Commons Sitting of 1 July 1999

Preamble
The House met at half-past Eleven o'clock
PRAYERS

  MADAM SPEAKER'S ABSENCE
  The House being met, the Clerk at the Table informed the House of the absence of MADAM SPEAKER from this day's sitting, pursuant to leave given on 23 June.
  Whereupon, SIR ALAN HASLEHURST, THE CHAIRMAN OF WAYS AND MEANS, proceeded to the Table and, after Prayers, took the Chair as DEPUTY SPEAKER, pursuant to the Standing Order.

Oral Answers to Questions
  AGRICULTURE, FISHERIES AND FOOD
  The Minister was asked—
  AGRICULTURE, FISHERIES AND FOOD

    Pet Passports
    Mr. Tony Colman: If he will make a statement on the implementation of the Government's policy on passports for pets. [87914]
    The Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Nick Brown): A pilot project will be in place as soon as possible, and in any event, by next April. The main scheme will be in place by April 2001. Good progress is being made towards meeting those targets.
    Mr. Colman: I thank the Minister for what I take to be a reaffirmation of his support for the pet travel scheme, which he announced to the House in March. I was concerned about some press speculation that there had been a change, so I am pleased to hear that the scheme is proceeding as planned. To move forward those proceedings, will he release information about improved vaccines, microchips and blood-testing laboratories so that owners can prepare their pets for travel to or from the United Kingdom?
    Mr. Brown: My hon. Friend has raised a very good point, which is at the heart of the scheme. Information about the microchips to be used is in the public domain now; for those who are interested, it can be found on my Department's website, where it was placed on 30 June. In the next few weeks we hope to be able to put in the public domain information on vaccines and the laboratories that are able to undertake testing.
    Mr. Nick St. Aubyn: Having seen the mess that the Government have made of passports for people, we shall not hold our breath for the introduction of their passports for pets scheme. The Minister must
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    realise that allowing the story to be spun out in April in the run-up to the local elections raised the hopes of many, such as my constituents, the Prestons, who were in Japan at the time, that the scheme might be introduced promptly. Instead, we are to have a year of foot-dragging, denying those who are prepared to take part in the scheme the opportunity to do so. Hopes have been dashed and the Minister is responsible for that.
    Mr. Brown: That is nonsensical; under the previous Government, we had 18 years of foot-dragging and no indication of any progress whatever. My predecessor, my right hon. Friend the Member for Copeland (Dr. Cunningham), initiated the scientific inquiry. We analysed the results and then acted. We are proceeding in a measured and responsible way. The pilot scheme has been well thought through; it covers all possible modes of transportation. We intend to move from that pilot to full change and, once that change has been made, the scheme will be widely used and, from the information that is available to me, widely welcomed.

    Research Expenditure
    Mr. Derek Twigg: How much money will be spent by his Department on research in the current financial year. [87915]
    The Minister of State, Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Jeff Rooker): The Ministry's budget for research and development in 1999–2000 is £125 million. The House will be interested to know that an example of such expenditure is a report that is being published today by the Institute of Occupational Medicine on the effects of exposure to organophosphate sheep dips, which was commissioned by the previous Government in 1995. It is a very important report, about which I shall give a further, longer written answer later today.
    Mr. Twigg: Will my hon. Friend pursue his analysis with the Government's scientific adviser at the utmost speed? Will he be talking to manufacturers of sheep dips?
    Mr. Rooker: We shall immediately refer the report that has been published today, which is based on the research that we have funded, to the Veterinary Products Committee and the special sub-committee of the Committee on the Toxicity of Chemicals in Food, Consumer Products and the Environment. I am asking manufacturers of sheep dips for urgent meetings early next week.
    Mr. Peter Luff: The Government have recently been forced to make significant cuts in the research budget of the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, and in many other areas of its expenditure, as a result of the mushrooming of the Phillips inquiry, the very tight settlement on running costs which was accepted under the comprehensive spending review and the failure to sell Covent Garden market. Yesterday, the permanent secretary made it clear to the Select Committee on Agriculture that MAFF expenditure remains very tight. What assurance can the Minister give that there will be no further unforeseen cuts in the research and development budget or other important areas of the Ministry's programmes?
    Mr. Rooker: We are not planning any more unforeseen cuts. The cuts have been regrettable. We are very much a

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    science-based Ministry—all the £125 million R and D budget is policy-driven; none is blue-skies research. Given our running costs of less than £700 million, hon. Members will realise the scale of MAFF's science base. We are not planning further reductions and will be very careful about those that we have had to make simply due to the comprehensive spending review. All key areas of MAFF's work in R and D will certainly continue.
    Dr. Ian Gibson: If the Institute of Occupational Medicine's scientific report suggests further investigation into the long-term adverse health effects caused by short-term exposure to organophosphates, will MAFF fund it, and to what extent?
    Mr. Rooker: The report is very large. There is a suggestion of further research, although it is clear from volume 1 that the institute has discovered a source of problems with OP sheep dips that relates to farmers or users coming into contact with the concentrate, giving unexpected results. We shall pursue that urgently with our scientific advisers.
    Mr. Paul Tyler: As chairman of the all-party organophosphate groups, I very much welcome the report and the statement that the Minister has just made. However, will he address the very serious concerns of victims, who have been waiting for the report for many years? They and the all-party group very much welcome the proactive attitude of the Minister and his colleagues, which contrasts with that of their predecessors, who always seemed to find excuses not to do anything. Will he give us an idea of the proposed timetable? How soon will COT—the Committee on the Toxicity of Chemicals in Food, Consumer Products and the Environment—report, and how soon after that will he be able to tell the House what action he proposes to take to help those whose lives and livelihoods have been ruined by exposure to those very dangerous chemicals?
    Mr. Rooker: As I said in my initial answer—I want to be absolutely fair about this—the report that is published today, funded by MAFF, the Health and Safety Executive and the Department of Health, was originally commissioned in 1995 by our predecessors. Given that it has taken a while and that the research took place over several years, we have nevertheless set up a sub-committee of COT to consider the wider issue of OPs, well beyond their use in sheep dips. The report to be published today will be referred to COT urgently, but it is also being referred to the Veterinary Products Committee urgently for a preliminary assessment. In addition, I have asked to meet the manufacturers as quickly as possible.
    Mr. Elfyn Llwyd: As a member of the all-party group, I also welcome the announcement but is it possible, without pre-judging the matter, to suspend the use of OPs until such further research has been commissioned and received?
    Mr. Rooker: If we are to ban or suspend the use of OP sheep dips, I must have a really good reason—one that is judge-proof, so that some sleek lawyer does not run round the corner and unstitch what we have done. That is why we are sending the report urgently to our own scientific advisers on the Veterinary Products Committee
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    for an urgent pre-assessment, and speaking to the manufacturers. COT, which is considering the wider issue, will report before the end of the year. I shall not wait until the end of the year, however, for an assessment by our scientific advisers of the report published today to see whether they can recommend any preliminary action that we could take before that.

    GM Crops
    Mr. Alan Simpson: What progress he has made in (a) defining and (b) monitoring an effective quarantine zone around genetically modified crop trials. [87916]
    The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Elliot Morley): Separation distances for GM crops were set out in the Supply Chain Initiative on Modified Agricultural Crops—SCIMAC—guidelines published last month. SCIMAC will enforce those through legally binding contracts, inspections and penalties for non-compliance. We are investigating the possibility of making those provisions statutory. The Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions is monitoring gene transfer at selected GM trial sites.
    Mr. Simpson: I thank the Minister for that answer, but is he aware that in April, the National Institute of Agricultural Botany identified that there has been pollen transfer well beyond the SCIMAC guidelines of 400 m where a GM crop barrier is in place? Is he also aware that the Scottish Crop Research Institute identified a pollen transfer of 4,000 m in the same month—mainly where bees are the pollen vector? Has the Minister any plans for the introduction of effective no-fly zones around GM crop trials? If not, on the basis of the principle that the polluter pays, can he say whether aggrieved parties should now look to pursue actions against the farmer, the Government or the bee?
    Mr. Morley: My hon. Friend raised the issue of liability in an interesting debate yesterday. On recent research—specifically, the John Innes research, commissioned by MAFF, because we take the potential contamination of other crops by GM crops very seriously—we are considering the advice that we receive from the report.
    SCIMAC set those crop separation distances on the basis of accepted and established practice in the agricultural sector in relation to seed transfers and potential cross-contamination between crops of different types, so one can understand the logic behind the separation distances recommended by SCIMAC. However, SCIMAC has made it very clear that it is prepared to review the position. Some sectors, such as the organic sector, are concerned about possible cross-contamination, and we urge it to discuss that with SCIMAC to see whether current separation distances are adequate.
    Mr. Anthony Steen: I do not know whether the Minister knows much about this, because he is the Minister responsible for fish rather than for GM crops, but is he aware that if a multinational company obtains a licence to grow GM crops in Greece or any European country, it can bring the technology and the licence to

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    Britain without any further permissions? Therefore, the idea of quarantine zones to ban such crops is gloriously irrelevant.
    Mr. Morley: Although sanction for release can be obtained in other European countries, we have to approve it in this country. If we recognise that there is a problem, we can take appropriate action within the United Kingdom. The issue has been recently discussed further within the European Union and agreed guidelines have been put forward, which tighten control at EU level as well as national level.
    Mr. Tim Yeo: Is the Minister aware that only two weeks ago English Nature reiterated its advice that no herbicide tolerant or insect resistant genetically modified crop should be grown commercially in this country for at least three and probably five years? Is he also aware that this is the view of the British Medical Association, the Science and Technology Select Committee, Friends of the Earth, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds and of many other responsible organisations and individuals? Why will the Labour Government not say clearly, without qualification, that no commercial planting of those genetically modified crops can take place in Britain until the research into their environmental impact has been completed?
    Mr. Morley: That is exactly the situation now. There are no commercially planted genetically modified crops within the United Kingdom. There is a commercial moratorium, but research is being carried out. That is exactly what English Nature has been arguing for. If issues such as the effect on biodiversity are identified during that research and evaluation, appropriate action can be taken. There will be no planting of pesticide resistant crops within three to five years.

    CAP Budget
    Mr. Eric Forth: If he will make a statement about growth in the CAP budget over the period 2000 to 2006. [87918]
    The Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Nick Brown): The spending limits agreed at the Heads of Government conference at Berlin mean that after an initial increase, common agricultural policy costs will, for the first time, fall year on year in real terms from 2002 onwards.
    Mr. Forth: Does the Minister recall that early in March the Prime Minister was making it clear that he was completely dissatisfied with the deal that was then being hatched? Yet two or three weeks later, mysteriously, the Prime Minister was prepared to have his Government sign up to a deal that was palpably worse than that which he had criticised only a few weeks earlier. Is the Minister satisfied that what is going on in the CAP is remotely in concurrence with World Trade Organisation rules? If not, what will he do if, as a result, we find ourselves with another futile conflict between the European Union and the United States?
    Mr. Brown: My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister secured a first-rate deal for this country at Berlin.
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    He secured the British rebate and for the first time ever not only constrained the costs of the CAP but got them on a downward trend. That is a substantial achievement. I am surprised that that is not acknowledged by Conservative Members. After all, it is something that they did not manage to achieve.
    The right hon. Gentleman asked me about the agricultural component of the deal that was arranged at Brussels and modified at Berlin. I have made no secret of my view that I think that we shall be revisiting this component before the six years during which it is expected to endure. There will be much to be discussed in the WTO round and collectively we have our ambitions for enlarging the EU, and there are consequences in those ambitions for the current agricultural settlement.
    Mr. Peter L. Pike: To take up my right hon. Friend's final point, obviously the CAP was originally designed for six countries. Is he satisfied that arrangements are in place for European Union enlargement, which will have major implications for agriculture throughout Europe?
    Mr. Brown: I am satisfied with the arrangements that are in place for the next spending period for European enlargement. However, further issues will have to be addressed in the next spending period. It has been my consistent view, as it has been that of the Government—I do not believe that it is a matter of controversy even between the two sides of the House—that we need to start addressing now the way in which the candidate countries can come into not only the EU but the CAP.
    Mr. Andrew George: The Minister seems to accept that the outcome of the CAP negotiations was an unacceptable fudge, which needs to be revisited. Because of all the uncertainties as a result of the fudged outcome, does the Minister accept that the negotiations should be brought forward, so that the issue of EU enlargement can be properly addressed and the uncertainty resolved as quickly as possible?
    Mr. Brown: The hon. Gentleman is right to point to the impact of enlargement on the current structures of the CAP, but he is mistaken to refer to either the Brussels or the Berlin outcome as a fudge. It was not a fudge. The criticism that can be made of the deal is that it did not go far enough now. The substantial gain for Britain in the deal is that we made a start on reform in each of the commodity regimes, in spite of the fact that the majority of our partners had reservations about going in that direction. We are going in the right direction. The correct criticism—it is one that I would make myself—is that we have not got far enough fast enough.

    Whaling
    Mr. Vernon Coaker: What discussions he has had with EU partners on the control of whaling. [87919]
    The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Elliot Morley): We regularly co-ordinate policies with other countries opposed to whaling, both inside and outside the EU.
    Mr. Coaker: I congratulate my hon. Friend and the rest of the Front-Bench team on putting animal welfare

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    issues at the centre of their policy objectives and the work of the Department. Will my hon. Friend examine the way in which the International Whaling Commission works, and consider whether it is possible for that organisation to deal not only with the stopping of whaling, but with the management of whaling, and how we can do more to protect the existing whale stock and increase the number of whales in the world's oceans?
    Mr. Morley: My hon. Friend raises a good point. The IWC was set up to exploit whales commercially. The Government have made it clear that we reject the idea of a return to commercial whaling, and we want the IWC to concentrate more on global threats to whales, such as environmental threats, global warming and pollution, and to extend its competence to small cetaceans, many of which are under threat internationally. In the IWC discussions that I attended to underline the importance that the Government attach to the issue, we received significant support from other EU states and other countries, without which we could not have made the advances that we have achieved internationally.
    Mr. John Bercow: In rightly continuing the policy of the previous Government of support for the continuation of the moratorium on commercial whaling, is it the Government's policy to support the exemption to allow the Makah Indian tribe in the United States to continue subsistence whaling which, as I am sure the Minister knows, has been undertaken there for about 2,000 years? If that policy is being continued, what progress is being made?
    Mr. Morley: We accept the case for indigenous aboriginal whaling in certain parts of the world. That is regulated by the IWC and a quota is set. However, I thought that the Makahs' case for restarting whaling was unimpressive and had not been proved.

