice system to match those elsewhere. I particularly thank Aurora New Dawn and the Suzy Lamplugh Trust for their briefing on the Bill and for copying the letter that they have sent to the Secretary of State for Defence. Both groups are very concerned that there are some key gaps in the Armed Forces Bill that will mean that victims in the military system do not get the same level of support and protection. I really hope that the Minister will agree to a meeting with them and those who speak today on these issues, preferably before Committee stage. If possible, it might be helpful if the noble Baroness, Lady Levitt, could be present at the meeting, because, as Courts Minister, she has recently been dealing with the equivalent in the non-military world.

I know from my own experience, two decades ago now, as a victim of a sustained, nearly three-year stalking campaign that the effect on victims of an obsessive, manipulative stalker is awful but, worse, that victims are re-victimised when those in the criminal justice system just do not understand how serious it can be. Since 2012, the laws relating to stalking have slowly changed, but those changes are only partially covered in the Bill. I note that the effectiveness of service stalking protection orders—SSPOs—will depend on the ability of military personnel, not just military police and courts, to recognise stalking, assess risk and respond appropriately. This is reflected in the report of the Select Committee on the Armed Forces Bill, which included an official recommendation that:

“The introduction of the restrictive orders under Clauses 5 and 6 should be accompanied by extensive training across the system in order for the measures to be properly understood, implemented, and enforced”.

One thing is clearthe need for training to identify and respond to stalking will be even greater within the Armed Forces setting than in the civilian world. That is because the nature of service life presents unique challenges, including hierarchical structures, close-knit communities, shared accommodation, deployments, and overlapping professional and personal relationships, as well as opportunities for community surveillance. We know already from domestic abuse cases in the military world that these factors will increase opportunities for perpetrators to maintain unwanted contact and try to exert control, as victims may continue to live, work and serve alongside them.

Effective implementation of SSPOs will therefore depend on specialist training delivered by independent experts, as in the civilian world, so that any personnel can recognise stalking behaviour, understand patterns of escalation and respond appropriately, as well as fully understand all the SSPO provisions, including the possibility of placing positive requirements on perpetrators. It is important to note that the statutory guidance on the independent stalking advocate requires specialist stalking responses and should not be subsumed within broader domestic abuse frameworks. Over a third of stalking cases are nothing to do with domestic relationships.

This is also reflected in the recommendations arising from the super-complaint on the police response to stalking, led by HMICFRS, the IOPC and the College of Policing, which highlighted the need to draw on specialist expertise in the development and delivery of all stalking training. Failure to identify stalking can result in victims being directed into responses that do not adequately address stalking-related risk and allow behaviours to escalate. Why is there no provision in the Bill for this important training?

Another area I have concerns about are the arrangements relating to the service stalking protection notices themselves. Early intervention is particularly important in stalking cases, where behaviours may escalate over time and are associated with an increased risk of serious violence and homicide. While the introduction of the SSPOs is very welcome, there remains a significant gap between identifying risk and securing an order within the civilian system.

The Bill addresses this challenge in the domestic abuse context through the provision of domestic abuse protection notices, which provide immediate protection while interim orders are being pursued. It is shocking that there is no equivalent mechanism in the Bill for stalking. Introducing service stalking protection notices would provide an important safeguard during this period and bring the stalking provisions into closer alignment with the domestic abuse framework.

It is not clear from the relevant clauses and Schedules 2 and 3 whether or not the Bill provides for continuity of protection after a convicted service man or woman has left the services. Whether a domestic abuse protection order, a stalking protection order, a sexual harm prevention order or a sexual risk order, it absolutely beggars belief that the service protection order automatically lapses when the offender has left the military, often after release from prison, even if the details of the protection order make it plain that the military police and/or military court still believe that the victims in these cases need formal protection.

It appears there is no facility at the moment to transfer protection orders, with the appropriate level of information, to the civilian police service where the victim and their dependants live, and the service where the offender will live, to explain under what circumstances the protection and prevention order was made. It should also ensure that victims are signposted to civilian victim support that is appropriate for their case. At best, the Bill is ambiguous; at worst, these specific issues and gaps were highlighted by the evidence of the Director of Service Prosecutions at the Bill’s Select Committee hearings.

When gaps such as this are created in stalking cases, danger thrives. The offender thinks they are home free and, especially with stalking, might well target their victim again. If they think that the police in their area do not know about them, that will embolden them further. Will the Minister say that the Government will table amendments prior to Committee to remedy this serious and dangerous gap?

Finally, I am very concerned by reports in the Guardian and by the BBC last week about the case of the US Air Force pilot, Captain Jacob Wulfson. My noble friend Lord Thomas of Gresford is much more expert than I on the military court system of visiting forces, and I look forward to his contribution. My focus is on how badly the victim in this case was let down, not just by the US court-martial process but by the local police and the CPS, at the moment it was suggested—I presume by RAF Lakenheath—that the case should be moved from the Cambridgeshire Constabulary to the US military courts.

My information comes from the two reports of the case. The most horrifying aspect is how on earth the rape of a British subject in Cambridge, which is British soil, by an American who chose to live off-base in Cambridge, could be tried in a US system that derides and diminishes a victim in a way that our criminal justice system—from police to courts and appeals—absolutely cannot.

I mention the Wulfson case as an exemplar. We know there have been many other such cases where the US system has intervened but without the details becoming public. I suspect that many of those are equally unsatisfactory. For example, I did not know that, in the USA, no rape case can be tried without evidence from the victim, even if there is ample forensic and other witness evidence, and that the victim can be cross-examined and derided by the defence attorney in a manner absolutely forbidden in our courts. Further, I did not know that the prosecutor does not need to have specialised training in rape and other sexual offences to balance the defence attorney’s contribution, or that, in this particular case, the eight jurors—all service personnel from Lakenheath, who, under US law, can also judge the case—can include someone with a spent conviction for sexual assault. This is unbelievable.

The victim has been brave beyond measure, but she does not have—as we have here—the chance of submitting a request to the Attorney-General for a review of an unduly lenient sentence. Further, because she is an alien—that is, not an American citizen—she is not entitled to any support from the American victims system, which helps guide their citizens through. That is shameful. Even worse, any convicted US service man or woman has an automatic right of appeal, as well as being able to ask the Secretary of Defense or the President to grant them clemency because their military service outweighs their crime, even if it is a serious sexual or violent assault.

This case is an absolute travesty, but it is not isolated. We need to address why Cambridgeshire police or the CPS thought it appropriate to allow the case to pass to Lakenheath base. Can the Minister please write to those of us speaking on this issue today to answer the following questions? At what level was the decision to transfer made? What was the relevant rank of the police officer or CPS staff? Did they have training to do this and therefore understand the full legal ramifications of the decision on treatment and justice for the victim? Were there any referrals back to the Ministry of Justice? I presume they would be via the Attorney-General, but I do not know. Do the Ministry of Defence, the Ministry of Justice, the Home Office and the Foreign Office have a co-ordinated approach to or a protocol for cases such as this, where the crime occurs on British soil but the case is moved to a visiting military court system?

It is interesting that we now have an interdepartmental protocol between the Foreign Office, the Home Office and the coroner service for when a British citizen is murdered abroad, with these departments all helping bereaved families. In cases similar to the Wulfson case, is there a protocol with these departments’ opposite numbers for high-level conversations to understand the consequences? I would be very grateful if the Minister, and the Courts Minister, the noble Baroness, Lady Levitt, could provide the answers to these questions as a matter of urgency, preferably before I and others table amendments in Committee.

17:28:00

Lord Lancaster of Kimbolton (Non-Afl)My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton. I start by declaring an interest that, as of 15 June, I was appointed Assistant Chief of the Defence Staff, with responsibility for reserves and cadets. I am now the de facto most senior reservist in defence. Perhaps if the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, could give me another couple of weeks to get my feet under the table, I would happily accept the burden of responsibility for the things he mentioned in his remarks. I hope to offer him some encouragement that progress is indeed being made. Equally, before taking up this recent role, I was asked, in my capacity as the independent chair of the Reserve Forces Review 2030—RF30—to give oral evidence when the Bill was in Committee in the Commons. After consultation with the Minister, and with the permission of your Lordships’ House, it is in this capacity that I speak today—as an extension of that earlier evidence session.

I support the Bill, as it brings much-needed clarity and simplification to the role of the Strategic Reserve and provides the enablement, through the formation of a non-departmental public body, for the reserve forces and cadets associations. The reserve landscape is complex. RF30 sought to simplify this landscape by broadly dividing the reserve between the Active Reserve—part-time and predominantly, but not exclusively, paid volunteers, such as me—and the Strategic Reserve; that is, former regular service men and women who retain a liability to be called back into service.

In recent years, the Strategic Reserve has been pretty much ignored. This Bill does much to enable its greater use, as both the Active and Strategic Reserve will be essential not only in war but in the transition to war, and it is the latter that elements of this Bill enable.

To the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, I say that considerable work has been done in this area. In recent months, tens of thousands of records of former service personnel have been checked and reloaded on to defence databases. I was surprised to discover— although perhaps I should not have been, given that the average age of a service leaver is 31—that the vast majority of these members of what will be the Strategic Reserve are under the age of 45. So, even though this increases the age of liability to 65, the vast majority of the Strategic Reserve is relatively young—just like us.

I will say a few words on the Active Reserve—the part-time volunteers—and equally, I hope to cheer up the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire by dispelling the myth that somehow these reservists are a contingent capability who train only at weekends and on drill nights. Today’s Active Reserve is a very different beast, with a large percentage of reservists in all three services and Cyber & Specialist Operations Command contributing on a daily basis to delivering defence capabilities on operations in the UK and around the world: for example, on recent reserve-lead UN missions in Cyprus or specialists such as cyber experts bringing their skills to defence, or working shifts as logistical experts at RAF bases. They are fully integrated with our regular force and must be valued as such.

I want to try to tie together the measures in this Bill with the aspiration, the ends and ways, of the Strategic Defence Review, published last year, and the Defence Investment plan, the means, published last week. The SDR, published in June 2025, called this

“the most serious and least predictable”

security environment since the Cold War. The ongoing war in Ukraine and recent events in the Middle East underline this assertation. At its heart, the SDR highlighted three shifts: a move to warfighting readiness; an integrated force model; and, crucially, a whole-of-society approach to national defence—a theme that has already been explored by the right reverend Prelate and, indeed, my noble friend Lady Penn.