    Coral
    Mr. Tam Dalyell: What studies he has commissioned on the importance of coral in the marine food chain. [87921]
    The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Elliot Morley): MAFF has not commissioned any studies specifically aimed at assessing the importance of corals in the marine food chain. However, MAFF's research includes assessments of the impact of fishing, gravel dredging and other activities on benthic communities.
    Mr. Dalyell: Is not coral—not least the north-west Atlantic coral in our own waters—crucial as a nursery for many species of fish? I was invited by the Foreign Office to a conference on coral for the dependent territories that was held yesterday at London zoo. Could reflection be given to which Department is the lead Department? The Foreign and Commonwealth Office is involved, as are the Department for International Development, the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions and, marginally, the Department of Trade and Industry. Is it not important that there should be a lead Department, particularly to follow up the report of
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    Dr. Charles Sheppard, which was published this week and gives an alarming picture of the bleaching of coral, which affects everyone on the planet?
    Mr. Morley: My hon. Friend is right. That is a serious matter for the cold-water corals in our waters, of which Lophelia is the main species in the north-west. However, I can give my hon. Friend some reassurance. The Joint Nature Conservation Committee is taking the lead role in co-ordinating research, which is one of its functions in relation to UK issues. The Natural Environment Research Council is also conducting research, as is Norway. Some of those corals are in international waters and we are sharing information because we take this issue seriously.
    Mr. Owen Paterson: Under the current fishing regime, British fishermen are dumping more dead fish back into the sea than are being landed for human consumption. What effect is that having on the marine food chain?
    Mr. Morley: The discarding of fish is an important issue, which we are addressing. I emphasise that the bulk of discarded fish are under-sized and non-marketable. We are commissioning a research programme in conjunction with the EU and other member states to look at the reasons for discarding and technical solutions for reducing and eliminating it.
    Mr. Patrick Nicholls: What possible confidence can we have in the results of the survey that the Minister has announced on the reason for fish discards? As he well knows, as long ago as 1991 the Commission's 10-year survey of the common fisheries policy said that discards were not simply a by-product—some unintended consequence—of the CFP, but a positive obligation under it. Will he also admit that many discards are purely and simply fish that are quite edible and of proper and fit size, but which cannot be landed because of the iniquities of the CFP? That is the reality of the situation and he should not need to commission a survey to tell him what is already an obligation under the CFP.
    Mr. Morley: I repeat that research programmes that we have carried out, most recently in the North sea, show that 90 per cent. of discards are under-sized and non-commercial fish. Some marketable fish are discarded as a by-product of quota control. Although I have repeatedly invited the industry and the Conservative party to put forward alternatives to quota control, no workable alternative has ever been suggested. I received a letter this morning from a Conservative Member of the European Parliament, who was unable to explain the Conservative party's fisheries policy, and it seems that Conservative MEPs have no idea of where their party stands on fisheries policy and tackling such issues as the conservation of fish.

    Pig Industry
    Mr. John Healey: What recent representations he has received on the current state of the pig industry. [87922]
    The Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Nick Brown): Over recent months I have received a number of letters, from hon. Members and others, about the difficulties currently faced by the pig industry. In addition, I have listened to the views of pig farmers, their representatives and other interested parties at seminars and regional events.
    Mr. Healey: May I draw my right hon. Friend's attention to difficulties faced by Mr. and Mrs. Brookes at West Melton? They are pig farmers in my constituency and last year, for the first time in four generations of farming, they took out a bank overdraft. What reassurances can he give to Mr. and Mrs. Brookes and thousands of pig farmers like them that the Government are doing all that they can to ensure that the exemplary standards of pig husbandry, feed and drugs treatment in this country are an advantage, not a disadvantage, in the marketplace?
    Mr. Brown: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. I am very sympathetic to farmers who find themselves in such circumstances. I am meeting the representatives of the agricultural divisions of the main high street banks specifically to discuss the problems of the pig industry. Furthermore, the Government's strategy, which is aimed at getting the industry through what I freely acknowledge are difficult times, is aimed at securing for pig producers such as his constituents a premium in the marketplace for the animal welfare measures that Parliament voted to be put in place. I have been working, with some success, not only with the British Retail Consortium, but with the Meat and Livestock Commission and others with an interest in this matter to secure that premium for the industry in the marketplace. The figures to date show that there is a 15 per cent. premium for United Kingdom pigmeat in the United Kingdom market.
    Mr. Christopher Gill: Does the Minister accept that the Government are presiding over the biggest crisis in the pig industry that the country has known? He will be aware that the breeding herd is 23 per cent. down in only 18 months and threatens to go lower. The Government have had the opportunity to help the industry, but they have failed. For example, they recently decided not to allow the separate rendering of porcine offals for feed.
    Is the Minister aware that I have asked questions about help from other Ministries? He should be, because I have raised that issue with him previously. On 20 May I wrote to Ministers at the Department of Health and at DETR and asked them to use their
    "best offices to ensure that Local Authorities"—
    and health authorities—
    "purchase only pork and pork products derived from pigs produced to the same high health and welfare standards as are applied in the UK."
    I have had no reply, other than an acknowledgement saying that the letter would be passed on to the Minister of Agriculture. Is that joined-up government?
    Mr. Brown: I assure the hon. Gentleman that it is joined-up government. I have made the representations that I previously promised to my colleagues within the Government and we have had a supportive response,
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    not least from the Ministry of Defence, which makes sure that its procurement of fresh pork products is 100 per cent. United Kingdom sourced. That is an important support for the industry. In addition, I have on my desk draft letters waiting to go out to the major public authorities—the prisons, the health authorities and local authorities—not via other Departments but directly, urging them to source products of the highest welfare and animal hygiene standards, thus supporting the Meat and Livestock Commission's quality assured campaign.
    I believe that the strategy that we are pursuing is the right one. Of course, the size of the national herd has come down; it is right that it should do so. The only way through for the industry is to bring supply and demand closer into alignment. The hon. Gentleman says that the Government have presided over the crisis, but over-optimistic decisions that were made in 1995–96 about the amount of product that the market could bear have, more than anything else, served to get us into the present difficulties. Those decisions were made not just in the United Kingdom but across the European Union. External factors, such as over-optimistic assumptions about a rising market in the far east and the former Soviet Union, turned out not to be well founded. Those were market judgments, which are not the fault of the Government.
    Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Alan Haselhurst): Order. May I appeal for briefer questions and briefer answers?
    Mr. Hilton Dawson: Is my right hon. Friend aware that, following a debate in the House last Thursday in which I referred to excellent pork sausages from Garstang, our worthy Hansard reporters asked where they could get them? May I tell them that a consignment is heading this way a week on Monday? Would my right hon. Friend like some as well?
    On a more serious point, may I urge my right hon. Friend to use his considerable weight and presence with the British Retail Consortium and with supermarkets everywhere to ensure that excellent products such as Mary Miller's pork sausages get into our supermarkets instead of lower quality pig products from abroad?
    Mr. Brown: I hope to meet the British Retail Consortium shortly to reaffirm the arrangements that I made with it before Christmas. I shall add to my weight, and perhaps my responsibilities, by consuming the product that my hon. Friend recommends.
    Mr. William Thompson: Is the Minister aware that in Northern Ireland the problem is particularly acute, because the selling price received by the farmer is a lower percentage than that in the rest of the United Kingdom? There are still many rumours that other European Governments are subsidising their pig farmers through the back door. What investigations has MAFF made into those allegations, and what representations have been made to the Commission about them?
    Mr. Brown: The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right to say that there are particular difficulties with the market in Northern Ireland. Prices there are not as buoyant as they are in the rest of the United Kingdom. Perhaps it is a mistake to use the word "buoyant", because although we have obtained for the industry a premium in the

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    marketplace, the industry is still not back to break-even point. I accept that we have more work to do. I have made representations to the Commission relating to the suggestion that the French Government plan to introduce state aids that go beyond EU rules, and the Commission is investigating that. Moreover, I recently met our agricultural attachés in the different EU embassies and went through a number of detailed questions with them on points that the Government hope that they will look out for.
    Mr. Tim Yeo: Given the collapse of the incomes of pig farmers since Labour came to power, how long will the Minister stand idle while imports of pig meat produced under conditions not permitted in Britain continue to flood into this country? How long will the French Government be allowed to pay unlawful state aids to their pig farmers before a murmur of protest passes the Minister's lips? How many British pig farmers will go bust before the Minister translates his warm words of sympathy into effective action to help the remaining British pig farmers to survive?
    Mr. Brown: I do not want to go through again the answer I gave earlier. The hon. Gentleman will have heard the explanation, but does not seem able to understand it. As I told the House, when other member states are trying to introduce state aids that we believe are outwith European Union rules, we complain to the Commission and ask it to investigate. We have raised with the Commission the matter of the alleged state aids in France—I notice that the hon. Gentleman has no hard evidence—and the Commission is requiring information from the French Government.
    On the hon. Gentleman's other points, I should say to the whole House that there is no solution to this problem in protectionist measures. We must fight for our industry to get a premium in the marketplace, and that is exactly what the Government are doing. The hon. Gentleman would serve the pig industry better if he joined forces with me and fought to secure for the industry the premium in the marketplace which the production systems in this country rightly merit.

    Meat Labelling
    Mr. Robert Syms: If he will make a statement about the labelling of country of origin on meat sold in Britain. [87924]
    The Minister of State, Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Jeff Rooker): Information on the country of origin of meat can be given by retailers voluntarily. It is helpful to consumers to be provided with full information, including the country of origin. As a consumer, I want that. If meat is not labelled as British, people should not assume that it is British.
    Mr. Syms: Have not the British public the right to know the country of origin of the meat on their table, so that they can make an informed choice about hygiene and welfare standards? We have pretty high standards in this country, and if we have health scares many consumers feel helpless when they go to a supermarket, because they do not know what they are buying for their children and their family.
    Mr. Rooker: I agree entirely with the hon. Gentleman. We cannot introduce rules unilaterally. There is a
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    Europe-wide beef labelling scheme, which is separate. Retailers can put the country of origin on other meats, and consumers should insist on that. If that information is not on the product, people should not buy it because they do not know where it has come from. If people want to buy British because of our high welfare and hygiene standards, they should look for the British label. If meat is not labelled as such, people should not assume that it is British.
    Mr. Bob Blizzard: Is my hon. Friend aware that there are two large beef processing factories in my constituency—Wessex Foods and Bird's Eye? It has been said that Lowestoft is the burger capital of the region, if not the country. Sales of beef products have soared since the Government restored confidence in British beef and the Meat and Livestock Commission quality mark label was introduced. The only concern that my factories have is whether they can get enough British beef. Is not that really good news for British beef farmers, by stark contrast with the dark days under the previous Government during their BSE crisis?
    Mr. Rooker: Yes. British consumption of British beef has risen 10 percentage points since December 1997, because British consumers' confidence in British beef is greater than it has ever been. That is right, and that increase in consumption is shown by the amount of purchasing. It will increase further when we persuade our European partners to accept the flow of British beef once again.
    Mr. James Paice: It is now several months since the Minister promised to investigate meat hygiene charges for British-produced meat. Yesterday at the Norfolk show I met abattoir owners who are concerned that they may go out of business, which will encourage imports of overseas meat. Will the Minister stop this absurd notion that there will have to be a fully qualified vet in every abattoir, at huge cost to the abattoir owner? That will lead to increased employment of foreign vets, who are clearly not up to the job. None of that is in the interests of British-produced meat.
    Mr. Rooker: It was the hon. Gentleman's final inquiry that gave me the clue to whether his supplementary related to Question 9 or Question 10. [HON. MEMBERS: "Answer."] I can answer the hon. Gentleman's question, although it does not relate to the question that is on the Order Paper. We have not yet announced the outcome of the review of the charges, but we have undertaken investigations of the requirements for vets to be present in abattoirs.
    I fully accept that the meat industry, although it is one industry, involves two cultures. For instance, the fact that 80 per cent. of cattle are slaughtered in 20 per cent. of abattoirs demonstrates that there are a few very large abattoirs and a good many very small ones. We are trying our best to establish a regime that will meet the requirements of both small and large abattoirs, so that they can work in harmony. We do not intend to put small abattoirs out of business, but we cannot recruit the vets we need. That is why we have imported some from the European Union.
    Mr. Paice: We do not have to do that.
    Mr. Rooker: Unfortunately, the supply of vets in this country is restricted for reasons connected with education

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    and the requirements of the royal college of veterinary Surgeons. The Government have been addressing that. [Interruption.] It is no good saying that we do not need vets in the first place; there is a European requirement, and a legal requirement, for us to have qualified vets. Nothing that the hon. Member for South-East Cambridgeshire (Mr. Paice) says can knock that on the head.[Interruption.]
    We are apparently being asked—by someone in a sedentary position—to diminish our standards in abattoirs. We are not prepared to do that.

    Specified Risk Materials
    Mr. James Plaskitt: What measures he is taking to ensure that controls on specified risk materials do not place additional burdens on the livestock industry. [87925]
    The Minister of State, Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Jeff Rooker): The House will be aware that the Government have deferred plans to charge the meat industry for the cost of specified risk material enforcement for a further year. That will save the industry some £20 million.
    Mr. Plaskitt: Farmers in my constituency are very grateful to the Government for meeting the costs of the scheme, and I think they accept in principle that the time has come for the costs to return to the industry. Can my hon. Friend say any more about the possible timing, and about whether he is considering any phasing in of costs?
    Mr. Rooker: The time mentioned in the announcement was a year. When my right hon. Friend announced the concession, having noted the industry's problems, we indicated that there was a potential for phasing in, probably over two years.
    This is a public health measure, and as such it is very important. It does not relate to every single abattoir; it is intended to deal with cattle and, to a lesser extent, sheep. We feel that the industry should take the cost on board, but it would probably be wrong to ask it to take all of it on board in one go.
    Miss Anne McIntosh: I welcome the postponing of the SRM costs, but will the Minister act urgently to reverse the decision to have qualified vets on site at the time of the slaughtering of all animals? This is an unacceptable charge which has more than doubled the cost of the slaughtering of all animals, and poses the risk that small local abattoirs will have to be closed in the coming months.
    Mr. Rooker: We have considered the matter, and are still considering it. We have not yet announced the charging regime for this year. At present the Ministry is bearing about £300,000 of the charges, and the industry is therefore benefiting from the delay. When we present our proposals, however, I hope that they will take on board what the hon. Lady has said about the requirement for full-time veterinary supervision.

    Organic Farming
    Ms Julia Drown: If the Government will introduce targets for the proportion of land that is farmed organically in the United Kingdom. [87926]
    The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Elliot Morley): We have no plans to do so at present. To be sustainable, production should be in response to market demand. The Government are committed to supporting the expansion of the organic farm sector, which in the United Kingdom has increased by over 400 per cent. in the past 12 months.
    Encouragement of organic farming in Scotland is a matter for the Scottish Parliament; in Wales, it is a matter for the Welsh Assembly. I understand that there are no plans to set a target for organic production in Northern Ireland.
    Ms Drown: My hon. Friend spoke of the need to respond to market demand, and then described the huge increase in demand that has taken place. In February this year, supermarkets reported an increase of between 35 and 40 per cent.—yet we are importing 80 per cent. of the organic fruit and vegetables that we consume. Will my hon. Friend consult his counterparts in Austria, which is farming 10 per cent. of crops organically—the figure here is less than 1 per cent.—and in Denmark, which has set ambitious targets, to establish whether there are lessons that we can learn?
    Mr. Morley: We are keen to expand the organic sector for the reasons that my hon. Friend states. However, an expansion of more than 400 per cent. in 12 months is a sign of the success of the extra support that the Government have given to organic farming; there has been a near doubling of aid for organic research. We want organic production to expand up to the market available for it. We are at about the 2 per cent. mark; it is under 2 per cent. Given market demand, there is further room for progress.

  The Attorney-General was asked—
  ATTORNEY-GENERAL

    Disclosure
    Mr. Chris Mullin: What discussions he has had with the Director of Public Prosecutions about reforming the law on disclosure in criminal cases; and if he will make a statement. [87904]
    The Attorney-General (Mr. John Morris): I meet the Director of Public Prosecutions routinely to discuss the work of the Crown Prosecution Service. At those meetings, we have discussed the application of law of disclosure. The director recently initiated a programme of work to ensure that the law is applied properly.
    Our discussions have not covered reform of the law, policy responsibility for which rests with the Home Secretary.
    Mr. Mullin: Does my right hon. and learned Friend recall that, when he and I were on the Standing

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    Committee that considered the Criminal Procedure and Investigations Bill, we both took the view that it was not sensible to allow the police and prosecution to decide what material should be made available to the defence? That is still my view. Is it his?
    The Attorney-General: I do not think that my hon. Friend is reminding the House precisely of what I said. I think that I said that the proposal was a distinct improvement in that both prosecution and defence would be able to focus on relevant material. The director and I share the concern that justice be done, and justice demands proper disclosure.
    Although 100,000 persons, in both the CPS and the police, were trained initially, there is need for more training. The director has begun a programme of work and emphasised the importance of the issue to the new chief Crown prosecutors. As regards the police, some of the work may be done together. That is primarily a matter for the Home Secretary, but I reiterate the director's words:
    "Innocent people may be convicted and guilty defendants acquitted if the CPS fails to properly disclose material to the defence in criminal trials."
    I attach great importance to that. We can move forward with proper training and proper retraining, if that is necessary.
    Mr. Edward Garnier: What discussions has the right hon. and learned Gentleman had with the DPP about disclosure in cases under the Prevention of Terrorism (Temporary Provisions) Act 1989? In the light of that, why did it take his Department 17 days to advise the Home Department of the errors that were discovered in the recent version of the PTA? Is 17 days an acceptable period of delay when dealing with a matter of that importance and urgency?
    The Attorney-General: I congratulate the hon. and learned Gentleman on the translation to his new office. Who knows—his learning curve may turn out to be as long as mine: 18 years.
    On the precise question, the position is as follows. I have read the debate in the House. The matter was discovered by one of my staff; the Home Office was informed; it requested advice on 1 June. The Solicitor-General and I took a preliminary view. The advice sought by the Home Office was not solely on the problem that the regulations had not been properly delineated; there were other issues involving the procedure to revive them. It was an unprecedented situation. There was also the knock-on effect in relation to the case that is to be before the House of Lords on 19 July.
    In those circumstances, I deemed it right to seek the advice of, eventually, two Treasury counsel. That was obtained on 17 June. The instructions were given to counsel on 8 June. It was important to get it right. We saw a preliminary view from Treasury counsel and, on the day we eventually received the final joint advice, it was conveyed to the Home Office.
    There was no unacceptable delay whatsoever. I am sure that, 18 years from now, if the hon. and learned Gentleman is doing my job, he will do precisely the same to get it right.
    Dr. Ian Gibson: Can my right hon. and learned Friend recollect a situation in which any
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    member of the Crown Prosecution Service has been subjected to disciplinary procedures for failure to disclose?
    The Attorney-General: The answer is none. Frequently, the problem is not one of non-disclosure but of late disclosure, as in the case referred to by my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, South (Mr. Mullin). There are also obvious difficulties unless non-disclosure is clearly an unambiguous fault, as opposed to something that has been overlooked. Of course, the Crown Prosecution Service has to rely on material provided by the police; hence the need to continue to be vigilant and to retrain, so that both the police and the CPS can ensure that justice is done.

    Welsh Language
    Mr. Elfyn Llwyd: What percentage of Crown Prosecution lawyers in Wales are able to conduct trials through the medium of the Welsh language; and if he will make a statement. [R] [87905]
    The Attorney-General: In Wales, 14.08 per cent. of Crown prosecutors are able to conduct trials through the medium of the Welsh language, which compares with the 13.6 per cent. of the population who can speak, read and write Welsh. In fact, it is estimated that the ability is needed in fewer than 1 per cent. of trials.
    Mr. Llwyd: I thank the right hon. and learned Gentleman for that reply. In some areas of north Wales, provision is considered very good; but in some areas of Wales, it is considered very poor. Moreover, where provision has developed, it has done so solely on an ad hoc basis. For example, in Dyfed—which, as the right hon. and learned Gentleman will know, is a Welsh-speaking area—three out of 15 prosecutors speak Welsh. There is under-provision in some areas, but proper provision in others.
    When the CPS next comes up for appraisal of service delivery, will the right hon. and learned Gentleman ensure that such provision is a definite subject heading, so that each and every area will report on this important issue?
    The Attorney-General: I know that the hon. Gentleman regards it as an important issue, and I share that belief. A long time ago, I had the privilege of prosecuting a case—a substantial part of it in Welsh—in his own constituency. Two of the four newly appointed chief Crown prosecutors speak Welsh, and one of them is learning it. All four were born in Wales. I assure the hon. Gentleman that we attach importance to the fact that, if required, 20 of the prosecutors in Wales are able to conduct cases in Welsh. If any case goes to the Crown court, a substantial number of barristers—including the hon. Gentleman—are capable of conducting it in Welsh.
    Mr. Gareth Thomas: I am sure that my right hon. and learned Friend will agree that the legal system has progressed quite a long way from the days when it was the instrument of official suppression of the Welsh language in Wales. None the less, does he accept that there is still a long way to go before the principles enunciated in the Welsh Language Act 1993 are realised?
    The Attorney-General: I am not sure whether I follow every material part of my hon. Friend's suggestions;

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    I know, having practised on the circuit a very long time ago, of problems arising. However, the figures show that the number of such cases are very small indeed. The case that I prosecuted concerned sheep stealing, which, as the hon. Member for Meirionnydd Nant Conwy (Mr. Llwyd) will know, is a very important matter in that part of the world. On language itself, the CPS has produced for the Welsh Language Board a draft report in which it sets out its policy in detail. I am sure that my hon. Friend will find it acceptable.

    Fraud Cases
    Dr. Brian Iddon: When he last met the Director of the Serious Fraud Office to discuss the failure rate of prosecutions in fraud cases. [87907]
    The Solicitor-General (Mr. Ross Cranston): The Attorney-General and I meet the Director of the Serious Fraud Office on a regular basis to discuss the operational work of the office, and on an ad hoc basis as issues require. In the past 12 months, the Serious Fraud Office has brought 19 cases against 39 defendants, of whom 32 were convicted. The overall conviction rate in each year since 1996–97 has been in excess of 80 per cent.
    Dr. Iddon: Has my hon. and learned Friend expressed to his colleagues the dissatisfaction of the general public at the fact that millions of pounds have gone down the drain as a result of the failure of several high profile serious fraud cases? Does he believe that people should benefit from serious fraud? I am minded to ask that question because of the case of Nick Leeson, who collapsed a bank, spent only six years in jail, and will apparently benefit to the tune of at least £100,000. Will my hon. and learned Friend condemn the media, as in assisting him to do that they are encouraging people to commit serious fraud?
    The Solicitor-General: As I said, the Serious Fraud Office has a very good record. It was not involved in the case of Nick Leeson because he was prosecuted in Singapore. If my hon. Friend is asking me whether people should profit from doing wrong, my reply is that as a general principle they should not. My hon. Friend may know that my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General has taken proceedings against George Blake, who profited from writing his memoirs about spying against the country. I understand that the Press Complaints Commission can take up the matter; that may be appropriate.
    Mr. Andrew Stunell: The Minister may be aware that an all-party group of right hon. and hon. Members was invited to visit the stock exchange yesterday and heard a detailed explanation of the regulatory regime, particularly in respect of insider trading and other offences that may come to light there. We were told that in the past two years 70 such offences, or suspected offences, had been referred to the Crown Prosecution Service and to the fraud squad, but that no
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    successful prosecutions had followed. Is that considered an acceptable outcome, when white collar fraud clearly has the capacity to produce great dividends for those who practise it and is often seen as being victimless?
    The Solicitor-General: I am not aware of the particular statistics to which the hon. Gentleman refers, but I shall certainly look into the problem. Insider dealing is a difficult offence to prosecute as it is particularly difficult to obtain evidence. Under the new regime in the Financial Services and Markets Bill, the regulatory authorities will be able to take disciplinary action, but at the end of the day serious cases have to be pursued. I shall certainly look at the matter raised by the hon. Gentleman.
    Mr. David Kidney: When the Financial Services Authority is given the power under the Financial Services and Markets Bill to prosecute fraud cases alongside the Serious Fraud Office and the Crown Prosecution Service, how will that affect the responsibilities of the Law Officers in this place?
    The Solicitor-General: The Serious Fraud Office will continue to prosecute the most serious fraud and cases will be referred to it by the regulatory authorities. Of course, under the new regime more cases should be pursued as a result of the activities of the Financial Services Authority. So as a result of the Bill, a more efficient regime will be in place.

    Lenient Sentences (Appeals)
    Mr. John Bercow: If he will make a statement on the number of appeals against lenient sentences in the latest year for which figures are available. [87908]
    The Solicitor-General: In 1998 in England and Wales, 94 individual references were made to the Court of Appeal and 88.1 per cent. of the references heard resulted in an increased sentence. Eleven cases have yet to be heard. This year, as of the end of June, 54 cases have been referred to the Court of Appeal. Of the 12 cases that have been heard, the sentence was increased in 10 cases.
    Mr. Bercow: I am grateful to the hon. and learned Gentleman for that informative reply. Does he have any plans to extend the number of offences in respect of which lenient sentences can be referred to the Court of Appeal—and if not, why not?
    The Solicitor-General: In our manifesto, we undertook to look into that matter, and we have done a great deal of preliminary work. I hope that an announcement will be made in the fairly near future. The previous Government made two minor extensions to the Criminal Justice Act 1988, but experience has shown that not many references have been made. Most of those that arise are for truly serious offences, but statistics demonstrate that more references are being made now than in the past. We take the matter seriously.

Child Support Reform
12.30 pm
The Secretary of State for Social Security (Mr. Alistair Darling): With permission, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I should like to make a statement on our reforms of the Child Support Agency—a key part of our strategy for supporting families and children.
Last year, we published a Green Paper setting out our proposals, and there was overwhelming support for change. I am placing in the Library a summary of 1,500 responses to the Green Paper, along with a list of those who contributed. I am also publishing our White Paper on child support, setting out reforms that will get money to 1 million children who currently miss out. I have written to all hon. Members enclosing a summary of the White Paper, and I have placed copies in the Vote Office.
The reforms that I will set out today are driven by principle. We are putting children first, and we are making sure that the new system is fair on fathers who want to support their children, and tough on those who will not. Our reforms mark a new contract for child support, based on the right of a child to the care and support of its parents, and on the responsibility of parents to provide it.
The responsibility for bringing up children lies squarely with both parents, and that responsibility endures whether they live together or apart. All children have the right to a decent start in life. The Government are already doing a great deal to help. We are increasing child benefit by a record amount and providing more help for low-paid families through the new working families tax credit, tax changes and the national minimum wage. Taken together all that means that a family on £13,000 a year will be better off by up to £2,500 a year.
We are investing £540 million in the sure start programme for very young, disadvantaged children. We are committed to ending the scandal of child poverty in a generation. We are determined to make sure that children receive all the help that they need, which is why we are introducing a new system of child support that is simple, effective and fair.
Today, many children miss out on the support that they should receive from both parents. Under the present system, only 250,000 children receive maintenance, and only 100,000 children get all that they should. Some 30 per cent. of parents using the CSA pay nothing towards the care of their children. That cannot be right. The child support system should help parents to meet their responsibilities, and, where necessary, it should take action when parents will not do so.
The system that we inherited has failed. It does not help parents who want to pay, and it is not tough enough on those who will not pay. The previous Government set up the Child Support Agency in 1993 to replace a court system that could not cope. Going back to the courts is not the answer. In 1979, 52 per cent. of lone parents on income support received maintenance, but by 1990, the courts were getting money to only 20 per cent. On top of that, decisions were often unpredictable, unreliable and unfair. The CSA was meant to sort that situation out, but it did not. The percentage of lone parents on income support getting child maintenance is the same today as it was when the agency was set up.
The CSA became a bureaucratic nightmare for parents and staff alike. The reason for that is clear. Under the current system the CSA can require more than
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100 different pieces of information to make a single decision, meaning that a third of all child support cases wait at least six months for a decision. The CSA spends 90 per cent. of its time chasing information, and only 10 per cent. chasing parents who will not pay. The result is that many responsible parents who genuinely want to support their children often find themselves facing a mountain of debt through no fault of their own, while irresponsible parents can play the system to their advantage and end up paying nothing for their children. We must always remember that it is children who lose out.
These failures have their roots in the complexity of the current system, and the result is an administration so burdened that only root-and-branch reform will turn things round. We are tackling that inheritance by introducing a simple, new and effective system of child support to deliver for children by reforming the policy and rebuilding the agency.
We will put the confidence back into child support by introducing radical reforms in four key areas. First, we are abolishing the current system for calculating child support, replacing unworkable policy with a workable new system that is based on a simple way of deciding how much parents should pay. Secondly, we are turning the agency round so that it provides a decent and effective service to all parents to make sure that children actually get the money from their parents, and quickly.
Thirdly, we are introducing tough new measures to deal with parents who try to run away from their responsibilities. Fourthly, we are helping the fight against child poverty by introducing new help for children in the poorest families.
I now wish to refer to the detail of our proposals. I want to set out our plans to reform the formula that is currently used to calculate how much parents pay towards the care of their children. That is the fundamental flaw at the heart of the system. It was designed to take account of any—in fact every—detail that might affect how much a father could pay. The result is a calculation so complex, it is barely workable; so complex, it is often difficult for parents to know whether a decision is right or not; so complex, it takes months to get a decision.
Today, I can announce that we are abolishing the complex formula and replacing it with a system of simple rates that is so easy to understand that parents can work out for themselves how much they should pay. We will publish these rates—indeed, they are in the White Paper—by putting leaflets in post offices, libraries and elsewhere.
The new rates are reasonable because they reflect the amount a parent would pay if he were still living with his children. Under the new system, a father will pay a flat-rate percentage of his take-home pay. The amount will be 15 per cent. if he has one child to support., 20 per cent. if he has two and a maximum of 25 per cent. where he has three or more children. For fathers on less than £100 a week, there will be a flat-rate payment of £5 a week.
Every parent knows that one cannot calculate the cost of bringing up a child down to the last penny. However, our proposals are fair and reasonable. The changes are fairer to fathers, because they are more reasonable and realistic. They are fairer to mothers, who will get money much more quickly. They are fairer to children, who will actually get the money they need. As the system is so