The SDR proposed a major boost to the reservesa new UK Strategic Reserve by 2030 and a commitment that the Army should be able to rapidly expand and mobilise reserve forces. The Strategic Reserve measures in this Bill are sensible, in that they provide both simplification and harmonisation between the three single services, with liability to 65, and form the basis of that rapidly expandable force. The key, though, will be the data that we hold on individuals and its digital management. We need to move away from a traditional paper-based system to a digital solution: interrogating the data we hold and contacting reservists digitally, perhaps via mobile phone apps, so we can best mobilise and employ reservists based on their current skills as well as their historical skills, and at pace. Defence should invest in this technology as a priority, otherwise we will struggle to convert whatever legislation we pass in the Bill into genuine defence capability. I was pleased to see the DIP specifically highlighting the need to invest

“in new methods and technology for engagement with the Strategic Reserve”.

The SDR also recommends an expansion of the Active Reserve by 20%, albeit with the caveat “when financial conditions allow”. I would say to the Minister that the Reserve is a fragile beast, overly reliant on the goodwill of its volunteers, and, while we await the financial conditions that will allow its expansion, we must in the meantime ensure we continue to nurture it. Notwithstanding the ambition to increase the size of the Active Reserve within the SDR, it is worth taking a moment to compare ourselves with the actions being taken by some of our NATO Allies. In Belgium, a territorial force, a combination of regular and reserve, is being developed with a focus on the protection of the homeland and critical national infrastructure, with an ambition to have 0.5% of the working population as reservists. Canada is doubling the size of its active reserve forces to 100,000 and developing a strategic reserve of 300,000. Simplifying processes for recruiting and training, the Canadian armed forces have had their best recruiting year for many years, led by a national conversation from the top of government. The Czech Republic is reported to have increased gross numbers of reserves by 5,000 in a year from a population of just 10 million. This contrasts with the increase of a few hundred for the UK Reserves; however, we should note that numbers of applications continue to grow. We are not alone in recognising the need to expand our Reserve Forces as an effective addition to deterrence.

RF30 and the SDR were both clear on the need for reinvigorated training and modernisation, and learning lessons from Ukraine on drones, autonomy and digital warfare. I was pleased to see the recent Defence Investment Plan prioritise these measures. This preparedness for conflict, however, cannot be Defence’s job alone. The SDR was also clear that defence to be a whole-of-society matter—something that other noble Lords have raised. With our homeland under attack via cyber, and critical infrastructure on a knife edge, we cannot simply contract out our defences to those in uniform.

That means we need civilian and military integration, with Defence playing a key role in the Cabinet Office-led home defence programme; community mobilisation—the SDR envisages substantial numbers of volunteers at local level; civilian rescue teams, reserve firefighters, special constables and a new home defence force; and partnering with society with a new partnership with industry, wider participation in resilience, an expansion of the specialist industry-sponsored Reserve and a national conversation on security.

This builds directly on the recommendations of the RF30 report, which asked us to redefine the Reserves’ relationship with society, to share expertise with industry and academia, and to unlock flexible service, enabling regulars and reserves alike to move between civilian and defence roles, sharing their expertise. The SDR and DIP were clear: we need a defence that is NATO first, innovative and lethal, but we also need a defence that is rooted in our communities. Our reservists, be they Active or Strategic, are the bridge between regulars and civilians, between barracks and boardrooms. If we are serious about resilience, defence is not just the job of the Ministry of Defence; it is the responsibility of all of us.

The modernisation of the Strategic Reserve and the Reserve Forces’ and Cadets’ Associations elements in this Bill represent a good first step, which I hope will be built on in the Government’s future defence readiness Bill. But legislation, as I have said, is only one element, and I have one plea to the Minister—apart from, of course, for continued support for the Reserve. It is that the Government embark on a conversation with wider society to explain why defence is a national responsibility. I know that work is being done on that within the MoD and I am very grateful to the Government for ensuring that it is being done—but we need to start that conversation now.

17:38:00

Lord Magan of Castletown (Con)My Lords, it is somewhat daunting to follow my noble friend Lord Lancaster of Kimbolton. He certainly knows what he is talking about.

We have to talk about money. It is the critical lifeblood of our Armed Forces and their effectiveness. This Labour Administration are totally failing to recognise fully their financial responsibilities for the defence of the realm. We are on a collision course with a Russia that is on a war footing. The threats are not imaginary; they are real. Yet the current Labour Administration are intent on sleepwalking into a critical situation for want of mobilising the immediately necessary and substantial funding to keep our country safe.

Yes, the UK is extremely vulnerable and exposed at this time, not least because of the very substantial underinvestment in our nuclear submarine capability. The strategic defence review made abundantly clear the scale of the increased investment in defence capabilities that is needed. The defence investment plan has quantified the requirement at £28 billion over the next four years. The reality is that the current Labour Administration have prevaricated and procrastinated until very late, coming up with a—very rushed—financial commitment of just £15 billion over four years, but substantially sourced by as yet unidentified cost savings. This is just far too little and far too late.

Defence expenditure will rise in 2030 to just 2.7% of GDP, far short of the 3% committed by the Prime Minister to our NATO allies. No wonder that John Healey, until recently Secretary of State for Defence, resigned—because, in his words, the proposed level of spending

“falls well short of what is required for defence and the country at this dangerous time”.

So Prime Minister Starmer goes to the NATO summit this week as a derided lame duck—an ignominious ending to his disastrous term in office. His weakness will hugely upset our European NATO partners but will enrage President Trump, whose ire will no doubt manifest itself in other ways of significant damage to the UK and our trading relationship with the USA. Starmer has surely smashed the special relationship; it will take a very long time for trust and confidence to rebuild.

17:42:00

Lord Dannatt (CB)My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Magan of Castletown, who has rightly pointed out the inadequacies of the funding package announced last week in the defence investment plan. However, that is not what I wish to talk about this afternoon.

I welcome the strengthening of the Armed Forces covenant, but I do so in the wider context of the funding—and underfunding—of defence. We put the Armed Forces covenant into being in 2011, following several years when the Armed Forces had been under huge pressure as a result of the double commitment in Iraq and Afghanistan. At that time, there was an imbalance between what the nation was asking the Armed Forces to do and what it was providing them with in order to carry out their tasks. That imbalance was translated into what is now the Armed Forces covenant. The covenant now focuses largely on individuals’ requirements and making sure there is no disadvantage, which is good, and we are now going to widen it and its legal underpinning.

I stress that the origin of the military covenant, as we called what is now the Armed Forces covenant, was a moral foundation to ensure a balance between what the nation was asking of the Armed Forces and what the Armed Forces were being given to do it with. In welcoming the strengthening of the covenant, I make the wider point that there is that moral consideration, as well as the legal underpinning.

Secondly, I welcome the defence housing strategy, but we have been there before. I have been in and out of the Ministry of Defence for the better part of half a century, and successive Governments have vowed to do what they can to improve the standard of service accommodation, both for married families and for single-living accommodation. They have identified money to be put to one side specifically to improve that, but time and again those pots of funds have been raided when other priorities were deemed to be higher. In the context of the underfunding of the defence investment plan, can the Minister say whether, this time, we have a commitment that the money being ring-fenced for the housing strategy will itself be preserved and used for the purpose for which it has been identified?

Thirdly, I welcome the reference in the Bill to a veterans’ commissioner for England. Such commissioners exist in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, but there is no commissioner yet for England. Some 20 years ago, with a previous Government, one argued hard that there should be such a commissioner. The Government of the day said that there should not. Well, that same party is now in power, and we seem to be going down the track of having a commissioner for England. I welcome that, but as I understand it, it was announced almost two years ago and a person has not been recruited, identified and put in place.

Fourthly, I raise Clause 48, which amends the Protection of Military Remains Act 1986 and will have some unintended consequences. I am not a diver, but the unintended consequence of strengthening that Act is that it places the hitherto innocent activities of diving parties into an illegal framework. If they conduct their diving as they have in the past, this legislation having changed, they will be conducting illegal activities that will render irrelevant their insurance to cover their hobby and diving practices.

As the Minister is aware, I chair the Gloucester 1682 Charitable Trust. That trust exists to fully expose for the benefit of the nation the story of the “Gloucester”, lost off the Norfolk coast on 6 May 1682. Why is that important? It was carrying James, Duke of York, who went on to become James II. If he had drowned, the course of English history would have been changed. If John Churchill, who was with him at the time, had drowned as well, he would not have gone on to become the first Duke of Marlborough, win the battles of Blenheim, Ramillies, Oudenarde and Malplaquet, and end the War of Spanish Succession. The course of European history would have been changed. I highlight the story of the “Gloucester” because we also run the risk of being prevented from continuing to excavate and bring to the surface artefacts that can tell the story of that ship and that important episode in British and European history. I therefore ask the Minister for assurance that the amendments to the Protection of Military Remains Act will not hinder our work as far as the “Gloucester” is concerned.

Fifthly and finally, I raise a subject I have raised many times in this House. In 2013, I was privileged to be given a debate in my name relating to the Northern Ireland Troubles. Well, 13 years later, we are still really no further forward. The Act recently passed has now been suspended, and the current Government’s intention to bring new legislation has itself been suspended. We cannot allow ageing soldiers, ageing veterans, to continue to run the risk of vexatious inquiries and subsequent court cases. If these things could have been settled, they would have been so 20, 30 or 40 years ago, when the evidence was fresh. Most of these cases collapse because the evidence is inadmissible and, frankly, old, and it is difficult to get fresh evidence. I therefore ask again that resumed efforts be made to bring fresh legislation forward to prevent further inquiries and the harassing of now aged and ageing veteran soldiers who served in Northern Ireland during the Troubles.

17:48:00

Baroness Carberry of Muswell Hill (Lab)My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Dannatt, and I start by congratulating the Government on bringing forward this Armed Forces Bill in this particular form. My noble friend the Minister has set out how the Bill strengthens the nation’s enduring covenant with armed services personnel. I thank the men and women who serve, who defend our nation and who protect our interests.

Every Armed Forces Bill is of course more than just an administrative requirement: it says something important about what the country stands for. This current Bill is an opportunity to modernise, strengthen and improve. As has inevitably been noted, the Bill arrives alongside the defence investment plan. Whatever the level of noise around that plan, there is no denying that this Government have already shown that they are prepared to make hard choices to invest in defence and that there must be even more, even harder choices to come. Meanwhile, against a background of growing global instability, the Government are acting decisively, with money attached, to begin to shore up our defence capabilities to meet present and future external threats.

Fundamentally, the Bill is about the people who defend us and I hope that one of its effects will be to help with recruitment, retention and morale. The Bill builds on the big pay increases, better housing, expanded childcare and the more flexible offer of service that the Government have already brought in. As my noble friend the Minister detailed in his introduction, the Bill deepens the legal force of the covenant, stretches obligations across government, improves the service justice system with better protection for victims and, as several noble Lords referred to, establishes the new defence housing service, backed by £9 billion over the next decade. We cannot honourably carry on expecting people to go off to risk their lives if they do not have a decent home.

Like many other noble Lords, I take every opportunity to encourage young people to consider joining the armed services. To a young person considering service, the Bill says that your country values you. It tells a parent that a service career for their son or daughter offers dignity, respect and opportunity. On recruitment, the defence investment plan promises investment in the first four years, then an expansion of the regular workforce, including increasing the size of the Army. I ask my noble friend the Minister: how will progress on this be tracked and reported?

The investment plan also signals a £4.2 billion spend on the reserves to the end of the decade. Like other noble Lords, particularly the noble Lord, Lord Lancaster, I want to focus on the reserves. There is a reason that around 12,000 employers across the United Kingdom have now signed the covenant. They will tell you that they recognise both their duty to support those who serve and the real benefits reservists bring into civilian employment. The British Chambers of Commerce, for example, signed the covenant five years ago and it uses its voice to encourage chambers and the broader business community to do the same. Over half of UK accredited chambers of commerce are signed up and all these signatories actively support the Armed Forces, including encouraging member employers to take on reservists and to give them the support they need.

The BCC and other employers regard this as an active and mutually beneficial partnership, particularly as businesses are up against skills shortages. The benefits of this flow in both directions. Employing reservists gives employers access to skilled staff and to skills training that they would otherwise have to pay for themselves. Organisations gain crisis-capable staff with leadership skills and sound judgment. For the Armed Forces, civilian employers provide the flexibility and support that makes reserve service viable.

There are also advantages for the wider economy. Employing reservists sustains a two-way flow of skills between the military and civilian sectors in, for example, engineering, logistics, cyber and healthcare. For example, a reservist cyber specialist may bring cutting-edge commercial knowledge into a defence company; a reservist military engineer may return to industry with world-class leadership experience; and a reservist medic strengthens both military readiness and civilian resilience.

It is not just private sector employers who testify to this. For example, NHS Employers reports that reservists in NHS trusts bring emergency decision-making, leadership confidence, problem-solving and resilience under operational pressure. One NHS trust recently described reservists as improving workforce capability daily, particularly in acute and emergency settings. That matters because healthcare is one of the clearest civilian environments where crisis management skills transfer directly. Reservists themselves report using the skills they get from military service in civilian jobs, as we saw in the 2024 tri-service reserves continuous attitude survey. I invite the Minister to consider what more the Government can do to encourage more employers to take on reservists.

It is, of course, the strategic reserve, as has already been said this afternoon, that is the Bill’s main target, and rightly so; it makes absolute sense to keep ex-servicepeople on the books longer and make call-up easier. But I ask Ministers not to underplay the Active Reserve. I anticipate a positive response to this from my noble friend the Minister after what he has told us about his close family member, who is a member of the Active Reserve.

I acknowledge a persistent low conversion rate among applicants to the reserves. It takes a constant effort to recruit, and it depends very much on employer support being sustained. But there is a positive pay-off from investment in the Active Reserve. It creates a continually renewing source of capability. It gives the military access to live civilian skills, and it is a source of larger long-term mobilisation and deeper long-term resilience.

The Defence Minister recently said in the other place that the MoD had taken urgent and targeted action to streamline and speed up volunteer reserves recruitment processes, and, from next year, reserve recruiting will pass to the new Armed Forces recruiting system. In conclusion, I join other noble Lords, notably the noble Earl, Lord Minto, in asking, in light of all of this, when will it be possible to make progress on the SDR’s ambition to increase the Active Reserve by 20% over time?

17:58:00

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)My Lords, it is a pleasure to take part in this debate. I welcome noble Lords who have said that they are relatively new to engaging in military issues, which is something that your Lordships’ House should encourage more of. In this age of geopolitical shocks, unlikely to reduce in intensity or frequency any time soon, and direct if undeclared attacks on the UK, we need far more and broader engagement in security issues than has traditionally been the case. We need a realistic assessment of the level of Armed Forces that the UK population and economy can support, rather than seeking to find a place in the world beyond our capabilities, and a realistic assessment of the unstable diplomatic environment in which we operate. We know who our friends are, and we also need to know that those who have been our friends in the past may not be so in the future. We owe it to the Armed Forces, as the whole of society, to be brutally realistic about the circumstances we now find ourselves in.

I begin by being positive. I welcome the defence housing strategy and the creation of the defence housing service, which, as the letter to noble Lords from the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, put it, aims to put first the needs of forces personnel, veterans and their families. That will be a welcome change from the disastrous privatisation—one more disastrous privatisation—of forces housing that, as the Financial Times summarised it,

“sparked multiple court actions and saddled the government with billions of pounds in rent and maintenance costs”. When I was completing the Armed Forces Parliamentary Scheme a few years ago with the RAF—I should perhaps declare now that I am completing the RCDS international security and strategy course—forces housing was the issue raised with us perhaps the most often when we spoke to forces personnel, and it is undoubtedly going to take a great deal more in costs and attention to repair. I note the amendment in the other place on ensuring consistent investment and support in the Bill for forces housing, and I think that is certainly worthy of your Lordships’ consideration.

I also welcome the improved attention to the Armed Forces covenant and to victim support, particularly for women and girls, and I was interested in the technical issue raised by the right reverend Prelate, who is not currently in his place, about the treatment of domestic abuse cases; that certainly deserves more examination. I will be probing the Government on how they might act more strongly on rape and sexual assault cases, something the House united in indicating its strong desire for changes to in 2021.

Saying that, I note that I am a veteran of the Armed Forces Bill 2021 and the Armed Forces Commissioner Bill 2025. The noble Lord, Lord Coaker, and the noble Baroness, Lady Goldie, will be hearing from me on some very familiar issues, and I make no apology for that. They are important issues, particularly violence against women and girls in the military and the recruitment of 15, 16 and 17 year-olds into our forces, but I will be adding a couple of new issues to raise.

The Long Title includes

“to make provision about visiting forces”.

I note that in the other place Green MPs supported what was a new Clause 4, which probably comes under that provision, and I will be happy to work on that here, but I want to raise a new issue now and pursue it at later stages, one that I have also raised by way of Written Question. It is that of foreign personnel based or visiting here who commit crimes.

This issue is raised through an excellent job of reporting by the Guardian , which it deserves to be commended for, on the case of Jacob Wulfson, who strangled in his apartment in Cambridge a British woman he met online. This case was allowed to be tried at an US airbase court martial, instead of him facing UK justice. That involved an all-male panel of Wulfson’s fellow US Air Force officers, all stationed at the same base as him. The victim described the hearing as a “distressing and degrading” experience. She said that the system, which was unfamiliar to her,

“picked me up, chewed me out”.

I want to see whether we can use this Bill to prevent any similar cases in future.

I will also be delighted to back up the noble Baroness, Lady Penn, not currently in her place, on the issue she has indicated she intends to lead on, that of inadequate paternity leave in the military. I note, since I was speaking on Friday about transparency in lobbying, that I have been lobbied on this by the NGO called The Dad Shift, and I am backing the campaign that it is leading. I always try in your Lordships’ House to bring the voices of people who cannot be here, so I want to bring some of those voices of men who have indicated their concerns about the current inadequate provision of maternity leave. This is from an Army soldier:

“Being posted 4 hours away from my child when she was born was tough, only having 2 weeks to bond before I was back to being 200 miles away with limited time to travel back and see her was tough and has definitely caused irreparable damage to our relationship, ultimately leading to the collapse of my relationship with her mother too”.

Another said that when his child was born, he was granted two weeks of standard paternity leave, with an additional two weeks of discretionary leave due to his wife requiring an emergency c-section. It is usually said that it takes at least six weeks to recover from a caesarean section. I note that in the joint service publication JSP 760, there is a discretionary element of providing additional compassionate leave, as that second account indicates, but it is, of course, discretionary.

It is difficult to put a full scale on this problem, but nearly eight in 10 service families have children, and 32% have children under five. The level of paternity leave actually taken has dropped, which may be accounted for by a slight fall in headcount, but it is a really significant drop. I would be interested if the Minister, now or in future, can provide any information on what he knows about the level of take-up of paternity leave.

I note that there is a review of parental leave arrangements currently ongoing, due to report in late in 2026 or early 2027, so there is a window of opportunity here for your Lordships’ House to do something really positive. I would argue that it is obviously the right thing to do, but also a great many of the contributions to the debate today have focused on retention of military personnel, and this is obviously an important issue, as well as supporting military families.

I come to the second issue that will not surprise those who were here in 2021, about recruitment of 15, 16 and 17 year-olds into the military and particularly the Army Foundation College in Harrogate, where over the past five years an average of 2,380 children have been trained each year. This has been a cause of considerable complaints and campaigning. I note that I am drawing on the work of Child Rights International Network, which obtained the inspectors’ reports from the last Ofsted visit to the site in March 2024. Recorded under a section titled “Ill-treatment of recruits by staff” was the following. In 2021: eight allegations made, six substantiated and military action taken. In 2022: 10 allegations, five substantiated and action taken. In 2023: six allegations, two substantiated and actioned. For 2024, the data was greyed out.

I have seen some very disturbing footage of not just the treatment of recruits by instructors but behaviour within groups of recruits. It cannot be shared very widely because it might identify the child who took it, but it is very disturbing. There are reports of a 16 year-old former recruit who witnessed his friend being so badly beaten by an instructor that they broke his leg. He was then forced to march on it for miles. We are an utter outlier among developed countries in recruiting 15, 16 and 17 year-olds, and this is something that I will be raising further.

I want to mention just two more issues. One is the Wiltshire Police investigation of sexual abuse during military examinations, which has been ongoing for some time and dates from the 1970s up to 2016 at different locations across the UK. I wonder whether the Minister can update us now, or I will understand entirely if he wishes to do it in writing, on how that inquiry is proceeding. There are a great many people with cause for concern who would like to know what is happening with that.

I also note a very specific issue, but one that is clearly of great concern to some people, with good reason, calling for the recognition and protection of the SS “Tilawa” from 1942 and comparable cases. This is identifying a statutory framework gap governing maritime war graves. Perhaps, again, the Minister might like to write to me about that. I realise it is a fairly technical issue, but it is one that we will be raising in future.

18:08:00

Baroness Fraser of Craigmaddie (Con)My Lords, like others, I start by welcoming this Armed Forces Bill. There are many measures within it that have been identified today that are in urgent need of our attention, such as the provisions to ensure that service personnel and their families have access to quality housing and the intention to modernise and strengthen our Reserve Forces; particularly the inclusion of support for employers, for example. I declare an interest: I have a daughter who is a serving reserve officer in the very unit that the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, mentioned, the London Scottish. I also welcome the desire to place the Armed Forces covenant fully into law. The Bill rightly recognises that our duty to those who serve must not end with warm words but must be reflected in legislation and public policy. However, in some areas, I wish that the Government would go further.