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simple, it will take the agency only a few days to confirm what should be paid, rather than the six months it takes now. It is fast and simple for parents and fast and simple for the agency—but, above all, it is right for children.
To do this, we need also to reform the way in which the CSA operates and to improve significantly the service that it provides. This is not going to be easy. The CSA will never be popular—it will always be doing a difficult job at a difficult and emotional time. However, by replacing the complex formula with new, simple rates, we are laying the foundations for a far better service than would ever be possible under the current system.
These reforms mark a new contract for the CSA, too—a new system in return for a radical change in culture, service and approach. The shake-up has already started. We are strengthening the agency's management and we are importing private sector know-how to work together with public sector experience to sort things out.
From next week, we are bringing in the private sector to help the agency to collect more money from more parents and get it to children. I can announce today that we will invest an extra £28 million over the next three years, but, in return, the CSA must deliver clear and tangible improvements—a better service, quicker decisions and more money getting to children than ever before.
The CSA will get new information technology, and will make more use of the phone to sort out queries quickly. It will be there at times that suit parents, so that they can call in the evenings or at weekends from the privacy of their own homes, and not in the daytime while they are at work.
The CSA will introduce also a more effective complaints system to ensure swift and effective action if things go wrong. Parents will get a clear statement setting out what they have paid and what is due. They will receive a clear picture of where they stand, just as one would get from a bank statement. In short, the CSA will move from an organisation that is bogged down in paper to an organisation that will focus on the needs of parents, and, above all, on the need to get money to children, fast. Our new contract for child support is good news for responsible parents, who will get a better service that helps them to do what they want to do. However, it is bad news for the minority—the hard core who persistently let their children down. We will make sure they are brought to book.
I can announce that, for the first time ever, we are making it a criminal offence to fail to provide, or to misrepresent, information to the agency. If parents lie to the agency, if they try to dodge their duty or persistently pay late, they will face a fine or even time in jail. Although most self-employed parents are highly responsible, there are some who are not, so we are introducing new measures allowing us to access tax records to get a true picture of their income. That will ensure that fathers who run around in the company Porsche, but plead poverty to their children, cannot get away with it.
We are also closing a loophole that allows fathers to string out a decision by denying that they are the father of their child. In future, if a child was born while the father was married to the mother, the burden will be on him to prove that he is not the father. We shall also make sure that teenage boys who become fathers face their
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responsibilities. They must realise that bringing a child into the world is a lifelong responsibility; it is not something that they can ever walk away from. We shall make sure that once they can pay towards the care of their child, they do pay.
Furthermore, because we are determined to make sure that all parents meet their responsibilities, we are looking at further measures to achieve that—including taking away driving licences from fathers who persistently shirk their responsibilities. The message is simple: there is no hiding place, no excuse and no easy way out. They must realise that their child is their responsibility. Every parent has to face up to that; they owe it to their children to do so. This is our new contract for child support. We will deliver a new, fair and simple system that will help responsible parents to support their children, but, in turn, we will take tough action to ensure that the rest deliver for their children.
We are also reforming the system to make sure that it does more for children in the poorest families. Under the current system, mothers lose their income support, pound for pound, whenever any maintenance is paid; because mothers lose out, their children lose out too. So, today, I can announce significant new help for children in the poorest families, worth up to £10 a week. More than 250,000 children will gain from that change alone. That is real help from the Government for children in the poorest families. For the first time ever, we are making sure that money goes to the poorest children, not to the Treasury.
I can announce today that, to make work pay, from October, low-paid families in work and receiving the working families tax credit will keep every pound and every penny of child maintenance paid. All those measures are delivering on our commitment to do more for those who need it most, to end child poverty and to make sure that the Government, parents and the Child Support Agency together deliver for children.
Of course, we need to make sure that those changes are introduced smoothly and successfully. We want to introduce the new scheme as soon as possible, but it is vital to get it right. The present system collapsed under its own weight because the previous Government tried to introduce reforms too quickly, and with too little thought. It is a massive task. Within a year of the millennium, the Child Support Agency will be dealing with more than 1 million cases—that is more than 2 million parents. Radical change on that scale will take time. The new system needs legislation and new computer systems, as well as a radical change of culture and working practices in the CSA itself.
We plan to introduce the new system for new cases towards the end of 2001, with existing cases coming on to the new system later, once it is up and running. However, we want to introduce some measures earlier, such as making it a criminal offence to lie to the agency, closing the loophole that allows fathers falsely to deny their paternity, and improving the administration of the CSA itself.
The future of child support lies in our new contract, which puts the rights of children first, and puts the unshakeable duty of parents at centre stage. The new system will be simpler and fairer for those fathers who want to support their children, but it will be tougher on those who will not. The agency will be turned around, so that it provides the standard of service that we all expect.

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We are putting the confidence back into child support, replacing complexity with simplicity, replacing delay with quick and accurate decisions, and replacing bureaucracy with a high-quality customer service. Together, our reforms will help I million children who, today, are let down by the current system. We are delivering for children and putting their needs first.
I commend these proposals to the House.
Mr. David Willetts: I thank the Secretary of State for his courtesy in giving me advance sight of his statement and the White Paper. Both sides of the House agree that the CSA needs reform, just as both sides of the House supported the creation of the CSA in 1993, and the reforms that we introduced in 1995. The system that Ministers inherited is one that we all supported—including those who are sitting on the Treasury Bench. The trouble is that the problems in the CSA have continued—if anything, they have become worse.
Will the right hon. Gentleman confirm that the latest annual report from the chief child support officer shows a further decline in the number of correct maintenance assessments? Will he now give a cast-iron promise to the House that that trend of deteriorating performance will be reversed, and tell the House when that will happen? It has taken Ministers more than two years to reach this statement, and it is eight months since the deadline for consultation on their previous Green Paper. It has taken Ministers longer to reach a decision than it takes the Child Support Agency they criticise.
The Opposition accept the need for a simpler system, with better enforcement and less fancy arithmetic to calculate liability. We accept that that approach is the right one. However, we have three areas of concern about today's proposals. First, rough justice is the new buzz phrase, but how rough is the rough justice to be? How many liable parents will have their obligations reduced, and by how much? How many of the parents with care will have their entitlement to maintenance reduced, and by how much?
Specifically, will the Secretary of State confirm that he will no longer take account of the income of the parent with care? Does he not recognise that one of the most important grievances arising from the current arrangements is felt by those absent parents who have a lower income than the family with care? Is not one of the effects of his proposals to redistribute dramatically toward the more affluent families with care?
Instead of addressing that point about liabilities, I fear that the Secretary of State will change the subject and talk about enforcement. His spinners have been making a lot of the new criminal penalties for absent parents who do not pay maintenance. That is a snappy soundbite, but a stupid policy. Putting absent parents in prison makes it less likely that they will be able to earn any income, less likely that they will ever pay any maintenance, and less likely that they will have any access to their children.
The Government should make existing civil remedies work. After all, the Minister's colleagues in the legal Departments are boasting about their reforms of civil justice and new fast-track procedures, so why does he not practise some joined-up government, trust his Government's reforms of civil justice and use those
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remedies effectively and energetically? Even if he does not trust his own colleagues, why does he not agree with the response to the consultation exercise of the National Association of Citizens Advice Bureaux? It said:
"We are not convinced that it is the powers themselves that are deficient, but rather the way in which they are being exercised".
The Minister thrashes about with any old wheeze to give the impression of action. We are told that absent parents might lose their driving licence—presumably as part of the Deputy Prime Minister's attack on the motorist. Today, we read that they will lose their passport—presumably that is a desperate attempt to get them out of those queues at the passport offices. Such gimmicks are not the answer.
Our third area of concern is Inland Revenue access to information. Let me quote to the right hon. Gentleman an assurance from his colleague the Under-Secretary of State for Social Security, the hon. Member for City of York (Mr. Bayley), given when a clause of the Welfare Reform and Pensions Bill that is designed to give the Revenue access to information was debated in Standing Committee. The Under-Secretary said to my hon. Friend the Member for Brentwood and Ongar (Mr. Pickles):
"the clause will be used as a last resort, after all attempts to get information from other sources have failed, to enable the CSA to check tax records in the interests of the children."—[Official Report, Standing Committee D, 27 April 1999; c. 1000.]
When did a last resort become a first resort? How is the Secretary of State's announcement today compatible with the assurance given by his colleague to the Standing Committee only a few months ago?
Yes, the CSA needs reform. Yes, more money needs to go to children. Yes, we accept that the current arrangements are not working. However, we need to know more about who gains and who loses. We need to know why Ministers will not use civil remedies more effectively. We need assurances about Inland Revenue access to information. The principle of the CSA is absolutely right; what has gone wrong is the practice, and that is where further reform is needed. It is pity that it will take Ministers four years to do anything about it.
Mr. Darling: I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on his appointment as shadow Secretary of State. I believe that this is his first time out. I am grateful for his acknowledgement that I let him read the White Paper, although that is perfectly normal practice.
The hon. Gentleman expressed three concerns, but what struck me was that only towards the end of his remarks did he mention children. If there is rough justice in the present system, it is that 66 per cent. of children do not get everything that is due to them. The reforms that we are introducing today are designed to ensure that an assessment is not theoretical but realistic, and that the child sees the money to which he or she is entitled.
The hon. Gentleman mentioned that we are not taking into account the income of the parent with care. I point out that 96 per cent. of parents with care have an income of less than £100 a week, so that will not be a widespread problem. We are ensuring that the formula, which takes into account the children in first and second families, is simple and fair. The more complex the system becomes—as more and more disregards and other considerations are brought in—the further we shall slip back into the mire that bogs down the CSA at present. If the hon. Gentleman

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is saying that we ought to have more exceptions to the general simple formula, he must accept that every added complexity will mean that it will take more time and be more difficult to get money to the children.
The hon. Gentleman also complained about penalties. There is nothing wrong in saying that there ought to be a criminal sanction for people who lie to the CSA, misrepresent their circumstances and give the agency the run-around. Those people are not cheating the Government or the agency—they are cheating their children. In any decent, civilised society, people recognise that there ought to be a deterrent and, if necessary, punishment for those who have obligations to society or to their children but who, at the end of the day, after every stone has been turned and every difficulty has been addressed, still insist on trying to avoid their responsibilities.
Most of those who have to deal with CSA cases know that there are mothers who are trying to bring up their children and, in the same town, the father is driving around in his Porsche, living the high life while his children are not being properly looked after. I make no apology whatsoever for taking the necessary action against the minority—I stress that they are a minority—of parents who insist on ducking their responsibilities.
I find it difficult to understand the hon. Gentleman's complaint about us allowing access to the Inland Revenue in cases where people will not tell us how much they earn, or where we have good reason to believe that they are not telling us the truth. If we do not take action, the state will have to support the children of people who are perfectly capable of doing that themselves. The Conservatives used to believe that that was wrong, but they are more concerned about protecting the interests of people who want to hide their affairs from their own children than they are about the children themselves. I simply do not accept the hon. Gentleman's complaint. Using the access to the Inland Revenue is, of course, an action that we shall take when every other option has been exhausted, but I disagree with the Conservatives' proposition that we should not allow access to the Inland Revenue so that we can find out the truth about those matters.
Finally, the hon. Gentleman complained about the time that the reforms will take. The Conservatives had six years to sort out the CSA, and they did not do so. We have tackled the problems and we are making improvements. The hon. Gentleman asked whether the CSA's performance is improving. If he reads the departmental report, which will be published later this month, he will find that the CSA has improved in a number of respects, although it has a long way to go before it provides an acceptable service. As I said in my statement, I do not believe it will be fully acceptable until we get rid of the complex formula that it must operate at present. However, the agency is making improvements and things are getting better.
These reforms will be introduced in a way that is manageable. The hon. Gentleman was trying to urge us to repeat the same mistakes that his Government made in 1993. We shall not do that. I want the agency to work because, above all, I want children to get the money and support to which they are entitled.
Mr. Frank Field: I want to give the warmest welcome to my right hon. Friend's statement and
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I hazard a guess that 1 million or so children may well, in time, also thank him. More immediately, taxpayers, who have to foot a bill of 5p on the standard rate of tax to pay for the shambles that the Government inherited from the Conservatives, will also thank my right hon. Friend for his statement.
Will my right hon. Friend consider two modest reforms? Because the Government are rightly taking their time and not rushing, and thereby risking getting things wrong, and because the Welfare Reform and Pensions Bill is due to return to the House, will he consider taking powers to intervene and stop the clock in exceptional cases when the rules are operating in a weird and mad fashion that will lead to the destruction of the second family? Secondly, given that it is so crucial that the reforms succeed, as if they do not we shall have to give up thinking about child support, will he consider asking the Revenue to collect the money? It is after all its culture to do so, and not that of the Department of Social Security, which is good at paying out money.
Mr. Darling: I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for his general welcome for our proposals. He raised two specific points. Although this is the first time that he has raised the point, I can see some difficulty in giving the Secretary of State power to intervene when something is wrong. Unless that is a general power to allow me or my successors to intervene in every case—which would mean that I would have to look at every case, which I will not volunteer to do—it might be difficult to operate the system satisfactorily. However, I will reflect on what he says.
Although the Inland Revenue has its problems like any other organisation, it works well. It certainly would not welcome—we should not consider it lightly—the requirement to collect information on 1 million quite difficult cases. At the moment, we have one organisation that works well and one that does not. There is a risk that we would end up with one organisation that does not work at all. I would be reluctant to go down such a route, which is why we excluded using the Inland Revenue. It is working well; we should let it get on with what it does. The key to success is to ensure that we reform the CSA so that it does a far better job collecting money on the one hand and paying it out to parents with care on the other.
Mr. David Rendel: The Secretary of State will not be surprised to learn that we on the Liberal Democrat Benches are disappointed that he has not introduced a system that can deal with each case individually. Only such a system can be seen to be entirely fair. Only when one has an entirely fair system will judgments be accepted and people be free to pay up quite generously.
We welcome several things in the White Paper, including giving access to tax records, which was a sensible move to make. I am surprised that the Conservatives object to it. The better shared care arrangements are also welcome, as is the fact that people will be allowed to keep maintenance if they receive the working families tax credit. That and the £10 disregard on income support must be good for children—and we welcome anything that is good for children. We also welcome the fact that he has not changed or narrowed the definition of good cause, which we were slightly concerned he might.

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However, several things are not welcome, about which I should like to ask the Secretary of State. He surely must agree that imprisoning or confiscating the driving licences of non-resident parents can only hinder their opportunities to provide an income for their children, or share in their care, which is also very important. Will he reconsider that move?
Secondly, does he agree that the fines for late payment, which I understand go purely to the Treasury, should at least partly be offered to the family with care, who will have also suffered from the non-resident parent's late payments? Thirdly, will he tell us a little more about the powers and the tasks that he will ask the private sector to introduce? What accountability will there be? He did not say very much about that in his statement.
Fourthly, what assurance will he give that the information technology that he will introduce will work any better than that surrounding the fiascos of the new passport system, the new national insurance system and the system in post offices? Fifthly, what will the ombudsman be able to do about cases that are dealt with over the phone? It is my understanding that, at present, the ombudsman cannot consider phone calls as part of the evidence that he is prepared to take into account. If so much more is to be done by the CSA over the phone, the Secretary of State will have to address such a problem.
It is rumoured in the press that travel-to-work costs will now be properly taken into account. It is important that we should know a bit more about that.
Finally, why has the Secretary of State decided to shorten the time before the benefit penalties kick in? There are some very good cases where time is needed for the women concerned to come up with the relevant evidence. I should like to know a little bit more about that.
Mr. Darling: I shall deal with all the points that the hon. Gentleman mentioned, although when he refers to "we on the Liberal Benches" I think that he uses the word "we" rather loosely. The others, presumably, are away on the leadership campaign. He has been left a somewhat lonely figure on the Benches. [Interruption.] Well, his seconder is there, so he is all right; his deposit is safe if nothing else.
Let me deal with the points that the hon. Gentleman raised. I know that it is his view, if not necessarily that of the entire Liberal Democrat party, that the CSA should be wound up and that we should return to the court system—because that is the only way, I suppose, that every case can be considered individually. Under the new system, the people who are required to use the Child Support Agency are those on income support and those on income-related jobseeker's allowance. Others will be able to use the courts; they will be able to opt into the CSA if they want to, but in many cases the courts will reach settlements that determine how much maintenance is paid.
However, it would not be possible to burden the courts with about 1 million cases without severe consequences to the entire justice system. Many of the children would be pensioners by the time that their maintenance was calculated. The court system could not cope 20 years ago and it would not be able to cope now. I believe that the hon. Gentleman is the only one who is actively advocating that course; I do not accept that argument.
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The hon. Gentleman raised several detailed points. I believe that he opposes the stiffer penalties—including, possibly, imprisonment or fines—for people who persistently refuse to co-operate. That is not a new prospect. Such penalties are imposed in many cases in the criminal law. Of course, in such criminal cases one does not imprison or fine people at once, but when someone persistently refuses to co-operate, or lies to the Child Support Agency with a view to preventing money going to their children, there comes a point when we must say, "Enough is enough. The sanction will be visited upon you." Whether it is a fine or imprisonment is a matter for the courts. There is nothing new in that. Most people find it extraordinary that those powers do not already exist.
The hon. Gentleman asked about the private sector. As far as accountability is concerned, the chief executive of the CSA is responsible to me for everything that happens in the CSA, including anything that may be done on our behalf by private sector partners. We want to improve the way in which the CSA operates. Let me take an example. At the moment, the agency's record of collecting maintenance that is due is not very good. Instead of going to someone who owes tens of pounds, we wait until they owe us thousands of pounds, when it is much more difficult to get the money from them. Banks in this country and elsewhere have experience of far more effective collection of sums due. We should use that expertise.
The hon. Gentleman asked about IT. I readily agree that the Government's record on IT—I do not wish to make a political point, as we have as many problems as the previous Government had—has led us to believe that one should be very cautious before saying that a new computer system will work from day one. I am determined to ensure that before we start the new system, we know that the IT systems work, because much depends on that. I will ensure that that happens, but we now have funding to replace the IT system in the CSA and elsewhere in the DSS, and we intend to ensure that we get the maximum benefit from it.
I shall look at the powers that the hon. Gentleman mentions in relation to the ombudsman.
More and more work throughout the DSS, not just the CSA, will be done by phone in future. It is far more effective, far more accurate and far better for customers.
The costs of travel to work will not be taken into account. Under the new system, the absent father will pay 15 per cent., 20 per cent. or 25 per cent. of his take-home pay, depending on the number of children. We are moving away from all the exceptions and disregards in the previous system, because they were what bogged it down.
The hon. Gentleman asked about the cooling off period in relation to a good cause. We are not changing the definition of good cause. Parents will still be able to show that there are reasons why a father should not be pursued. The cooling off period has been shortened to four weeks, but it can be extended if there is good reason for doing so.
Several hon. Members rose—
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Alan Haselhurst): Order. I hope that we can now step up the pace, otherwise many right hon. and hon. Members will be disappointed. Let us have brief questions, please.
Mr. Malcolm Wicks: In terms of responsibility for this mess, the figure of the absent parent

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has now been joined by the absent-minded shadow Minister, given his version of history. However, this is a serious matter. Hundreds of thousands of children in Britain will spend all or some of their childhood away from one parent. It is my guess that family insecurity is now—[HON. MEMBERS: "Get to the question."] I will get to the question. Family insecurity is probably as much a cause of poverty as economic insecurity.
Does my right hon. Friend agree that however we reform the process—I warmly welcome what he is saying today, not least about maintenance disregard for lone mothers—we need to win the public debate? We need to convince our people, including children at school, that if someone has a child, the child is for life, and that the financial maintenance of that child is the parent's responsibility. Will my right hon. Friend put some effort into winning the public debate as well as reforming the system?
Mr. Darling: I wholeheartedly agree with my hon. Friend. It is important that the culture is changed throughout the country. People, especially young people, must realise that if they help bring a child into this world, they are responsible for that child's well-being for the rest of that child's life. People must realise that that is a very important principle, and that is why we are introducing reforms. It would not be right to take the place of absent parents, but we can make sure that they fulfil their entire responsibilities.
Miss Julie Kirkbride: The Secretary of State has set out many interesting changes but has put very little flesh on the bones in terms of who will be affected by these changes. Will he tell us how many parents with care responsibilities—they are mainly women—will receive less money every week as a result of the absent parent's having a reduced maintenance liability? Will he tell us also how many in the present case list he thinks might qualify to be the errant fathers whom he has described, who may find themselves criminals as a result of the proposed changes?
Mr. Darling: As I understood it, the shadow spokesman said that he welcomed the principle of what we are doing. Clearly he does not carry the whole of the Opposition with him on that.
The point of the reforms is to ensure that children benefit. The difficulty now is that many assessments are made but the money is not paid. About 40 per cent. of assessments are not paid in full. We are making changes to ensure that although in some instances the notional assessment is reduced, the amount of money that a mother receives is increased.
Mr. Chris Pond: I very much welcome my right hon. Friend's statement. Many of my constituents, whose lives have been destroyed by the inadequacies and inefficiencies of the current system, will also welcome what he has to say. They will certainly welcome the disregard on the working families tax credit. It is important that we ensure that those parents on low incomes receive help.
Will my right hon. Friend ensure that in promoting his proposals he will propose others to encourage parenthood and family life? I have in mind particularly the
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Government's policy on parental leave, which many of us would like to see paid. What plans does my right hon. Friend have to deal with shared care between the parents? I know that this is something that the Government wish to promote.
Mr. Darling: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his welcome for my statement. He is right to say that the changes that I have announced today are not the only matters that we should consider. The directive on parental leave is also an important part of ensuring that parents can spend more time with their children.
My hon. Friend asked about shared care, which we want to encourage. We are making arrangements to ensure that if a child stays with another parent for one night a week, the amount of maintenance payable will be abated by one seventh—by two sevenths for two nights, and so on. That will avoid getting into ridiculous arguments with the agency about who was where on a Saturday night. We are banding days. Maintenance will be reduced by one seventh if a child stayed with the non-resident parent for between 52 and 103 nights, and so on further up the scale.
Secondly, we are ensuring that where there is equality of care, maintenance is still payable so that there is not a disincentive to enter into that arrangement. At the same time, there will be a reduction in the amount of maintenance paid by the absent parent, which is roughly equivalent to about half child benefit.
Mr. Peter Brooke: How many cases of access to the Inland Revenue as a last resort is the Secretary of State expecting?
Mr. Darling: That depends on how difficult people are. In an ideal world, there would be none. Unfortunately, some people are so determined not to pay what is due to their children—sometimes for wholly extraneous reasons and as part of another battle that they are fighting—that they will not co-operate. I find it extraordinary that Conservatives seem to be united in the belief that it is important to keep a person's affairs with the Inland Revenue away from another part of government that is simply trying to help that person's children and to avoid a situation in which the taxpayer, instead of the individual who has that responsibility, is paying to support the children.
Ms Joan Walley: I welcome my right hon. Friend's proposals. Many people have long wanted a straightforward formula. Given the time that it will take to implement the proposals, what attention will my right hon. Friend give to transitional arrangements? As part of the changes to the CSA, will he make it possible for fathers to have a named child support officer to help them sort out what they must pay, so that they can do what is right by their children?
Mr. Darling: My hon. Friend makes an important point. It is a matter of regret that it will take time to make the changes. Unfortunately, we could do nothing without changing the legislation, and there will have to be changes to the IT and so on. We are making changes in the meantime, and some of them will start next week.
We are bringing in more staff. Some 600 staff will be allocated to face-to-face interviews, which I think is what my hon. Friend has in mind. I have constituency cases in

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which a parent cannot make head or tail of what has happened. Such parents will be able to sit down with a member of the agency's staff, go through the documents line by line and try to reach a resolution. We are also bringing some of the best people from the Inland Revenue and the Contributions Agency into the Child Support Agency, because the middle management of that agency needs to be tightened up. It is a relatively new agency and it lacks expertise in several areas. Those are some of the improvements that will be made. We also want people to make better use of the telephone.
I certainly agree with my hon. Friend that it should be possible to ensure that an individual deals with one member of staff. It is entirely consistent with our philosophy for the ONE service agency that we launched this week that someone has a named member of staff to whom to go, to avoid the situation that is common in various organisations, where members of the public speak to someone on the telephone who has no recollection of ever having spoken to them previously. That must stop.
Mr. Roy Beggs: I welcome the changes. Many of us have sympathy with office staff who have been engaged hitherto, and we welcome the additional funding and support that will be given to the CSA. I welcome the fact that children are being put first; that abandoned mothers will be supported; and that fathers, especially those from Northern Ireland who skip over to Great Britain and sometimes to the continent to avoid all responsibility, will be pursued.
Will the Secretary of State give us an assurance that when fraud is identified in the father's case from false returns—or in the case of the caring mother who is exploiting the situation—no expense will be spared, and the matter will not be pushed aside and written off because a prosecution would involve court costs? It is important to give confidence and to insist that the whole truth is presented by both parties to such disputes.
Mr. Darling: The hon. Gentleman can rest assured that where there is fraud, the agency will take prompt action. One of our problems is that more than 90 per cent. of the agency's time and effort goes into calculating liability, and only 10 per cent. into enforcement. Because the new formula will be simpler, more staff will be available to deal with cases such as those to which the hon. Gentleman referred. We will take powers to ensure that where someone has, for example, deliberately diverted his income to avoid his liabilities, that can be looked into, and if necessary referred to a tribunal to determine the matter. We want to ensure that every single child gets what he or she is entitled to—the right amount from his or her parent who, after all, has not just a moral but a legal obligation to look after his or her children.
Ms Dari Taylor: I warmly welcome my right hon. Friend's statement. Does he accept that threatening criminal charges and defining a criminal offence will make it less likely that men will want to cheat the system? Only a small number want to do so, but even that can cause serious problems. So that I can be comfortable with his remarks about a simple formula for identifying commitment, will he outline that formula once again? I am concerned about wives in second families.
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Will their income, which is often—although not always—included in assessments, be included in the new assessments and the new formula defining commitment from fathers?
Mr. Darling: No, that income will not be taken into account, as I told the hon. Member for Havant (Mr. Willetts); he was not paying attention, which is why he was uncertain about it. The object of the exercise is to make the formula as simple as possible. The net income—the take-home pay—of the absent parent will be taken into account. We want to keep the departures and the exceptions to the absolute minimum, otherwise we will be back in the trouble that we were in in the first place.
We will take children in a second family into account. Relationships may end, perhaps leaving a couple of children, and the father or the mother may go into a new relationship and have another child. It is right to take all those children into account, and we will do that, but I repeat that we want to keep the system as simple as possible. I agree with my hon. Friend's point about deterrence. I find it quite extraordinary that Conservative Members do not understand that, throughout the criminal system, the principle of deterrence is very important and actually works.
Mr. David Curry: Although many parents want to evade their responsibilities, many others want only to find out where they stand within a reasonable time. My constituents have to deal with Belfast. It is difficult to get through on the phone and difficult to find the same person answering successive queries. Callers often get different stories from different people and years can elapse before matters are settled. Circumstances can change, which is not taken into account. If more reliance is to be placed on the telephone, will the Secretary of State ensure that people are able to gain rapid access to a known person who will always be at the end of the phone when necessary so that matters can be settled within a reasonable time?
Mr. Darling: I agree with almost everything the right hon. Gentleman has said, which is why we are changing the system. The problem just now is that the calculation is so complex that it is difficult for parents to understand how on earth the end result was reached. We all have constituents who have come to us with problems and we cannot work out what on earth the agency has done. That is why we are simplifying the whole process.
An advantage of the new system is that parents will be able to get a statement similar to a bank statement so that they can see what they have paid and what they are due. That is important. What is more, by being able to do those things quickly, we will avoid the build-up of huge levels of arrears, which lead to all sorts of difficulties.
We are investing £28 million more to improve the staff and staff retention. The CSA loses far too many staff and the result is that it is not common for the same person to deal with a case. The new money will help to address that problem. I agree with the right hon. Gentleman that we need to make far more use of the phone. With new technology, which banks now use, it is quite easy to ensure that calls coming in through a call centre are referred to the person dealing with a case. We are making those improvements. They will take time, but I hope that, by the time that we introduce the new system, the CSA

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will be well on th way to becoming the sort of organisation that is taken for granted in almost every other sector.
Mr. Paul Goggins: I welcome the emphasis placed by my right hon. Friend on tackling child poverty. What estimate has he made of the number of children and families who will be better off as a result of the introduction of the disregards on income support and the working families tax credit?
Mr. Darling: We estimate that, overall, about 1 million children will be better off. We think that about 250,000 will be better off as a result of the disregard. Others will be better off as a result of the working families tax credit. Overall, the effect of everything we are doing will mean that more and more children gain. About 120,000 will gain through the working families tax credit. Others will gain because the current cash compliance is some 60 per cent.; we think that we can raise it to 80 per cent., which will mean that 300,000 children will get what they are due.
Mr. Charles Wardle: The theory of the right hon. Gentleman's statement will be welcomed, but is not one of the pitfalls for the CSA the huge backlog of cases in which arrears are in dispute? How will that backlog be cleared, and will the new formula apply retrospectively to cases in that backlog?
Mr. Darling: No, the new formula will apply to new cases. It would be very difficult to apply it retrospectively, because all sorts of repayments would have to be made to people and that would almost guarantee that the new system collapsed within a few days of opening. Thus the new system applies to new cases. We shall then transfer existing cases to the new system in phases, once we are satisfied that the system is fully operational.
With regard to the hon. Gentleman's general point about the backlog, we shall continue to pursue cases where maintenance is due, because it would be wrong to write off payments that people should have made to their children.
Mr. Peter L. Pike: Is it not important to recognise that there will be losers as well as gainers as a result of my right hon. Friend's proposal? The message that we must spell out is that the new system will be fairer, more workable and more acceptable. May I urge my right hon. Friend to consider the possibilities of carry-over legislation? Might not this be an appropriate Bill to introduce sooner, so that the proposals can be implemented a few months earlier than if we had to wait for the new parliamentary Session?
Mr. Darling: On the latter point, my hon. Friend will be aware that virtually all my colleagues have a long list of Bills that they would like introduced under the new carry-over system. I hope that we can do more through that system because we could get a lot more legislation through the House, especially where there is broad agreement.
On the other point that my hon. Friend makes, it is important to bear it in mind that when a system is introduced that has a simpler formula, there will inevitably be cases where the amount to be paid, which
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may be a theoretical amount, is less than at present. However, because of the changes, more cash will flow through the system and into the hands of the children. That is the advantage of the new system, which is why most people welcome what we are trying to do.
Mrs. Jacqui Lait: I certainly want the children to be the winners when it comes to maintenance, but does the right hon. Gentleman accept that given that there will be winners and losers among those who pay, under the new system cases that are currently settled would need to be backdated to the date at which the new cases are being settled? Will not there be a delay between new cases coming on board under the new system and old cases being referred? Can he assure the House that the old cases will pay from the date of introduction of the new legislation and that the amount to be paid will be recalculated?
Mr. Darling: If I understand the hon. Lady correctly, she is asking whether somebody who transfers two years after the new system comes in will have his assessment backdated. I do not think that that would be possible. What I am desperate to avoid—I think that there is sympathy from some Conservative Members on this—is burdening the system as the CSA was burdened in 1993, with the result that it stopped working almost before it got going. I understand that many people who are currently toiling with the CSA, who want the system to work better, cannot wait for the new system to come in. We all share that sentiment, but if we try to rush it before the CSA is operating properly and without the new IT, and if we burden the CSA unduly, the system will collapse again. That would be good for nobody. The hon. Lady and I share the same view: we must be concerned about the children. If the CSA collapses, the losers will be the children, not us. That is why I want to phase in the new system and to make sure that it works.
Mrs. Anne Campbell: I warmly welcome my right hon. Friend's statement. Is he as astonished as I have been to hear not a hint of apology from the Opposition for the shambles that was left behind and the thousands of lives that have been ruined by the legislation as they left it?
In the case of an absent parent who has abandoned more than one family, how will the available finance be shared between those families?
Mr. Darling: If an absent parent had two separate children in different family units his liability would be 20 per cent., and it would divided between the two children. On my hon. Friend's first point, she may be astonished, but I am not.
Sir David Madel: Will the Secretary of State confirm that, if there is a large second family, there will be flexibility in respect of what the father pays? If MPs have reason to believe that the CSA is acting carelessly or unreasonably, we should have the power to tell it to put a stop on the deduction of earnings order while the matter is carefully investigated. I am not asking for widespread cancellations: merely for a pause while the work is thoroughly and carefully carried out.