As others have identified, the measures in this Bill extending the recall liability and easing the transfer from regulars to reserves focus on the Strategic Reserve. If we are really going to adopt a whole-defence approach and increase the Active Reserve by 20%, we need to be much smarter about who we have, what skills they bring and how we attract, train and retain people within all the Volunteer Reserve Forces. The MoD does not manage or track total spending on Reserve Forces. Answers to Written Questions in the other place show that the MoD has no idea as to the make-up and skill set of the Reserve Forces. My noble friend Lord Lanacaster of Kimbolton suggested that we focus on digital data solutions; would they not be basic low-hanging fruit that the Government should ensure they resolve as a first step?

Along with others, I, too, look forward to the Minister explaining how else the Government plan to deliver on expanding the pool of reserves. Should this Bill be confined to changing the length of time and age limits for recalling personnel? What about tackling the less favourable treatment of reservists regarding pension access and daily rates of pay, and addressing the conclusions of the 2024 employment tribunal ruling? Will he commit to supporting my noble friend Lord Lancaster in implementing the recommendations of RF30, or perhaps the suggestions for tax incentives for reservists made earlier by my noble friend Lord Minto? There is another area where this Bill suffers from a glaring omission. There is a group of people who wear a uniform with pride. They are described by the Minister himself as essential and a unique asset to government. They participate in military operations in contested environments in direct support of the UK’s national security. These personnel spend months away from their families. They can be exposed to missile threats, hostile actors and escalating regional tensions. They accept restrictions on their freedoms. They may suffer the same psychological impacts of operational deployment as others in our Armed Forces, yet when they return home, they do not enjoy the same recognition under the Armed Forces covenant because they are classified as civilian employees. I am referring to the Royal Fleet Auxiliary, the RFA. Because its members are employed as civil servants, the Armed Forces covenant and the provisions in this Bill do not extent to them.

The Royal Fleet Auxiliary is not a commercial shipping company; it is a uniformed fleet owned by the Ministry of Defence, operating under naval command, crewed by people who volunteer to deploy wherever the Royal Navy is sent. Without them, carrier strike groups do not remain at sea, amphibious operations cannot be sustained, and NATO task groups cannot remain on station. They are not merely supporting defence; they are part of defence. RFA “Tideforce” has recently been participating in maritime security operations in European waters, working with NATO forces and Royal Navy warships, including on tracking, intercepting and seizing Russian shadow fleet oil tankers. Right now, the crew of RFA “Lyme Bay” is deployed in the Middle East. Repurposed as a specialist mothership for autonomous mine-hunting, the vessel carries advanced underwater drones, uncrewed surface vessels, and specialist mine warfare and diving personnel. The 60 or so members of the ship’s company who run RFA “Lyme Bay” were trained and tested thoroughly before deployment alongside the embarked forces who provide the mine warfare expertise. With the destroyer HMS “Dragon”, RFA “Lyme Bay” will play a central role in any future multinational effort to safeguard the freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz.

RFA personnel have trained, and are deployed and operating right now, in one of the most volatile places on the planet, yet when they return home, they and their families will not be covered by the Armed Forces covenant. The Minister confirmed this in an Answer to my Written Question on 3 June:

“In the spirit of the Covenant, organisations who have signed the Armed Forces Covenant pledge are encouraged to consider the needs of other groups within the wider Armed Forces community if individual circumstances merit it. This includes members of the RFA that have seen duty on defined military operations”.

We have an opportunity in this Bill to put this right. I know first-hand that the Minister is a supporter of the RFA. Surely, tracking the shadow fleet, deployment in the Middle East, and supporting NATO task groups are defined military operations, and surely every member of the RFA who has been part of them deserves to be protected by the provisions of the Armed Forces covenant. I hope this Bill can be amended to ensure that from now on, this is unambiguously the case.

The Armed Forces covenant exists because those who serve our nation accept unique risks, restrictions and sacrifices. It is not founded on military status but on military service. It is profoundly unfair, then, that there remain men and women, routinely deployed alongside our Armed Forces in areas of conflict and crisis, who enable military operations every day but who remain outside the covenant’s protections. That cannot be the intention of this Bill. I therefore urge the Government to consider an amendment that extends covenant eligibility to Royal Fleet Auxiliary personnel who have undertaken defined operational service. It would be a modest change to this Bill, but a significant statement of fairness.

18:16:00

Lord Morse (CB)I am delighted to speak after the noble Baroness, Lady Fraser. I am an Army brat. I am not sure how many of them are in the room, but my father was a serving officer and I was brought up in some 25 different insalubrious married quarters around the world, so I have some feeling for what we speak of. In addition to that, as Comptroller and Auditor-General, I had the pleasure of making quite a lot of reports on both the MoD as a whole and on the Annington Homes “deal”, which is probably the most neutral expression I can use.

I am clear that we owe a massive debt to the Armed Forces, and it is not easy to pay it off, because it requires seeing them integrate into society in a comfortable way, which is often very difficult for them, quite painful, and not always successful to be honest. We need to recognise responsibility for a lot of people who have been deeply embedded in major institutions for long periods, and are coming out of that and trying to live what we would call a normal life. They need help when they are doing that, and if we are not responsible, then I do not know who is.

I respect and support the objectives of this Bill, and I believe the best way I can help is by trying to point out a few areas where we need to be on guard against building disappointment into the legislation. The Bill places a legal obligation on various public bodies that are likely to be providing services to service people before or after retirement to give due consideration to the armed services covenant in making decisions on access to their services. This is positive, but it is important to remember that local authorities have a wide range of services they are legally obligated to provide to their residents, as do health providers. There is a significant difference between a legal obligation to give due consideration, which could be satisfied by having a minuted discussion, and an obligation to provide a service where residents can and frequently do seek judicial review to enforce provision of services. I suspect that many local authorities feel they are under heavy financial pressure already, and struggle to meet their existing statutory obligations, so the obligation to consider the covenant may sometimes produce disappointing results for people who believed that they were walking forward with the Armed Forces covenant in their hand, expecting a fulsome response. It may be very difficult for local authorities to do that.

Local authorities may be able to seek relief under the new burdens rules, but most applications of this relief are intended to provide transitional cover only, so the burden will generally last a lot longer than the relief. Notwithstanding that some service providers support champions to assist forces people to find their way to what may be available, it may be worth while to consider an independent professional advocacy service modelled on the ombudsman, with ombudsman-style authority and the ability to command witnesses. That would provide much more effective and wider enforcement of their rights, or at least make sure that, when we say “due consideration”, it really means something. Having an authoritative voice at the table might help a great deal.

On service accommodation, the record of underachievement is a long one. The Annington Homes example is currently in the press, although it all took place a long time ago. Put briefly, this was a sale and lease back of a large estate of MoD-owned properties in need of extensive repair. The deal provided the MoD with a significant capital payment and a future rental obligation, but the responsibility to keep the estate in repair has been the subject of a long-running dispute. Meanwhile, the estate has become progressively more dilapidated and, in some cases, uninhabitable. The lump sum that the MoD received certainly did not go into keeping the estate in repair. The moral of the story is that assets with no income stream to support maintenance lose value and fail in their primary purpose of providing good-quality accommodation for forces people.

Could this sort of thing happen again under the Bill’s provisions on property? It is obviously not meant to. Let us answer that by looking at the three pillars of The Defence Housing Strategy 2025 . The first looks to a renewal of defence family housing stock over a 10-year period and commits £9 billion to support this. The second calls for an independent body for defence housing and the third looks to ensure that defence housing and defence land deliver for the nation. I will come back to that one.

The first two pillars look mutually reinforcing, although it would be helpful to set a standard that housing stock could be brought to and maintained at, rather than just hoping it will be in good condition. As we saw with Annington Homes, maintenance is crucial in sustaining the value and usability of a property. Since lack of maintenance is not necessarily obvious, it is perilously easy to rob Peter to pay Paul elsewhere in the MoD budget. I have seen this happen quite a few times. One suggestion to push back on this would be to set a required enforceable objective, perhaps treating the decent homes code, which is familiar to the MoD, as the basement and then building up from that to the quality of accommodation we want this scheme to deliver. We could and should think about that.

On the third pillar, the objective of delivering for the nation may involve delivering to the nation instead. The objective has a Treasury-ish tone to it. The pressure to generate substantial funding and to assist in the pursuit of national housebuilding targets and other wider policy objectives could become a very powerful driver. However, this need not be irreconcilable with providing excellent accommodation for our armed services, provided this is suitably protected and the defence property budget is specifically ring-fenced and protected so that it is accumulated over the 10-year period specified for renewal and not accessible for other purposes. The enshrinement of the Armed Forces covenant in law is a significant step forward. The ambitions inherent in it deserve our support and as much reinforcement and stiffening on the delivery front as we can bring to bear. We need our military, now more than for many years, and we owe it our strong engagement in this Bill.

18:24:00

Lord Thomas of Gresford (LD)My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Morse, who spoke movingly of his experience of some 25 married quarters and the immense debt we owe to the services. I entirely agree with him. I declare an interest as president of the Association of Military Court Advocates, though I speak entirely on my own behalf.

In the last 30 years, the traditional court martial system has been completely overhauled as a result of the European Court of Human Rights decision primarily in the case of Findlay in 1997. It was ironic to hear the noble Earl, Lord Minto, talk about the modernisation of the justice system and at the same time call for the abolition of our membership of the European Court of Human Rights. I had a flash of when I was a bus conductor as a young man and the driver told me how, in his youth during the First World War, he had been tied to the wheel of a gun carriage and lashed. The military justice system has come a little way forward since those times.

As the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig of Radley, reminded us, the main reforming legislation was the Armed Forces Act 2006, which set up a justice system under the control of civil judges in serious cases and, in particular, independent of the chain of command. On our last excursion into this area in 2021, more reforms were pushed through which have now been brought into force. I am pleased to see further important reforms in this Bill, which I entirely support. It is extremely important to the recruitment and retention of personnel not just that the social and welfare conditions of the Armed Forces are maintained, matters with which this Bill also rightly deals, but that, where problems arise, the justice system is fair, appropriate to the conditions of service life, proportionate to the civil system and, above all, attracting the confidence of those who serve.

The area that has given rise to controversy is that of sexual and harassment offences. Although there has been a great deal of improvement in the investigation and support services, there remains a need for vigilance at all times. It is an area of concern to military justice not just in the United Kingdom but in the United States. I gave evidence to a Department of Defense review in Washington DC in September 2014 when the issue was very much alive in relation to American forces. My evidence concerned the matters I have referred to: the independence of the chain of command and, in particular, the employment of civilian judges experienced in Crown Courts. However, the US Department of Defense committee was persuaded by a formidable array of gold-braided generals, led by the chief of the general staff, to maintain its existing system of ranking military judges acting within the chain of command. There are therefore significant procedural differences between British and US courts martial which have an impact on US forces stationed in this country. I am grateful to my noble friend Lady Brinton for raising the case of Captain Jacob Wulfson, referred to last week. Your Lordships will recall that this was a sexual attack by an off-duty US pilot on a British lady in civilian accommodation in the city of Cambridge. That offence in 2023 gave rise to concurrent jurisdiction between the British and US authorities. Prima facie, where an offence by an off-duty American serviceman against a British civilian takes place outside the ambit of an American base, the appropriate investigation should be by UK police and the prosecution should be brought in our own Crown Courts.

What happened in this case, however, was that the Cambridgeshire police waived jurisdiction and the trial took place by court martial before a US military judge and a convened panel in the Lakenheath base. It is undoubtedly the case that, without any of the measures we have developed to protect the victim as a witness, the attack on the lady’s character by a US defence attorney went far beyond what would be permitted in a UK Crown Court. Captain Wulfson was acquitted of a rape-type charge but convicted of strangulation—something he admitted had happened in the course of their encounter. In accordance with the practice at the time, the sentence on him was determined by the lay panel of fellow officers at the US base, and he received six months’ detention in a commodious detention facility on camp. He was also dismissed from the service.

Two issues arise, and the first is jurisdiction. On what basis did the Cambridgeshire police hand the case over to the US military police for investigation? There are unpublished agreements—the details of which we know nothing—between the Attorneys-General of the United States and the UK. Will the Government undertake to publish those agreements in the interest of transparency? Should there not be a register kept of decisions made by UK authorities to waive jurisdiction which would set out in writing the reasons for such waivers, whether by the police, the CPS, the Director of Public Prosecutions or the Director of Service Prosecutions? This would inform the public and enable a victim to challenge such decisions by way of judicial review if the quality of justice was at risk.

The second issue is sentencing. In this country, the sentence is determined by the board sitting with a judge advocate, who advises the members on the law and the scale of sentence recommended by the Sentencing Council for a particular offence. In the event of an equality of votes among the members of the board, the judge advocate has a casting vote. I have argued in the last two Armed Forces Bills that, in the modern era, the judge advocate in the UK system should sentence alone, on the basis that the exercise of sentencing today is highly technical and beyond the competence and experience of members of the board who, unlike magistrates, have no training and have probably never been in court before and are unlikely to be there again.

This sensible reform has always been resisted, on the basis that the board of senior officers and NCOs has the military experience valuable for addressing the just penalty. That view has been supported elsewhere. However, I would argue that a judge advocate sitting in courts marital on a daily basis has more than adequate experience of the military world. The wholly inadequate sentence passed in the Wulfson case shows what can happen when sentencing is left to amateurs. In the US system, the military judges’ role—in accordance with the practice then in force—was limited to indicating to the panel the maximum and minimum levels of sentencing. That US system has since been replaced and, had the offence occurred after December 2023, the process would have followed the system I have been putting forward for years, in which the judge passes the sentence alone. Wulfson was lucky. I hope to advance these areas in Committee.

18:34:00

Baroness Dacres of Lewisham (Lab)My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford. I take this opportunity to thank all those who serve and have served, and their families. This Bill is about more than just military law; it is about the promise we make to those who serve our country and their families that their service and sacrifice will be recognised, not only while they serve but long after their military service has ended. Our Armed Forces do not serve alone. Their families also make sacrifices in support of that service.

I welcome this Bill, in particular the measures to strengthen the Armed Forces covenant. My own experiences have shown me why these issues matter so deeply. Earlier in my career, while working at JP Morgan Chase, I had the privilege of managing a colleague who had served in the Royal Engineers. He brought with him not only highly transferable skills but also professionalism, teamwork, a good sense of humour and a can-do attitude that benefited everyone around him. His military experience enriched our workplace and demonstrated the enormous value that veterans can bring to employers across every sector.

My work as a councillor gave me a different perspective. I helped a veteran who was experiencing serious housing difficulties in the private rented sector. Despite those challenges, he continued working as a bus driver, supporting his family—including a severely disabled child—while completing a law degree and then a master’s in law. Today, he is a practising solicitor. His journey demonstrates the grit, determination and resilience that so many who have served continue to show in civilian life. It also reinforced my belief that our duty to those who serve does not end when military service ends. Veterans leave the Armed Forces with the qualities to continue making significant contributions to our communities and our country. They deserve our gratitude and continued support, and the opportunity to fulfil their potential in civilian life.

For that reason, one issue that particularly resonates with me is ensuring that the Armed Forces covenant is delivered consistently across every local authority and public service, as well as in the private sector. The promise we make to those who serve should not depend on where they happen to live. The covenant must not be simply a statement of intent or a legal obligation; it must become a practical reality in every community across the United Kingdom. We should also do more to support veterans as they transition to civilian life. Veterans bring a wealth of expertise and transferable skills that strengthen our workplaces, public services and economy. We should encourage employers and organisations across the public, private and voluntary sectors to recognise the qualities that veterans bring and the value their skills and expertise can add to their organisations.

Many people have little direct experience of military service or the Armed Forces community. That makes it all the more important that we strengthen public understanding of the contributions made by our Armed Forces. Greater awareness helps foster respect for those who serve and encourages future generations to consider a career in the Armed Forces. Supporting our Armed Forces and supporting veterans are not separate responsibilities: one flows naturally from the other. If we are to honour the priorities and promises embodied in the Armed Forces covenant, we must ensure it is reflected not only in legislation but in the everyday experiences of those who serve and those who have served, and their families.

I therefore ask my noble friend the Ministerwhat further steps will the Government take to ensure that the Armed Forces covenant is delivered consistently across the country? How will that consistency will be measured? What more can be done to support veterans into employment and encourage employers and organisations across the public, private and voluntary sectors to recognise the qualities that veterans bring and the value their skills and experience can add to their organisations?

18:40:00

Lord Hay of Ballyore (DUP)My Lords, the Armed Forces Bill comes before the House at a very important time in the history of our nation. The threats facing our country are the most complex there have been for many decades. War continues to rage in Ukraine, which is a reminder that our country’s defence cannot be taken for granted. We need to invest properly in our Armed Forces. This starts with giving our brave Armed Forces personnel the best possible support.

There is much in the Bill to welcome. The creation of a new defence housing service is a long overdue step to improving the unacceptable standard of military accommodation that too many service families have endured for years. Good-quality housing is fundamental to keeping up good morale, giving our Armed Forces a place they can call home during active service. There are changes also to expand our Reserve Forces. Likewise, the reforms to the service justice system should improve efficiency and confidence that cases are dealt with fairly and transparently.

However, there are important areas where the Bill does not go far enough to support our Armed Forces. Most concerningly, the protections in the Armed Forces covenant do not apply to every corner of the country. The Bill proposes to strengthen the commitment to our Armed Forces by extending the statutory duties under the covenant to devolved and local government across this United Kingdom. The intentions behind this are good, but it is simply unacceptable that the Bill will potentially leave an opt-out for councils in Northern Ireland. That risks creating a situation where veterans, serving personnel and their families receive different levels of support based simply on where they happen to live. As we know, in Northern Ireland there are local councils which are controlled by parties which have pursued a political campaign against those who have served the Crown. It is simply unacceptable that a veteran in Northern Ireland can have less access to the support protected by the covenant than a veteran in Scotland or Cardiff.

Unfortunately, this is part of a wider pattern of inconsistency in the Government’s approach to veterans’ rights when it comes to Northern Ireland. The former Armed Forces Minister in his recent resignation highlighted the lack of protection for veterans in Northern Ireland as one reason why he could no longer serve in government. Many veterans of Operation Banner feel that the Government’s Troubles Bill does not provide the necessary protection from fictitious claims and legacy investigations. While transparency and the rule of law must always be upheld, many feel that the current legacy framework does not take into account the extraordinarily difficult circumstances that our security forces faced in the line of duty and that it leaves the door open to endless cycles of investigations, even where no evidence exists.

The Bill is a step in the right direction to improving the conditions that our Armed Forces serve under, particularly with the improvements to Armed Forces housing and the justice system. There is still significant work to do to ensure that our Armed Forces personnel are not left behind because of their service, especially in Northern Ireland, and we owe it to them to get this right. It is the very least we can do to support them, just as they have supported us by serving the Crown and putting on their uniforms every day to protect our country.

I support the principles of the Bill, but there are some concerns that have already been raised in the House, including about the level of defence investment that is needed for our future security.

18:45:00

Lord Bailey of Paddington (Con)My Lords, it is a pleasure to speak after the noble Lord, Lord Hay of Ballyore. Before I come to my remarks, I declare my interests: I am the chair of the cadet health check team; my daughter is currently wading her way through basic training to join the RAF; and I am an honorary colonel of the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers cadets.

I welcome the opportunity to speak on the Bill, and I do so with great respect for those who serve, those who have served and the families who support them. The Armed Forces are not simply a military institution, they are one of the great social institutions of our country. They teach discipline, duty, teamwork, resilience, courage and service. At their best, they give people a sense of belonging and purpose. That is especially powerful for young people who sometimes find it hard to find these things and may not have access to them elsewhere in their life.

That is why I want to focus on what I believe is missing from the Billa stronger recognition of the wider social impact of the Armed Forces, particularly the role of the cadet forces. The Minister will understand my going on about the cadet forces. Across the United Kingdom, cadet units are doing extraordinary work. They give young people structure, they teach self-control, they build confidence, and they connect children and teenagers with adult volunteers who model responsibility, leadership and service. For many young people, particularly those from struggling communities, this can be life-changing. I know this from my own life and many years of working with young people. I used to be a member of the Army cadet force, and it was the only institution in the neighbourhood where I grew up that was stronger than gang culture. I can point to the day that the Army cadets saved me from going to jail, and it is why I stand in front of noble Lords today.

Over many years working with young people, you come to understand that opportunity is not just about money; it is about access as well. It is about having someone say that you are capable of more, but you must turn up, work hard, be a part of this team and, above all, take responsibility. This is what the cadet movement does every week. Yet, too often, cadets are treated as a nice extra rather than a serious national asset. The Bill rightly deals with the Armed Forces covenant, service family housing, veterans and the justice system. But it does not go far enough in recognising the role of the Armed Forces in strengthening society itself.

I ask the Government to look again at the Bill and what it could do for cadets. First, we need a clear duty to support the growth of the cadet units. I know the Government are doing this work, but the Bill is an opportunity to lay it down and make sure it continues, supported by long-term funding as well. This is especially so in poorer areas and communities where young people would really appreciate and benefit from this access, because they do not have much structured youth provision.

Secondly, we need proper reporting to Parliament on cadet numbers, waiting lists, adult volunteers, facilities and funding. If we value cadets, we should measure whether their number is growing or being allowed to decline. Thirdly, we need better support for adult volunteers. Cadet units cannot run on good will alone. Volunteers need training, safeguarding support, equipment, facilities and recognition. They are giving up their evenings and weekends to help build the next generation—the Government should make this easier, not harder.