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I have just stopped the CSA demanding £10,000 from a constituent. He had already paid £8,500, but it took God knows what to get that across to the agency.
Mr. Darling: That case shows why we need to improve the administration of the CSA. No one should be allowed to run up such debts before anything happens. I have also come across such cases. I am not sure that I would agree with the hon. Gentleman that MPs should be given statutory powers to stop administrative action. That would have ramifications for other parts of government. It is tempting, but I am not sure that we would want such powers, because it would lay us open to a great deal of pressure.
I am determined to ensure that such problems are less likely to arise under the new system. The CSA has been told to develop a close working relationship with Members of Parliament—as the Benefits Agency does—so that if such problems arise they can be dealt with quickly. That is what MPs are there to do: if there is an injustice because of something that the Government are doing, MPs should be able to speak to the local agency to try to resolve matters. If an MP remains dissatisfied, he has every right to take the matter up with the appropriate Minister in my Department or with me.
Mr. Gordon Prentice: We inherited a dreadful mess, and I understand why my right hon. Friend wants to proceed slowly. Will he tell us when all existing cases will transfer to the new system? I suspect that many people who read the newspapers tomorrow will think that these changes, of which I approve, will affect their lives sooner rather than later, whereas they will happen four, five or perhaps six years down the line.
Mr. Darling: My hon. Friend makes a good point. To be blunt about it, these changes will not happen until towards the end of 2001 at the earliest. It is not possible to get the legislation through the House: even if there were all-party agreement, it would take some time. We must install the computer equipment, and we must make a number of changes within the CSA. I do not want to raise people's expectations falsely.
I have made it clear that the first people to be transferred will be the new cases. I then want, as quickly as is prudent, to transfer the existing case load on to the new CSA. As some people will see a difference in their assessment, we will allow their payments to be phased in. If someone's assessment has changed dramatically, it would be wrong to make him pay a massively increased amount the following day. Steps set out in the White Paper will allow those payments to be phased.
I want the changeover to be as smooth as possible, and to move at whatever speed is consistent with that. Despite people's frustrations about the system, they would not forgive us if we rushed it as happened in 1993, and to a certain extent in 1995, with the inevitable result that the whole system fell apart.
Mr. David Lidington: Does the Secretary of State agree that one of the difficulties has been the inadequacy of civil court recovery procedures to get hold of the money that the agency has been seeking?
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Does he have any specific proposals to strengthen or alter the recovery procedures of the civil courts, so that the agency will find it easier in the future to get hold of that money on behalf of children?
Mr. Darling: The agency has numerous remedies. The difficulty is that it does not always exercise them.
Mr. Willetts: Oh, absolutely.
Mr. Darling: The hon. Gentleman from a sedentary position says, "Oh, absolutely". What on earth was he doing during the last six years of the Conservative Government? They had six years to sort this problem out, and it has yet again fallen to us to do so. We are sorting it out by diverting more staff to enforcing payments, so that we avoid the problem of money that we know is due not being collected.
We are not waiting for new legislation in order to do that. As I told the hon. Member for Newbury (Mr. Rendel), we are bringing in private sector expertise next week to ensure that we are as efficient as, for instance, banks in identifying customers who owe us tens of pounds rather than thousands of pounds. If we cannot persuade people to pay what is due voluntarily, we shall then be able to enforce the remedies that we have at our disposal.
Ms Jenny Jones: I, too, welcome these much-needed reforms. Can my right hon. Friend confirm that, as part of his proposed reform of the culture of the CSA, staff will be trained—or retrained—in effective communication skills? There is a danger that these good reforms will be weakened if staff cannot communicate properly with the public.
Mr. Darling: I can give my hon. Friend that assurance. I also want to try to slow down the rather large turnover. Many of our best people, having been trained, then leave—to the benefit of, usually, the financial services industry. We want to try to keep our good-quality staff.
I believe that, if we achieve the change in culture, the CSA will be a much more attractive place in which to work. Many of our staff have to put up with quite difficult people, and, through no fault of their own, have to operate systems that do not work. I agree, however, that it is important for us to employ good-quality staff who can communicate with the public.
Mr. Eric Pickles: The Green Paper rightly emphasised the need to protect the children of second families. There is no point in impoverishing one set of children at the expense of another. The paper set out two methods of calculation. One method involved the netting of income according to the number of children in the second family, while the other involved the netting of income according to the combined number of the two sets of children. Did the Government finally decide which calculation was the more reasonable?
Mr. Darling: Yes, we did. Our conclusion is set out in the White Paper. We decided on the first option. When a person has a second family, we take the children of the second family into account. We deduct the same percentage as we would for the other set of children. For

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example, if someone has two children in the first family and three in the second, we take 20 per cent. of that person's net income for the first family and then, off the balance, 25 per cent., which is then given in respect of the other three children.
The tables in the annexe to the White Paper make it very easy to calculate exactly how much people will have to pay, and how much the deductions are for first and second families. The White Paper is well worth a read.
Several hon. Members rose—
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. We must move on. I suspect that hon. Members will have other opportunities to pursue this matter.

Business of the House
1.33 pm
The President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons (Mrs. Margaret Beckett): I should like to make a statement about the business for next week.
MONDAY 5 JULY—Progress on remaining stages of the Finance Bill.
TUESDAY 6 JULY—Conclusion of remaining stages of the Finance Bill.
WEDNESDAY 7 JULY—Until 2 o'clock, there will be debates on the motion for the Adjournment of the House.
Opposition Day [17th Allotted Day].
Until about 7 o'clock, there will be a debate described by the Opposition as "Crisis in the dairy industry", followed by a debate entitled "Choice and diversity in education". Both debates will arise on Opposition motions.
THURSDAY 8 JULY—Remaining stages of the Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Bill [Lords].
FRIDAY 9 JULY—The House will not be sitting.
As I am sure the House will understand, some uncertainty remains about the business for the week commencing 12 July. The business will, however, include:
MONDAY 12 JULY—Estimates day [2nd Allotted Day].
There will be a debate on the office of Her Majesty's Chief Inspector of schools in England, followed by a debate on transport policy. Details will be given in the Official Report.
At 10 o'clock the House will be asked to agree all outstanding estimates.
FRIDAY 16 JULY—There will be a debate on the policing of London on a motion for the Adjournment of the House.
The House will also wish to be reminded that on Wednesday 7 July, there will be a debate on the 2000 Preliminary Draft Budget Overview and the Agenda 2000 inter-institutional agreement. That debate will be in European Standing Committee B. Details of the relevant documents will be given in the Official Report.
[Wednesday 7 July 1999:
European Standing Committee B—Relevant European Union documents: SEC(99) 600: 2000 Preliminary Draft Budget; COM(99) 200: 2000 Preliminary Draft Budget; 7698/99: Agenda 2000: Institutional Agreement. Relevant European Scrutiny Committee reports: HC 34-xxi and xxiv (1998-99).]
The House will also wish to know that, subject to the progress of business—which is clearly an important factor at this time—it will be proposed that the House should rise for the summer recess at the end of business on Tuesday 27 July, and return on Tuesday 19 October.
Sir George Young: I thank the right hon. Lady for next week's business and a framework for business for the following week.
The right hon. Lady will have heard of the sad death of one of her predecessors as Leader of the House: Lord Whitelaw. We all send our sympathy to Lady Whitelaw and the family. Willie Whitelaw was a brave, loyal, decent, wise and honourable man. His popularity and the respect in which he was held went way beyond my party:

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it extended to all parts of the House and, indeed, to the wider public, who liked and trusted him and who will miss him, as we do.
We understand all the difficulties about Northern Ireland. I assume that that is the uncertainty to which the right hon. Lady referred in relation to the week after next, but what arrangements has she in mind to keep the House informed about the important discussions that have been and, indeed, still are taking place?
The right hon. Lady announced a debate on the dairy industry. Would not that debate be informed by the publication of the Milk Marque report, which has been available for some time? As she will have heard, there is growing frustration at its non-publication. Will she seek to make it available before that debate?
The Select Committee on Standards and Privileges reported on the premature disclosure of the Select Committee on Foreign Affairs report and recommended that an hon. Member should be suspended. When will the House debate that report and recommendation? Will the Foreign Secretary, whose arguments were rejected by the Committee, take part in that debate to address what was said about him, his advisers and civil servants?
Will the right hon. Lady confirm that, before the House rises, we shall have a debate on economic matters, and that the much postponed debate on the royal commission on long-term care will also take place before then?
We are grateful to the right hon. Lady for the dates of the summer recess, but when will she be able to announce the date of the state opening?
Mrs. Beckett: I join the right hon. Gentleman and Members on both sides of the House in asking for our sympathy to be conveyed to Lady Whitelaw. Lord Whitelaw was liked, respected and admired in all quarters of the House. He was a most distinguished Leader of the House—that was only part of a distinguished career. I am certain that he will be widely missed throughout the House.
The right hon. Gentleman is entirely right: the uncertainty to which I referred is events in Ireland, where we cannot clearly anticipate what the needs of the House may be. I am not able to give him any more firm information at present. The Government are, of course, mindful of the need to keep the House informed and we will do our utmost to do so. Any arrangements involved will be discussed through the usual channels.
The right hon. Gentleman asked me to ensure the release of the former Monopolies and Mergers Commission report on milk marketing. He will have heard what my right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister said yesterday. He has already drawn the interest in the matter to the attention of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry. I will also do so. However, the right hon. Gentleman will know that these matters are complex and difficult, and that it is only right that the report should be published when proper consideration of its recommendations has been undertaken.
The right hon. Gentleman asked me when the report of the Select Committee on Standards and Privileges would be discussed. A motion will be tabled at the appropriate time, in accordance with the terms of the Committee's
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recommendations. I cannot give him a time for that at this moment, but I assure him that we are looking for such a time.
The right hon. Gentleman asked me to confirm that there would be a debate on economic matters. I certainly hope to be able to secure one before the recess. I cannot undertake to find time for a debate on long-term care before the summer recess, but I do not rule it out later in the Session.
Mr. Ted Rowlands: I associate myself fully with the remarks about Willie Whitelaw. He was a great parliamentarian and a great believer in this place above all.
I remind my right hon. Friend that today is the day of the transfer of functions to both the Scottish Parliament and the National Assembly for Wales. We have not had an opportunity to debate how we will handle business in the House of Commons relating to Wales and Scotland. There is an interim report by the Select Committee on Procedure. It is urgent that we debate it, so that the House can clarify hon. Members' position in relation to Welsh and Scottish business. Will my right hon. Friend therefore make time available as soon as possible, so that we may debate and come to a decision on those matters?
Mrs. Beckett: I am very aware of the interest that my right hon. Friend has long taken in these matters. We are, of course, aware of the Procedure Committee's report, but I cannot undertake to find time for a very early debate on it. As he will be aware, the situation is developing—the Scottish Parliament, for example, is being opened only today. The Government will respond to the Procedure Committee's report in due course, but I cannot find time in the immediate future for a debate on it.
Mr. Paul Tyler: On behalf of my colleagues, I endorse what has been said about Willie Whitelaw—with whom, as a very new Member, 1 had the pleasure of working in the 1974 Parliament. I had the greatest respect for his talents in this place.
I also endorse the statement that we should have early information on the outcome of the MMC report on the milk retailing industry. May we have an undertaking that a Department of Trade and Industry Minister will participate in Wednesday's debate—so that, even if we do not have the Government's final determination, the Minister might at least hear the very real concerns of all hon. Members representing dairy farmers about the very long delay in reaching a decision?
I draw the attention of the Leader of the House to this morning's judgment in the case of the Department of Health v. Aldridge, concerning specialist cheese production. It raises some very important issues. Will the Secretary of State for Health come before the House to make an early statement on the role of the Food Safety Act 1990, and the emergency control orders deriving from it, in driving out—I do not exaggerate; that will happen if the situation is allowed to get out of control—some of the United Kingdom's most important specialist food producers?
Reports today state that the chaos in the passport office may have been caused partly by preparations to ensure 2000 compliance. If it is true that the millennium bug is part of the cause of the chaos, which is causing so much