Fourthly, we should place cadets more clearly within the Armed Forces covenant. The covenant should not only speak for those who have served or are now serving; it should also recognise the pipeline of service, citizenship and leadership that cadets help to create.

If we are serious about defence, we must also be serious about the society from which our Armed Forces are drawn. Recruitment and resilience do not begin at the recruitment office; they begin in the homes, schools, youth clubs and cadet units of this country. In communities where too many young people are exposed to gangs, drugs, crime and, worst of all, low aspirations, and there is an absence of trusted adults, the cadet force offers some profoundly positive things: discipline without hostility, authority without fear and ambition rooted in service. Those are social and national goods, and they deserve to be recognised in the Bill. The Armed Forces do not only defend our nation abroad; they help build character at home. They remind us that service and duty still matter and that young people, when given structure and belief, can rise. The Bill is an opportunity not only to support those who serve today and have served in the past but to invest in those who may serve tomorrow, whether it be in uniform, in public service, in our communities or simply as stronger and more responsible citizens. I hope that the Government take this responsibility.

18:51:00

Lord Stevens of Birmingham (CB)I declare my interest as an honorary officer in the Royal Naval Reserve and as chair of the Armed Forces Parliamentary Trust. At this stage of the debate, after such a wide-ranging and thoughtful set of contributions, I will make just three brief points.

The first is in respect of Clause 2 of the Bill, on the Armed Forces covenant, which, as a number of other speakers rightly pointed out, builds on the progress that has been made in recent years. In fact, it was five years ago that I, in my former role, together with the Minister for Veterans and People, launched what was called Op COURAGE. It provides specialist mental health services for veterans. It has been great to see its progress since then. The Bill is now expanding beyond health, education and housing to bring in scope a wider range of public services for the Armed Forces covenant.

I will just raise two questions for the Minister on Clause 2. The first is a very detailed one: new Section 343AZB appears to exclude GP practices individually from obligations under the Armed Forces covenant. Instead, it talks about integrated care boards as health bodies, but not GP practices. He will also be aware that the Royal British Legion has argued that the Bill does not explicitly list non-departmental public bodies, such as HMRC or HM Prison and Probation Service. Can the Minister say whether he regards those as in scope of the provisions of the Bill or whether that is a lacuna, as the Royal British Legion appears to believe?

As well as scope, can we hear a little more about practical impact? The noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig of Radley, the noble Baroness, Lady Lane-Fox, and the noble Lord, Lord Morse, all raised the bite that the “due regard” requirement will actually have. I suspect that, in practice, it will only be when the Government issue new guidance, as they intend to do, to identify the practical steps that this wide range of public services should take that we will see whether the inclusion of “due regard” has any impact. Can the Minister tell us when that guidance will emerge and how granular it will be? That was the first point on Clause 2.

Secondly, on Clause 4, the Bill contains new powers to prevent and respond to drone attacks on defence. On their own terms, these provisions make great sense, but I wonder whether the powers are perhaps too circumscribed and hemmed in. Is there, for example, an opportunity to use the Bill to create a more permissive and expansive maritime statutory framework for the testing and training of military uncrewed vehicles above and beyond the specific cases that are identified here? How will the measures be synced up with the Government’s regulating for growth Bill with its proposed regulatory sandbox for maritime autonomy? How do the Government think about the interface between the defence and civilian aspects of drone testing and training in UK territorial waters?

Equally, rather than confining the scope of the Clause 4 provisions to defence property and areas, I wonder whether consideration has been given, for example, to expanding the scope to include critical national infrastructure in UK territorial waters. If not, can the Minister confirm that it is the Government’s view that no new legal authority will be required to do that, or are they instead waiting for the defence readiness Bill to provide the statutory vehicle for that set of measures? The defence investment plan has £330 million of investment earmarked for critical underwater infrastructure protection. Are the statutory provisions needed to give effect to that in place? Could they be covered by the Bill, or will they emerge through the defence readiness Bill?

Thirdly, as a number of other speakers have said, there is obviously a read-across between the Armed Forces Bill and the defence investment plan. Like other speakers, I note the concerns around the funding of the DIP and that, nevertheless, many of the commitments that the DIP makes are to be welcomed, such as confirmation of support for major capabilities, including Defence Nuclear, AUKUS and GCAP. It has to be said that far and away the boldest and most radical aspect of the DIP is the rapid move to a hybrid Navy and increasing integration with other northern navies from JEF nations.

The biggest bet is on a networked mix of sensors, effectors and deciders as a radical new force design for maritime air defence systems, intended, by 2035, to replace the Type 45s and in lieu of the previously proposed Type 83s. The risk with this big bold bet is if the funding does not stack up, the hybrid Navy cannot cohere, because it will work only if you have all the components in place. For example, the Type 94 uncrewed radar platforms need to co-exist alongside the Type 91 uncrewed missile platforms, which, in turn, need to co-exist alongside the common combat vessels—underpinned by the comms and information systems that will sync up the entire network. If the components are not all in place at the relevant time, the hybrid Navy will struggle to succeed. That implies that we need to get going on the procurement for many of those key components, including the CCVs, if they are going to be in place for the early to mid-2030s. Can the Minister tell us when the procurement for that aspect of the hybrid Navy will begin?

Looking at the financial environment facing defence over the next three to four years, I think the pressures are real. The RDEL uplift for defence is only £2.9 billion in total by 2029-30 compared with 2026-27, which is a miserly real-terms increase. People in defence talk about the fact that the revenue position will be something of a bloodbath over the next several years, which will have a big impact on current operations and other capabilities. In any event, the revenue uplift will be more than offset by the so-called lower-maturity—that is, unidentified—efficiency gaps that will outweigh that funding between now and the end of this Parliament.

Most depressingly of all, for noble Lords who got to the end of the otherwise excellent DIP, on the very last page of text, page 78, they will have seen that, no doubt at the behest of the Treasury, a big asterisk has been inserted to say that terms and conditions apply. I will just quote some of those:

“The investments described in this document … do not constitute binding commitments and are subject to … affordability considerations … They may be reprioritised, deferred, re-scoped, or cancelled”.

If the DIP is not fully and expeditiously implemented, all the good of this Armed Forces Bill will be for naught.

18:58:00

Baroness Smith of Newnham (LD)My Lords, it is a pleasure to speak after the noble Lord, Lord Stevens, who, as he said in his declaration of interests, is currently chair of trustees of the Armed Forces Parliamentary Trust, which runs the Armed Forces Parliamentary Scheme. I am currently a trustee, having attended all parts of the scheme, starting off in 2015, when the noble Baroness, Lady Hodgson of Abinger, and I were the only Members of the Lords who participated in the scheme. People were not quite sure what to do with Members of the House of Lords on the scheme. They did not quite know how the arrangements would work. Everything was thought through for Members of the House of Commons. So I am absolutely delighted today that we have heard from so many Members of your Lordships’ House who have participated or are participating in the Armed Forces Parliamentary Scheme. That means that we have heard a range of different voices today.

The right reverend Prelate pointed out that all that seems to have happened since the last Armed Forces Bill in 2021 is that the noble Baroness, Lady Goldie, and the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, have swapped places. I and the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig of Radley, have not moved, yet some of what I am hearing from the Opposition Benches sounds quite similar to what I was hearing in 2021, and the responses that I suspect we will hear from the Minister this evening may sound quite similar as well. In particular, the noble Baroness, Lady Penn, and the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig of Radley, called for us to look again at the costs for those from services families applying for indefinite leave to remain.

So there are perennial questions that some of us have been debating for several years. I hope the change of Government might allow the Minister to give some slightly more positive answers, at least on some issues, even if he will have to go back and persuade his colleagues in the Home Office to support those families—I assume we are talking primarily about the Nepalese Gurkhas who are here. We owe them a duty as well.

We are here primarily to talk about the quinquennial Armed Forces Bill. Every year, we have to renew our endorsement of having Armed Forces. At times we have been doing that in the Moses Room as a statutory instrument with four Members of your Lordships’ House present—the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig of Radley, the noble Baroness, Lady Goldie, and I—plus some officials. For the five-year Armed Forces Bill, it is really important that we are hearing so many voices from across your Lordships’ House engaging with issues that matter so fundamentally at this time, precisely for the reasons that the noble Lord, Lord Hay of Ballyore, pointed out. In 2026, the position we are in is fundamentally different from when we debated the Bill five years ago.

We could have all sorts of debates about whose fault it is that the Armed Forces are not sufficiently well funded, but the point is that, in 2026, we all know that we need to invest more fully in the Armed Forces. That is a national concern, and the national conversation is beginning but does not go far enough. If every one of your Lordships who has spoken in this debate, particularly if they do not come from a services background, goes out and talks to their family and friends about what they have been doing when they have been out on the Armed Forces scheme, that would begin to raise conversations beyond the echo chamber where we normally are. As we have heard from many noble Lords today, it is vital that we have a conversation that looks to how we strengthen resilience.

The particularly welcome aspect of the Bill this year, as far as I am concerned, is the expansion of the Armed Forces covenant. I have called on His Majesty’s Government on many occasions for its extension. In the past, when the Conservatives were in government, there was very much a sense of, “Yes, yes, we’re committed to the covenant. It’s really important that health, education and other people deliver the covenant”. The response on these Benches was, “No, it is vital that the whole country understands the covenant, but particularly that His Majesty’s Government take on that responsibility”.

The expansion of the scope of the covenant is clearly welcome, yet, as we heard from the noble Lords, Lord Morse and Lord Hay of Ballyore, and the noble Baroness, Lady Dacres, we need to look carefully at some of the aspects of how the Armed Forces covenant can and will be expanded to local authorities. The noble Lord, Lord Morse, is right that, if we appear to put something on the statute book that is unaffordable, or if we give further duties to local authorities that they cannot afford to deliver or that some councils will deliver and others will not, that will create a whole set of unintended consequences.

During my time in local government—under a very different Government in very different financial times—the Lib Dems had control of Cambridge City Council during the new Labour Government. We did not really need to worry about funding. A lot of questions were very easy, but there was still a bit of a sense that it was too easy for central government to tell local authorities what to do without giving commensurate funding. Times have changed financially for local authorities, so we need to be very careful that if we are asking local authorities to do more things, we try to work out how they will be able to deliver them. But the principle of extending the covenant is hugely welcome.

One issue that many noble Lords have talked about today is the defence housing service and the moves towards spending the £9 billion on service accommodation. It is clearly an area where we need to hold the Government to account in the most appropriate way. This is not a criticism of Governments of any complexion, but it is a reality that a decade ago, when we were debating the Armed Forces Bill in 2016, I raised questions about the standard of forces accommodation. At the time I was a newbie on the Armed Forces Parliamentary Scheme, and it was pointed out to me by service personnel and their spouses that there were a couple of Facebook groups. At the time, one was “Victims of CarillionAmey”. Carillion went bankrupt and it became “Victims of Amey”. This afternoon I double-checked and there is still a Facebook page. It is now called “Victims of Pinnacle”.

When she was a Minister, the noble Baroness, Lady Goldie, congratulated me on one occasion. She said, “We’ve been listening to you. The new arrangements now mean that the telephone will be answered much more quickly. People will get the responses they need”. Yet criticisms remained. The defence housing service and the defence housing strategy are very welcome, but it will be an area where close monitoring and accountability are hugely important.

The Armed Forces Bill and the annual renewal are very often about service justice, and that is an area I always hand over to my noble friend Lord Thomas of Gresford, who knows far more about service justice questions than I do. I very much hope that in Committee he and my noble friend Lady Brinton will table amendments. As we have heard today, there are a range of very technical issues. It would be helpful to have a sense from the Minister of whether he will be open to some amendments of a technical nature that are needed for service justice.

There has been discussion about the gap in funding of the defence investment plan. This is the final point from these Benches; my colleagues on defence would expect me to say it. There is a proposal from the Liberal Democrats perhaps to support defence funding with defence bonds. Has the Minister had a chance to think about that as a way of enhancing the provisions? I conclude by saying that in principle we welcome the Bill, and we look forward to debating it in Committee.

19:09:00

Baroness Goldie (Con)My Lords, it is a pleasure to wind up this debate for His Majesty’s most loyal Opposition. I say to the noble Baroness, Lady Smith of Newnham, that I am very pleased to be sitting here and I do not envy the Minister sitting over there. Everything has its moment.

As my noble friend Lord Minto said, we on these Benches support the Bill. This House has renewed this legislation every five years since the 2006 Act, in an unbroken constitutional tradition stretching back to the Bill of Rights of 1688—a discipline this House takes seriously. We certainly shall not be a roadblock to its progress.

This has been a rich debate; as the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, said, there have been many contributions which have been genuinely interesting to listen to. However, one issue has recurred with such frequency it is almost like a musical reprise: funding. I shall leave the Minister to respond to that in whatever way he can, but the current position is overwhelmingly regarded as unsustainable.

Turning to other matters addressed by my noble friend which resonated with others, I want to reflect briefly on some contributions from around the House. The importance of housing was universally agreed throughout the Chamber. As the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Norwich reminded us, houses, flats, terraced accommodations, bases and dockyards also have to be homes. I am grateful to him; we should never forget that.

On housing and the creation of this new defence housing service, there is a risk of duplication of function—I remember the extraordinary size of the defence infrastructure organisation when I was in the MoD—as I gather this will remain as a directorate within the MoD. If we have two organisations both claiming responsibility for defence estate, duplication is not a hypothetical risk, and that is precisely the kind of institutional confusion this House should be pressing the Government to eliminate before Royal Assent and not after.

I note that Section 343F gives the defence housing service the power to

“form, participate in forming, or invest in, a company, partnership, joint venture or other similar form of organisation”.

I simply want to ask the Ministerwhy do the Government see this as necessary? What kinds of commercial vehicles does the ministry envisage the defence housing service establishing? And what safeguards will apply to ensure that a body created to serve service families and house them does not drift into activities that begin to serve as accountancy balance sheet operations?

There must also be a clear boundary between the defence housing service and the residual functions of the Ministry of Defence, and clarity of purpose about where responsibility and accountability lie, not least because Schedule 1 provides that the service will not enjoy Crown status in respect of much of its property, save in specified circumstances, which itself raises questions about its legal exposure that I hope the Minister can address.

My noble friend Lord Minto offered up the policy on these Benches of an Armed Forces housing association. That is an alternative model for service accommodation reform to that which the Government propose. Whereas the Government have opted for a body that remains tied closely to the Secretary of State, subject to Treasury borrowing consent and a government direction, our model would deliver a genuinely independent, tenant-accountable organisation. I would welcome the Minister’s reflections on why the Government judged a Crown-adjacent body preferable to that independent, not-for-profit model, and what protection service families will have to ensure that the defence housing service does not simply repeat the mistakes of the past. At the risk of making the Minister feel a little uncomfortable, my noble friend asked about the rumoured deferral of investment in defence housing to help fund the DIP, and I hope that question can be answered.

Since I, as a Minister, took the then overseas operations Bill through this House, politicians from all parties, with the possible exception of the Liberal Democrats, have started to question the impact of the ECHR on UK sovereign law and sovereign decision-making across a whole spectrum of activity, and there is a debate to be had. Specifically in relation to defence, the court decision of Al-Jedda v the United Kingdom, decided in 2011 by the Strasbourg court, clarified the reach of that law into a live arena of conflict. The court ruled that the detention of terrorist suspects in Basra by British troops violated Article 5 of the convention, and that the British state had therefore acted unlawfully. This has serious ramifications for future operational decision-making and for the ability of British troops to hold prisoners of war in any future conflict.

The extent to which such law may now to be incompatible with the overriding need to make instant life and death decisions in a conflict environment requires, in my opinion, serious reflection. I look forward to continuing this argument in Committee, where our amendments will receive fuller scrutiny, and I hope the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig, is feeling encouraged by my contribution.

A number of very interesting contributions were made on the service justice system. I certainly welcome the sensible alignment of various provisions with the arrangements in the civilian criminal justice system. I am very grateful to the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Norwich for raising a number of valid concerns, because there is a conundrum here. Under the Bill, service police will not be able to authorise pre-charge custody for offences under Schedule 1 to the Armed Forces Act 2006—offences such as battery—even where there is a clear domestic context, because the legislation is drafted so that only “serious offences” fall within scope, a category which does not capture Schedule 1 offences and does not separately articulate the context of domestic abuse.

A further issue arises under Clause 16, whereby a provost marshal may act as the appropriate authority when a person has been charged with a serious offence, meaning there will no longer be any involvement from the commanding officer in terms of pre-charge attention for such an offence. This seems to be fairly significant interference with the chain of command if we consider the environment where many of these offences might be occurring, which could be a base remote from other places with a military police presence but not an extensive one—I would be grateful if the Minister could expand on the Government’s reasoning here. There is also a concern that commanding officers are not obliged to refer offences, such as common assault, voyeurism, and actual bodily harm in a domestic abuse context, to the service police. Consideration should be had to amending Schedule 2 to the Armed Forces Act 2006 to ensure that commanding officers are required to refer such offences for investigation.

These Benches welcome the incorporation of the Armed Forces covenant into law. It finishes off what I was privileged to start in this Chamber in a previous iteration of the Armed Forces Bill. I say to the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig, that I realise the pace may have been too slow, but I pay tribute to his tenacious pursuit of this issue and to the noble Lord, Lord Dannatt, for his continued and vigorous support of the covenant. The previous Government’s reticence was through caution, because we need to understand the consequences of such statutory incorporation. Further questions will follow, and it seems from the Bill’s attempt to define national authorities, local authorities, education authorities and health bodies that this is far-reaching. But what about arm’s-length bodies—corporate bodies which deliver many of the functions detailed in Clause 2? Can the Minister explain their omission from the Bill?

I think we all welcome the provisions in the Bill on reserves to improve flexibility and create fluidity. That is important because there are skills, expertise and niche specialisms in civilian roles which our Armed Forces need to be able to call on at short notice. Indeed, the noble Baroness, Lady Carberry, gave some interesting examples to show how that could work in practice. But as for the laudable objective to increase numbers in the active reserve by 20%, my noble friend Lord Minto indicated a proposal from these Benches of a tax-free first 30 days of reserve service, and that seems to me a no-brainer. I am sure that my noble friend Lord Lancaster of Kimbolton’s reference to the successful recruitment experience in Canada following a national conversation has not been lost on the Minister. I pay tribute to my noble friend for the vital work which he is doing and ask the Minister to take some of these ideas back to the department.

This has been a useful and constructive debate, and I have highlighted the issues of particular significance to these Benches. I hope that the questions that my noble friend Lord Minto and I have posed can be addressed by the Minister; I have also tried to indicate where we expect to return to issues in Committee. I conclude by saying that, notwithstanding these Benches’ serious reservations about the broader funding issues, there is a lot of good in the Bill, which I am sure the scrutiny of your Lordships can make even better. My colleagues and I shall endeavour to make a positive contribution to that process.

19:20:00

Lord Coaker (Lab)I thank the noble Baroness for winding up the debate and noble Members from across the House for their contributions. I am really pleased—as I think the Opposition Chief Whip heard me say—that everyone is in favour of the Bill. I would hate to be answering on a Bill that everyone opposed; I would be in serious trouble answering all their questions, challenges and gaps, so I start by saying that I am so pleased that everyone is in favour of the Bill. Somebody outside the Chamber used the term non-controversial, but I will not use that phrase as it was made outside the Chamber.

That said, noble Members from across the House have made some serious points about how a Bill that they support could be further improved. I accept that and the challenge for the Government to take it forward. As I said in my introductory remarks, we all want the Bill to succeed because we support its aims.

Let me deal with some points. We have had the debate about funding, and I appreciate that the noble Earl, Lord Minto, and the noble Baroness, Lady Goldie, will continue to make their various points about that. I will make the same points back, and that debate will continue. However, a number of noble Lords, including the noble Earl, Lord Minto, raised defence housing. I do not often get irritated—and I am not irritated—but I find it slightly strange that a Government who have committed £9 billion of public money over 10 years to improve housing are being taken to task on it. That is all I will say: the Government’s policy is to improve defence housing with £9 billion over 10 years.

Somebody asked whether it applies to single-person housing. With the defence housing service, we are talking about family accommodation. A separate review is going on for single-person accommodation which will report in due course and then the Government will have to respond. That is a very clear answer on that.

The noble Earl, Lord Minto, and the noble Baroness, Lady Goldie, raised the DIO and its relationship with the defence housing service. I will read out this bit of my brief to make sure I get it completely right: “The responsibilities of the Defence Infrastructure Organisation will continue to be provided as part of the National Armaments Director Group within the MoD alongside the new defence housing service, which will assume responsibility for the provision of family housing and the development of surplus defence land in line with the objective set out in new Section 343E(1) inserted by Clause 3 of the Bill. The new defence housing service will continue to work closely with departmental teams, and this will be covered in the framework document between the department and the defence housing service in the usual way”. That seeks to clarify some of the points that the noble Earl, Lord Minto, made in his introductory remarks, and that the noble Baroness, Lady Goldie, and other Members made about the relationship between the DIO and the housing service.

On the ECHR and its application continuing, I think the noble Earl, Lord Minto, made the point that an amendment would seek to change the Government’s wording from “may” to “must”, but all Governments usually argue, and this Government will argue, that they often require flexibility in how they implement various laws. That is something that we would seek to continue.