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misery to our constituents, will the right hon. Lady and her team please consider the matter urgently and make it the subject of an early report to the House?
Mrs. Beckett: I should first like to use this opportunity to reply to the final question asked by the right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir G. Young), on the date of the state opening. I cannot do so now, but hope to do so in the not too distant future. I shall do so as soon as I can.
I am pleased to hear the hon. Member for North Cornwall (Mr. Tyler) confirm what has been said on both sides of the House about the late Lord Whitelaw.
The hon. Gentleman asked whether a DTI Minister would participate in next Wednesday's debate. I cannot give him that undertaking. Although the report is a very important matter, the aspects of it that are for the DTI are on competition policy, not on other policy. However, as I told the right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire, I undertake to draw the concerns expressed to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry and to ask him whether it would be possible for a DTI Minister to attend the debate. I cannot say now whether it will be possible to arrange that, as Ministers have many commitments.
The hon. Gentleman also asked me about cheese production. Although I am aware of the concern, as he rightly said the judgment has only just been given. I cannot anticipate whether my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health will wish to make a statement on the matter, but I shall certainly draw the request to his attention.
Finally, the hon. Gentleman asked me—very understandably, after the press reports—whether there is any truth in suggestions that the problems in the passport office have some relationship with the millennium bug. I am assured that the millennium bug has no relationship to the problems at all. The new system was developed to introduce a more secure digital passport, and has no connection in any way, shape or form with the millennium bug. Indeed, the passport office has been processing dates beyond 2000 for many years—as hon. Members will readily appreciate when they realise that passports have a 10-year validity. Such reports are, therefore, yet another piece of scaremongering by people who should know better.
Mr. Tony McNulty: I thank my right hon. Friend for announcing the annual debate on policing in London, which is to take place on 16 July. Although I know that she cannot control events, will she at least try to ensure that that Adjournment debate is not interrupted by a statement at 11 am, as such statements tend to get in the way of things on Fridays? Will she find out through the usual channels who will be speaking for the Conservatives, given that the shadow Home Secretary is from Kent and their London spokesperson is apparently from Oxfordshire?
Mrs. Beckett: I am happy to say that I have no responsibility for what the Conservatives choose to do about these matters, but I have no doubt that my hon. Friend's remarks will have been taken on board. I shall certainly bear in mind what he said about the need to avoid a statement during the debate on policing
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in London. I am well aware that hon. Members consider it to be an important debate for which they have long sought a suitable day. We are trying to avoid statements on Fridays, but my hon. Friend and the House will understand that it is not always possible. Indeed, sometimes it is for the convenience of the House.
Sir Peter Emery: The right hon. Lady will know of my interest in the DTI response to the Milk Marque report. I do not apologise for returning to the issue as it is so vital to the dairy industry and agriculture in general. The right hon. Lady said that it was necessary for the Government to consider fully the MMC report. The normal process is that the Government are given 10 weeks to reach a decision and to report to the House. The report has been with the DTI for 18 weeks, and I believe that the House and the industry have the right to expect the report to be published before the debate next week. Will the right hon. Lady press that forward?
Mrs. Beckett: As I have said, I will draw the concern that has been expressed in the House to the attention of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, who has given a commitment that he will seek to publish the report before the summer recess. Whether he can publish it before next week, however, is another matter. The right hon. Gentleman says that it is normal process that such reports are published after 10 weeks. Having been the relevant Secretary of State, I am not aware of any such rule. Indeed, I inherited a substantial number of reports that had been around for a lot longer than that. Just before the general election, my predecessor informed me that a number of extraordinarily difficult and sensitive issues had been lying on his desk for a number of weeks, and that he proposed to leave them to his successor.
Mr. Paul Flynn: Does not today's news that the majority of the drugs that were donated to Kosovo refugees were either useless or lethal mean that we need an urgent debate on the subject? It follows the case of 11 pregnant Lithuanian women who were temporarily blinded by a drug that had been donated to their country. The instructions were in English only and the drug was intended for animals. Two hundred children in Haiti and Nigeria died after taking donated paracetamol which had been mixed with a toxic substance in the donor country. Should we not investigate the reasons why so many companies gain tax advantages by donating to charities overseas, and avoid the cost of disposing of useless and unwanted drugs in tips at home? Such companies are cynically dumping their problems on people in Kosovo and other third world areas in order to increase their profits.
Mrs. Beckett: I am aware of my hon. Friend's interest and concern in these matters. The whole House will share his anxiety about the reports that we have heard today. He has rightly identified the fact that the problem is widespread and complex, and does not necessarily involve the United Kingdom. Of course, that does not mean that it is not a matter than hon. Members might want to discuss and pursue, but I fear that I cannot undertake to find time for an early debate.
Mr. Peter Brooke: Recalling the late Lord Whitelaw's

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legendary charge about some politicians going around whipping up apathy, is it really in the Government's interest that their inactivity on long-term care should begin to seem like indecision?
Mrs. Beckett: Of course we are not inactive. My right hon. Friends are giving the most careful and thorough consideration to the far-reaching proposals from the royal commission. The right hon. Gentleman and the whole House would wish the Government to undertake such consideration before producing proposals and ideas for discussion. However, the right hon. Gentleman is right. The remark about stirring up apathy is only one of many memorable observations which we all recall with affection from Lord Whitelaw.
Mr. Ben Bradshaw: Will my right hon. Friend find time next week for a debate on the Home Office's disgraceful decision to grant draconian new powers to the police to levy spot fines on cyclists, a decision taken without proper consultation and with no debate in the House? Is she aware that Home Office figures show cyclists to be a negligible risk to pedestrians in comparison with the risks posed to pedestrians and cyclists by illegal parking and bad driving? Does she agree that it would be quite unacceptable if the police were to spend valuable time and resources chasing children on bicycles while illegal parking and driving were widely ignored?
Mrs. Beckett: I sympathise with my hon. Friend's concern for cyclists, and I appreciate that responsible cyclists have a right to proper treatment by the police and by everyone else. However, my hon. Friend, as a keen defender of cyclists, will condemn those cyclists who are irresponsible and inconsiderate and who are a danger to others, including pedestrians. A public consultation exercise was held before the order was introduced, and a notice cannot be issued to anyone under 16. We hope that the provisions will improve public safety without causing greater disadvantage to cyclists.
Rev. Martin Smyth: I, too, pay tribute to Lord Whitelaw. He was a genial man, and one of the few Cabinet Ministers prepared to apologise publicly for his mistakes, as we heard some time ago during a debate at a Conservative party conference.
Can the Leader of the House assure us that General John de Chastelain's reports will be published, and that hon. Members may have copies before any further debate is held on Northern Ireland? I ask for the reports in the light of an article in today's Evening Standard, which states that Sinead O'Connor, from whom I differ politically and theologically, has refused to appear at the West Belfast festival. She had intended to speak against victimisation and beatings, but her life has been threatened by the IRA. She has pulled out of the festival because she does not want to be a propagandist.
Mrs. Beckett: I am grateful for what the hon. Gentleman has said about Lord Whitelaw.
I take heed of the rest of what the hon. Gentleman said, and I shall draw to the attention of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland his request for
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publication of General de Chastelain's report. We all hope that the difficult and delicate issues to which he has referred may be resolved later today.
Mr. Mike Gapes: Will my right hon. Friend find time for a debate on institutional reform in the European Union, in which we might highlight links between the British Conservative party and the Italian neo-fascists? We could also raise the fact that a Conservative Commissioner has taken a post with a Spanish telecommunications company while still serving as a Commissioner. May we have an opportunity to impress on the institutions of the EU the need for integrity in public life?
Mrs. Beckett: I recognise my hon. Friend's long interest and expertise in European matters. I am aware of the embarrassing discussions held by the Conservatives in their attempts to find—somewhere in the European Parliament—a comfortable home that will satisfy the different wings of their party. They appear to have settled for being half in and half out of the European People's party, but I suspect that they will find that as uncomfortable as sitting on the fence usually is.
Whatever the origins or political party of the retiring Commissioner, the matter raised by my hon. Friend is a matter for the European authorities. I understand my hon. Friend's concern, and it may well be felt that there should be rules, such as those that apply here, about how such matters should be handled. If such steps are allowed by the contracts under which European Commissioners serve, as appears to be the case, my hon. Friend will be aware that those contracts were not negotiated by us.
Mr. Elfyn Llwyd: When will the concordats between this place and the National Assembly for Wales be produced? The right hon. Lady referred to the opening of the Scottish Parliament today. The vesting powers have been transferred to the National Assembly for Wales, but they will be hampered because the concordats have not been produced. Nobody in this place or in the National Assembly for Wales has seen any of them. Without them, the place cannot function. When can we reasonably expect to debate this issue?
Mrs. Beckett: I cannot offer time for a debate on the issue in the near future. The hon. Gentleman is right to say that it is intended to produce concordats, and I will draw his wish for them to be produced speedily to the attention of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Wales. Welsh questions will be held on Wednesday, and the hon. Gentleman may find an opportunity to raise the matter then.
Angela Smith: Many of us welcomed the Government's announcement yesterday that they would provide more than £6 million to campaign against domestic violence and to tackle violence against women. However, may I press my right hon. Friend for an early debate on the issue of domestic violence? Throughout the country, a number of organisations that already provide services to women are facing financial difficulties, largely as a result of the withdrawal of funds by health authorities. Can we discuss this matter in the House to

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look at how we can mesh together the new initiative "Living Without Fear" with the real problems that are facing our constituents and those organisations?
Mrs. Beckett: I am aware of the concerns raised by my hon. Friend, and the welcome that she has given for the document and for the proposals to support the helpline will be shared across the House. I fear that I cannot undertake to find time for a special debate on the matter in the near future, but my hon. Friend will know that there will be opportunities in various pre-recess debates where she may seek to raise the matter.
Sir Sydney Chapman: The right hon. Lady will know that, earlier this week, an important and thought-provoking report was published—namely, the final report of the urban task force, chaired by Lord Rogers of Riverside, entitled "Towards an Urban Renaissance." As these issues raise vital matters of concern not only for people who live in cities and towns, but for those who live in the countryside, will the right hon. Lady look favourably upon an early opportunity—even if it is not before the summer recess—for a full-scale debate on this important issue?
Mrs. Beckett: It is one of the issues that I will bear in mind when I look at requests for future debates. I fear that I cannot undertake to find time for a full-scale debate on the matter in the near future. In fact, we had such a debate fairly recently, although I recognise that it perhaps preceded the publication of the report. The hon. Gentleman might consider talking to his right hon. Friends, who get Opposition time.
Mr. Gareth R. Thomas: Will my right hon. Friend make time for an early debate on our progress in reforming the national lottery so that we can consider the launch today of the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts—the excellent national fund for talent? Such a debate would allow the House to congratulate a three-way partnership of Harrow council, Harrow arts council and Harrow heritage trust on successfully completing phase 1 of a £1.75 million lottery bid to refurbish Headstone manor, a quite delightful 13th century moated manor house in my constituency.
Mrs. Beckett: I join my hon. Friend in welcoming the launch of NESTA, and I am delighted to hear of the successful moves in the Harrow partnership. It sounds like a delightful project, and I get the impression that my hon. Friend is extending a welcome to Members of Parliament to go and see what is being done. I fear that I cannot undertake to find time for a special debate on the matter in the near future, but I am confident that my hon. Friend will continue to use his ingenuity to raise the matter.
Mr. David Maclean: On behalf of all my constituents and all the people of Cumbria, may I take this early opportunity to pay a tribute to my predecessor, Willie Whitelaw? I followed in his footsteps, but I do not think that any man could ever aspire to fill his shoes. Today, not only has his family lost a devoted family man, Cumbria its finest ambassador and the Conservative party a true and loyal friend, but the nation has lost a great statesman.
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On a business point, will the right hon. Lady please consider holding a debate, at an early opportunity, on how we handle Scottish and Welsh matters?
Mrs. Beckett: No doubt, there will a number of opportunities to consider how we handle Scottish and Welsh matters. There is, of course, a report from the Procedure Committee, to which the Government are considering their response. I cannot undertake to find time for an early debate on the matter, but I shall lodge the right hon. Gentleman's request with others on the same issue.
Mr. James Gray: The right hon. Lady will remember that, during Prime Minister's Question Time yesterday, her right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister responded to questions on the passport office from my right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir G. Young), the shadow Leader of the House. The Deputy Prime Minister said:
"Today's figures show that the queues are getting shorter."
He said later:
"I am assured that, by 11.30 this morning, the queues had been completely cleared."—[Official Report, 30 June 1999; Vol. 334, c. 341–42.]
Those two statements are demonstrably incorrect. Home Office officials advise that the number queueing has now reached a record high of 565,536 and rising. On television last night, the Home Secretary was shown touring the queues that, only a few hours earlier, his right hon. Friend said had completely disappeared.
In accordance with the code of practice for Ministers, has the Deputy Prime Minister asked the Leader of the House for time to make a personal statement apologising to the House and to the nation for those substantially misleading remarks?
Mrs. Beckett: I assume that the hon. Gentleman is simply making a point; I cannot believe that he is making a serious request. There may well be a simple, practical reason why queues have reappeared today: on hearing that the queues had substantially diminished, people may have been encouraged to come along to the passport office.
Mr. David Heath: I am extremely grateful to the right hon. Lady's deputy, the Parliamentary Secretary, Privy Council Office, for telling me on Monday that he and the right hon. Lady carefully consider all early-day motions tabled during the week before delivering the business statement. Does the right hon. Lady recall having looked at early-day motion 455, on the Monopolies and Mergers Commission report on Milk Marque, which I tabled on 19 March?
[That this House notes the extreme difficulties experienced by many in the dairy sector; further notes that these difficulties are being exacerbated by the delay in publication and failure to reach a decision on the outcome of the report of the Monopolies and Mergers Commission on the milk industry; believes that further indecision on the part of the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry is damaging the industry; regrets the entirely inadequate reply given by the Leader of the House on this subject to the honourable Member for North Cornwall on 18th March, Official Report, column 1264; and

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accordingly calls upon the Secretary of State to publish the report and to make a statement to the House forthwith.]
Did the right hon. Lady bring that early-day motion to the attention of the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry? As other hon. Members have pointed out, it is quite extraordinary that, four months later, we are still awaiting a response. It is not simply a dry matter of competition; it is a matter that affects all the dairy farmers in my constituency and all those working in milk-processing plants in my constituency, of which there are a great number. Will she give us an assurance that the report will be published before the summer recess, and that we will have a chance to discuss it on the Floor of the House?
Mrs. Beckett: No, I cannot give the hon. Gentleman either of those assurances. As I have already made plain, we have drawn to the attention of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry the concerns that have been expressed. I can assure the hon. Gentleman that we are not saying that it is merely a matter of dry competition. Competition responsibilities are serious ones. The Secretary of State is required to act in a quasi judicial role; that means taking those responsibilities with extreme care and seriousness.
I do, of course, understand the concerns expressed by hon. Members on both sides of the House, and that they want the report to be published as soon as possible. However, the hon. Gentleman will realise that my right hon. Friend has statutory responsibilities in those matters.
Mr. Michael Fabricant: Before the next Government reshuffle, may we have a debate on the processes of government? Has the right hon. Lady had the chance to read the excellent article in today's Evening Standard entitled, "How Prescott and his team took transport for a spin"? Is she aware—or does she deny—that the advisers to the Deputy Prime Minister brief against the Prime Minister? Is she aware that the advisers to the Deputy Prime Minister refer to the Prime Minister's advisers as teenyboppers? Does she not think that, far from being joined-up Government, that is interdepartmental warfare of the worst and most destructive kind?
Mrs. Beckett: I am pleased to say that I have not seen the article to which the hon. Gentleman refers. As for the notion that we should base a Commons debate on it, given the title cited by the hon. Gentleman, it sounds as though it is a less than impartial piece of reporting. Having had some recent experience myself of press reporting that was literally a piece of fiction from start to finish, I do not take it very seriously.
Mr. Owen Paterson: Is the Leader of the House aware that the Welsh Assembly plans to report on a proposed lifting of the beef on the bone ban before it rises for its recess? As the majority of Members elected to that Assembly promised in their election manifesto to vote for the lifting of the ban, will the right hon. Lady give me some advice? What is the position of my constituents living right on the Welsh border if they go over the border, buy beef on the bone in Wales and bring it back? The question also applies to innocent travellers from the south of England, who might pass
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through in their caravans. May we have a clear statement on the position of those living in the constituent parts of the United Kingdom if they commit an act that is legal in one part of the United Kingdom, but prohibited in the three remaining parts?
Mrs. Beckett: The hon. Gentleman asks an interesting question, but it is based on a decision that has yet to be made by the Welsh Assembly, and I do not propose to anticipate that decision.
Mr. John Bercow: May we have an early statement from the Home Secretary to clarify Government proposals to resolve the escalating passport crisis? Is the right hon. Lady aware that my constituent Sarah Crisp currently intends to go on honeymoon with her husband-to-be Jonathan Breaks on 7 August; that she applied for her passport in May; that the cheque has been banked; but that she has received no communication to reassure her that her application will soon be processed? Is she aware that, in responding to the debate the other night, Ministers said only that they would move heaven and earth to ensure that people received their passports in time, but that they did not give a categoric pledge that people would receive their passports in time? May we have a statement to enable such a pledge to be made?
Secondly, will the right hon. Lady take account of the genuine and widespread concern that, although Ministers are saying that the passport in person charge will be waived—[Interruption.] No, I do not need to hesitate when asking my questions, unlike the Under-Secretary of State for Defence when he responds to debates.
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Lord): Order. The hon. Gentleman is taking rather a long time. Will he put his question now, briefly?
Mr. Bercow: I am grateful for your guidance Mr. Deputy Speaker.
Can the Leader of the House guarantee that, if people have to make an application in person and incur travelling costs in the process, they will be reimbursed for those costs?
Mrs. Beckett: All I can tell the hon. Gentleman is that, as my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary has repeatedly made clear in the House, Ministers are doing everything possible to make sure that the problems experienced in the Passport Agency are resolved, and they are extremely mindful of the difficulties that people are experiencing. Any Minister who gave a guarantee that there would never be a mistake in his Department's handling of any issue would be a less than wise Minister, but Ministers are doing all they can to resolve the difficulties.
Dr. Julian Lewis: Will the Leader of the House arrange for the Home Secretary to come to the House to resolve an apparent contradiction between two answers he gave to questions about whether the Security Service is or is not continuing to monitor subversion? On 21 June at column 783, the right hon. Gentleman cast doubt on my assertion that the Security Service was no longer monitoring subversion, but in a written answer yesterday, he asserted that what was said in his Department's booklet about MI5 was still valid—