I thank noble Lords for their interesting ideas about funding for the future. The noble Baroness, Lady Smith, also raised the issue of defence bonds. The Government are looking at different ways in which we can finance defence in the future and no doubt that discussion and debate will continue.

The noble Lord, Lord Wallace, talked about the national conversation. That may change. This is a “stop the press” announcement: responsibilities among the ministerial team may change and I may already have lost the national conversation—not because I have not started it yet, I hasten to add. The serious point is that that national conversation is a priority within the department; the ministerial responsibility for it may well change, but it will be taken forward. I think that is something that the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, will be particularly pleased about, as will we all. The noble Lord mentioned cadets, which I will come to later, when I also respond to some of the moving remarks made by the noble Lord, Lord Bailey.

Clearly, the national conversation is extremely important, not least around how we support homeland defence. The noble Lord, Lord Wallace, and other noble Lords also made the point about how we ensure that we get and retain public support for the amount we spend on defence. That is crucial to the way forward.

I thank the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig, for his welcome of the extension of the covenant to national bodies and his general support for that. He and the noble Baroness, Lady Penn, raised visas. I cannot answer all the questions, but I will answer some of them. Again, the Government are committed to scrapping visa fees for non-UK veterans who have served our country for four or more years, and their dependants. The MoD has started work with the Home Office to deliver this manifesto commitment, and that commitment on visa fees remains. I know that the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig, raised that, as well as the issue with the ECHR, and he heard me address that.

Lord Craig of Radley (CB)I hope that the intention to proceed with it will be coupled with a date when it will be done.

Lord Coaker (Lab)That is always my intention—rather than to be just aspirational—to try to demand change of the system. The noble and gallant Lord will know from his experience and military service that even a senior rank or senior ministerial rank does not always mean things moving quite as quickly as one would hope. Certainly, this is not an aspiration but a desire to actually bring it about. We will work with other government departments to try to ensure that something happens on that as quickly as possible.

The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Norwich raised various issues and welcomed the covenant. He heard what I had to say about single-person accommodation and the importance of a whole-society approach. A number of noble Lords mentioned service police and we will come back to some of those issues in Committee.

The noble Baroness, Lady Penn, heard me talk about some of the changes to visas. She mentioned the importance of paternity leave and raised that with me at another meeting outside the Chamber. Of course, we will look at that and see how we can take it forward. I think she mentioned an individual case as well; if she wants to write to me about that, because I do not know the case, I will look into it for her.

The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Norwich made a really interesting point with respect to not just the Church of England but faith organisations as a whole. The moral dilemma there is between supporting the Armed Forces and appearing to support war versus being a peace-loving faith, which all faiths are. That is a moral dilemma, but sometimes you prevent war by preparing for it. That is the difficulty with respect to that.

The noble Baroness, Lady Lane-Fox, made the point about housing; she will have heard what I had to say about that. She made some other points about the need for transition support, learning and training, which were really important. The noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, made a number of very important points, which were linked to points made by the noble Lord, Lord Thomas. I thought his was a brilliant legal contribution—I actually understood it, which is not always the case—in the way that he laid out some of the issues with respect to the cases that he referred to, as the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, also pointed out. I do not want to say too much, because there are ongoing legal issues with respect to that, but there are certainly discussions taking place about how we take it forward.

Here is the legal advice I have had—and this is for the noble Baroness as well as the noble Lord. The Visiting Forces Act 1952 sets out the legal basis for how jurisdiction for criminal offences is decided between the UK civil authorities and a visiting forces service court martial. This is implemented in practice by the police, the Crown Prosecution Service and the UK courts as part of the criminal justice system. Following the deeply distressing recent case, officials are working across government to establish the full facts of how this process was enacted in this case.

If needs be, regarding some of the other things said by the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, I will make sure that we come back in Committee with answers to the questions she raised, when I have had a full legal response to the things she asked. I thought they were really important, and I will bring them forward and share them—obviously, if I bring them up in Committee, people will see that.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Lancaster, for the points he raised about the Strategic Reserve, and the point about data and the digitalisation of the system strikes me as one of those important things where it seems we ought to be able, sometimes, to just get on with them.

I take the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Magan, and we will continue the debate around resources. My only point of contention with him is that I really do not think we have “smashed” our special relationship with the United States. There are ups and downs, and sometimes it is difficult, but the UK-US relationship is of immense importance to our country and continues to be so.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Dannatt, for the points he made. He will know that we are working hard to ensure that we do all we can to work properly with respect to historic wrecks. I will take the point about divers and come back to him in Committee about how the Bill impacts on that.

I thank my noble friend Lady Carberry for her remarks and the importance she gave to the reserves, not underplaying the role of the Active Reserve, and of employers being on side. I completely agree with that, and we will continue to take that forward.

The noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, also made the point about paternity leave, and she will have heard what I said to the noble Baroness, Lady Penn. The noble Baroness and I will continue to have the debate about 16 and 17 year-olds, the young adults—they are not child soldiers. I see it as a really important part of the contribution that the Armed Forces can make to the development of some of our young people, but that is a debate that we will continue to have. I do not know what the maritime war graves committee is looking at, but I will come back to her on that in Committee.

I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Fraser. We may not have delivered exactly what she wants with respect to the covenant but, if she looks at Clause 31, she will see that we have moved on the commissioner having responsibility for RFA personnel. She will know, given the continued remarks that she has made over a number of years around the importance of the RFA, that, although not giving her what she wants with respect to the covenant, the Government have moved on the extension of the role of the commissioner to that, which shows that contributions from all sides of the Chamber can actually make a difference to government policy.

I have said what I have said to the noble Lord, Lord Thomas. The noble Lord, Lord Morse, made the point about housing which, again, is really important.

My noble friend Lady Dacres made a good contribution. The consistency of delivery around the covenant across the country is really important, and she is quite right to make that point. I would say that one of the successes of the introduction of the covenant has been that it has changed attitudes and culture, which often does not require legislation. I think that the Armed Forces covenant has forced local authorities—and will soon do so for national government, although it has probably changed national government behaviour by its very introduction—to change the way in which people operate and the way people interact with our Armed Forces and veterans. I think it has made a difference there, and I say to my noble friend that that is how we see it taking place across the country.

With respect to the noble Lord, Lord Hay, discussions continue on the Troubles Bill and Northern Ireland and the proper place for our veterans and respecting them.

The noble Lord, Lord Bailey, made a hugely moving speech about his own experience and the way in which cadets work. We all support cadets. There are significant sums of money going into cadets, and we wish to expand on that. The noble Lord made an important point about how we attract more volunteers to support that. He will know there are tens of thousands of cadets across the country. This is a point I often make: you see them at events such as Remembrance Sunday but also many others, including Armed Forces Day, which we had recently. The role of cadets in those events, nationwide, was a great tribute to their organisations and a symbol of the sort of society we want in the way in which cadets can bring people together. I thank the noble Lord again for the contribution he made, from his own personal experience, on the way that cadets can help people who may need help and also help those who are simply young people growing up. I think that that is important.

May I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Stevens, on his work as a graduate of the Armed Forces Parliamentary Scheme?

Lord Hay of Ballyore (DUP)My Lords, I thank the Minister for giving way. He will know Northern Ireland extremely well, and he will know that there are at least five councils of Northern Ireland that do not implement the covenant. What do you have when your veterans lose out? You end up with a two-tier system where, across the rest of the United Kingdom, the covenant is very much rolled out. There is an opportunity in the Bill to try to address that issue, so it is not the responsibility of a local government to implement the covenant.

This issue has been going on for some time. I could name the councils involved, but, when you have five councils out of 11, you are in a situation where you have almost half of Northern Ireland not implementing the covenant and veterans losing out, when the rest of the United Kingdom and the veterans benefit from the covenant. So I ask the Minister: is there a way, within the Bill, of addressing the issue around Northern Ireland and the covenant?

Lord Coaker (Lab)The noble Lord explained some of that in his question. There is a particular situation, as he will know, with respect to Northern Ireland and the application of the covenant to all bodies there. As he will know, the duty applying to local authorities does not apply, and that becomes a problem, but we expect the covenant to apply to Northern Ireland through what the UK Government do. It is an ambiguity and it is difficult, but we will always seek to apply the covenant where we can, where it is appropriate, and where it fits the various devolution settlements with respect to that.

The covenant supports the Armed Forces community in Northern Ireland. Borough districts and city councils in Northern Ireland do not generally exercise functions in the policy areas in scope of the covenant legal duty. This does not exclude councils in Northern Ireland from pledging their support for the Armed Forces community by becoming a covenant signatory. I think that is what the noble Lord referred to. Some councils will choose to do so and others will not. That is the situation as it stands.

Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)The Minister must recognise that if this goes through without any recognition that Northern Ireland is again being treated differently, it really is not good enough. Surely, they are the Government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and the covenant is so important to all those people who have served in Northern Ireland and who live there.

Lord Coaker (Lab)The noble Baroness will know from my record that the Government support the Armed Forces community in Northern Ireland completely. I went to Armed Forces Day in Northern Ireland last year, a government Minister went to Northern Ireland just a couple of weeks ago to support Armed Forces Day, and I have been asked to an event in Northern Ireland in a few weeks’ time, which I hope to go to.

Support for Northern Ireland’s Armed Forces community with respect to the aims of the covenant are clear. We seek to recognise the reality that is there. Councils can pledge themselves to the covenant if they wish. A number have done so, but some have chosen not to. I reiterate the Government’s support for the Armed Forces community in Northern Ireland.

I turn now to a couple of remarks the noble Lord, Lord Stevens, made. On the covenant, as I said, it is the bite of the “due regard” that makes a difference. We saw, when it was introduced by the last Government, that “due regard” has impact as it seeks to bite. Cultural change will cause the councils—as they were then; they are now national bodies—to start to do things that they would not otherwise have done.

It is good that drones are in the Bill. They start to plug a gap. There will be questions about how we deal with that.

I thank the noble Baronesses, Lady Smith and Lady Goldie, for their remarks. There are many questions that we will have to come back to.

I finish by saying that I welcome the general support for the Bill. I also welcome the various challenges and questions that have been posed. We will seek to address those and move forward in a constructive way. If there can be improvements and adaptations, and the Government agree with them, we will see whether we can find a way forward.

Bill read a second time.

Commitment and Order of Consideration Motion

Moved by

Lord CoakerThat the bill be committed to a Committee of the Whole House, and that it be an instruction to the Committee of the Whole House that they consider the bill in the following order: Clauses 1 to 3, Schedule 1, Clauses 4 and 5, Schedule 2, Clauses 6 and 7, Schedule 3, Clauses 8 to 31, Schedule 4, Clauses 32 to 36, Schedule 5, Clauses 37 and 38, Schedule 6, Clauses 39 to 46, Schedule 7, Clauses 47 to 56, Title.

Motion agreed.

House adjourned at 7.45 pm.