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namely, that the Security Service is currently undertaking no investigations into subversion. In view of the failure of intelligence about the riot in the City, which the Home Secretary acknowledged was thought out in advance in a conspiratorial way, is it not important that the House knows whether MI5 is still doing its job in that vital respect?
Mrs. Beckett: I have not studied closely the two answers to which the hon. Gentleman refers, but it seems possible to me that there is no contradiction between them. If I heard him correctly, one answer is that there are no current operations, which is not the same as saying that the Department has given up the role entirely. Although I cannot undertake to find time for a special debate to clarify the matter, if the hon. Gentleman feels that there is confusion, he may find that dropping a line to my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary is a fruitful way of proceeding.
Mr. Christopher Gill: The right hon. Lady will be aware of the long-standing and continued hostility of the Spanish Government towards Gibraltar, and of the way in which the Government steadfastly refused to accept amendments to the European Parliamentary Elections Act 1999 to give Gibraltarians the right to vote in the recent European elections. She is, perhaps, not aware that her Government are now stalling on the issue of a banking passport to Gibraltar, which will, of course,
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seriously affect the colony's economy. Will she, therefore, grant the House the early opportunity of a debate on Gibraltar so that we can discuss all those matters and more besides, which are published in the excellent report of the Foreign Affairs Committee?
Mrs. Beckett: I am afraid that I cannot undertake to find time for a debate on the matter in the near future. I am aware of the recent Foreign Affairs Committee report, and I know that the report is being studied carefully and there will be a Government response in due course. I draw the hon. Gentleman's attention to the fact that Foreign Office questions will be tabled on Tuesday, and he might seek to get the matter on to the Order Paper by that means.

Point of Order
2.11 pm
Mr. John M. Taylor: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. During business questions, the hon. Member for Ilford, South (Mr. Gapes) referred to a Commissioner as being a Conservative. I should like the House to know, for the record, that Commissioner Bangemann is a Liberal.
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Lord): That is not a point of order for the Chair.

Business of the House (Statutory Instruments)
Motion made, and Question proposed,
That, if a Statutory Instrument or Statutory Instruments relating to a Northern Ireland matter be laid before the House this day, a Minister of the Crown may, notwithstanding the practice of the House, make without notice a Motion or Motions for the approval of the said Instrument or Instruments at the sitting this day.—[Mr. Clelland.]
2.12 pm
Rev. Martin Smyth: I appreciate being given the opportunity to speak to the motion. I can understand one reason why it was tabled. However, in business questions, in response to a question about beef on the bone, the Leader of the House suggested that, because no decision had been made about that, she would make no assumptions. I was taught always to be very careful about conditional sentences, and the motion is conditional. Many years ago, a professor told me that, if a cow had a long enough tail, it would reach the moon. He stressed the word, "if".
I have had no instructions from Belfast, but I am mindful of a report on Sky Television on Tuesday evening, when Adam Boulton said that Northern Ireland questions would be asked in the House the next day, and English, Scottish and Welsh Members would participate but all the Northern Ireland Members were in the Castle buildings in Belfast. You and the House will know, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that five Northern Ireland Members were present yesterday, seeking to handle that business. However, if a statutory instrument on a Northern Ireland matter were to come before the House today, it is doubtful, because of the events in Belfast, that anyone from Northern Ireland would be present in the Chamber. In the light of the continuing discussions, I should have thought that it would be wiser to leave such business until another day.
2.13 pm
The President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons (Mrs. Margaret Beckett): I understand the concern expressed by the hon. Gentleman. I simply say to him that this is a classic example of an enabling motion. By moving it, the Government do not commit ourselves or the House to further action but, if we do not move it, we will be unable to take action if it is requested. I understand the hon. Gentleman's point, but he will understand that, if an agreement were to be reached, the House would want to proceed in that manner, and unless we move the motion, we will not be in a position to do so.
Question put and agreed to.

Armed Forces Personnel
[Relevant documents: First Report from the Defence Committee of Session 1998–99, on the Strategic Defence Review: Territorial Army Restructuring (HC 70), and the Government's Response thereto (HC 417). Sixth Report from the Social Security Committee of Session 1998–99, War Pensions Agency Business Plan 1999–2000 (HC 377).]
Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Clelland.]
2.14 pm
The Minister for the Armed Forces (Mr. Doug Henderson): I am very pleased to open this debate about people in defence. At Defence questions last week, I did not have the opportunity to welcome the hon. Member for Croydon, South (Mr. Ottaway) to the Opposition Front Bench. I take this opportunity to do so. I hope that he has an enjoyable time as an Opposition spokesman and that he enjoys longevity in opposition, so that he can be completely fulfilled in his role.
I am sure that the House will agree that the men and women of our armed forces, and those who support them, are a tremendous national asset. The people who make up our armed forces make an enormous contribution to Britain's place in the world. I want this afternoon to pay tribute to the dedication, professionalism and commitment of all who serve in our armed forces. We have long known about those qualities. In the past 14 weeks in the Balkans, our forces have demonstrated them to people not only in this country but worldwide. I have every confidence that our forces will continue to display those qualities in any task that we set them in future.
We all know the danger that is involved in the tasks that our forces are currently carrying out in the Balkans. I know that the whole House will want to join me in sending condolences to the loved ones of Lieutenant Evans and Sergeant Balaram, the two Gurkhas who were killed—helping others—in the tragic accident in Kosovo last week.
When we announced the results of our strategic defence review last year, we stated our belief that, as a leading member of the international community and a trading nation, we have a responsibility to be involved on the world stage. That is why we continue to have worldwide interests, worldwide responsibilities and worldwide influence. The British people want our diplomatic and military activities on the world stage to pursue not only what is in our direct interest but what is right. Those are the objectives of this Government.
Recently, of course, the focus has been on Kosovo. The air campaign there was an outstanding success for the alliance as a whole and for the UK. Credit is due to all those involved, but particularly to the RAF pilots who put their lives at risk day and night in the cause of humanity and who flew some 10 per cent. of the total strike sorties flown by NATO. The focus has now turned to operations on the ground in Kosovo. We have some 8,500 troops in Kosovo, with a further 2,200 in Macedonia. The speed at which they were deployed will stand as a lasting tribute to the efficiency and professionalism of all those involved. The fact that our armed forces were the first into Kosovo in significant numbers demonstrates that, if there is a job to be done, they will not shy away from doing it.
Mr. Julian Brazier: The Minister has just commented on the remarkable achievement of our forces

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in moving so quickly into Kosovo. Will he therefore tell the House why he is breaking up Fifth Airborne Brigade—the only brigade headquarters capable of mounting an operation at seven days' notice—and merging it with a lower-readiness formation?
Mr. Henderson: The hon. Gentleman knows that the changes that we are making aim to modernise our armed forces and to put them in a position where they can deploy in a ready and usable manner. That is why that change has been made. We have had exchanges on the details of that change on many occasions in Committee and in the House.
Our troops in Kosovo are involved in a variety of tasks, but the dangers have not deterred the colleagues of Lieutenant Evans and Sergeant Balaram in any way. Indeed, for many, it has made them even more determined, and I have no doubt that their tasks will be carried out with the same level of commitment and the skill that their Air Force colleagues demonstrated. Our troops are helping, in very difficult conditions, to create an environment where all people, whatever their ethnic background, can live together in safety and peace. That is a task for which the abilities of the UK's armed forces are second to none.
Our forces are engaged in many other places across the globe. At the last count, there were almost 30 separate deployments of British forces. More than 63,000 men and women are undertaking tasks in locations ranging from Latvia to South Africa, and from Sierra Leone to Singapore.
Examples of those tasks include the five military personnel in Romania who are helping the country to draw up its new defence strategy and run training courses, and the eight-person military advisory training team in Sierra Leone. I can announce today that we are sending two military liaison officers to the United Nations mission in East Timor. They will form part of the continued deployment of civilian police officers and military personnel who are being sent to East Timor to assist the ballot on the future of the island in August that is being organised by the UN. Such deployments show the breadth and width of the tasks that are carried out by our armed forces in their numerous postings all over the world.
Mr. Bob Russell: Having read out the list of countries, does the Minister accept that the British Army is suffering severe overstretch?
Mr. Henderson: I am coming to the issue of overstretch a little more quickly than the hon. Gentleman might have expected.
I accept that overstretch is a major problem facing the armed forces. They recognise that it cannot be solved overnight, as I hope does the House. Ultimately, overstretch can be addressed only by a long-term strategy. That strategy must address the level of our commitments and the way in which we meet them.
As always, we are assessing our level of commitment. I cannot predict political events in the Balkans any more than anyone else. I do not know for how long we will have a commitment in the Balkans, but we will be there for as long as is necessary to complete the task. I anticipate, however, that others will be making a telling contribution. NATO is reviewing the level of troops in
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Bosnia. We clearly want to reduce our force levels when appropriate; we of course review those levels very regularly.
Mr. Brian Cotter: I am pleased that the Minister has referred to Lieutenant Evans, whom he may know was a constituent of mine. The Minister may also know that I referred last week in business questions to the very sad circumstances of Lieutenant Evans's death, and secured a commitment from the Leader of the House that the Minister would in this debate address my serious concerns about the security and safety of personnel, and about the procedures being put in hand to ensure that everything possible is done to protect military personnel and civilians.
Mr. Henderson: I am grateful for the opportunity to clarify for the hon. Gentleman that the safety of all our troops has been paramount in all our calculations over the past 14 weeks, and will continue to be so. All practical steps possible to secure maximum safety will be taken.
Mr. Richard Ottaway: Before responding to the hon. Member for Weston-super-Mare (Mr. Cotter), the Minister talked about the uncertainties over the withdrawal from Kosovo. Is he aware that, in Question Time last week, the Defence Secretary said that he expected "a significant reduction" in troop numbers "after about six months"? That seems to be inconsistent with what the Minister has just said. On what assumptions did the Secretary of State make such a statement?
Mr. Henderson: I hope that I can reassure the hon. Gentleman—and, indeed, anybody else who might be listening to this debate—that the Defence Secretary said that he would hope to be able to reduce our numbers. Many discussions are taking place with our NATO partners—and with some countries outside NATO on how they might make a contribution. Several have said that they want to make a contribution. As they are able to move their troops to the front line, we will be allowed to pull back some of ours for roulement and recuperation. That is what the Secretary of State said, and that is what I believe will happen.
Mr. Iain Duncan Smith: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Henderson: I cannot resist the pleasure of giving way to the hon. Gentleman.
Mr. Duncan Smith: Is the Minister aware that his answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon, South (Mr. Ottaway) on the back of his comments on overstretch will be studied very carefully? The Secretary of State indicated a six-month deadline—he is talking about looking to remove troops from the commitment—yet, just now, the Minister said that he did not know how long the commitment would last. The issue of overstretch, particularly pressure on troop numbers in Bosnia, is hugely affected by such decisions. I want the Minister to be clear: what are the criteria that will enable the Secretary of State to order the withdrawal of troops from Kosovo other than that already alluded to?
Mr. Henderson: The hon. Gentleman has failed to draw a distinction. I do not know how long there will be

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a need for military involvement in the Balkans. I cannot predict that any better than anyone else. We have said that we will make the necessary provision, together with others, to meet our responsibilities on the commitment. In doing so, there is the question of how and what resources will be brought to bear.
Discussions with NATO partners are taking place, and it is known publicly that many non-NATO countries want to make a contribution. As such countries make a greater contribution, it will allow us to reduce the level of troops. Initially, we would be replacing troops already in the region with others who are ready to move into the theatre. I believe that, and I am confident that, other nations will be prepared to carry more of a responsibility than has been so up to now. We must all welcome that as a clear sign of the democratic world acknowledging that they must share responsibilities for such a task.
Mr. Eric Martlew: We are due to send extra troops to Bosnia next spring, but would not it be reasonable to divert those experienced forces to Kosovo as other nations take over our role in Bosnia?
Mr. Henderson: One of the reasons why we want six deployable brigades under the strategic defence review is that it will enable us better to meet such commitments. There are questions of commitment generally in Kosovo and of who will meet the commitment in Bosnia. Both issues will affect the number of troops that are required in total in both Kosovo and Bosnia. The supply of those troops is a separate question. As I said in reply to the hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr. Duncan Smith), other NATO nations and others are increasingly prepared to contribute to such a commitment
Mr. Tom King: The Minister knows that at the heart of our ability to sustain commitments is the retention of troops. Crucial to that is the attitude of their families. In the Balkans, there has been a significant increase in unaccompanied tour commitment. We do not have endless resources, but if we are to undertake more commitments, for what level of tour interval on unaccompanied tours is the Government planning?
Mr. Henderson: I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for raising that point. Many people who serve in the armed forces will be asking that question. The answer is that we are gearing ourselves to meet the commitments that we set out in the strategic defence review. We hope that several initiatives on recruitment will increase the number of our troops—I shall announce some of them this afternoon—and other measures on retention should help us to meet commitments.
Mr. King: What is the level?
Mr. Henderson: It was stated in the strategic defence review.
I want to move from the issue of commitment to the one of provision of resources.
I want to make an announcement about the Military Provost Guard Service. I can announce today that we are addressing one of the ways in which our armed forces can
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get more people to the front line. Currently, 1,400 soldiers in the Army—the equivalent of two and a half infantry battalions—are undertaking guarding duties in the United Kingdom. Those duties are not generally relished by many of our young soldiers; they find them tedious and they want to be in the field with their units, putting into practice the skills that they have learned.
On 23 June, I announced that, following a two-year pilot scheme, I had decided, subject to consultation, to expand the Military Provost Guard Service to a strength of 600, replacing MOD police in carrying out armed guarding duties at 27 Army establishments throughout the country.
Military Provost Guard Service personnel are soldiers on local service engagements—that is to say that they are generally limited to serving within their travel-to-work area. However, in other respects, they are subject to the same service regulations and discipline as full engagement regular soldiers. They are part of the Army.
I now intend to develop the provost guard scheme further. We are already in the process of recruiting an additional 200 provost guards to replace soldiers who have completed their initial training but are required to undertake guarding duties at training establishments. That will release personnel for the front line.
Mr. Robert Key rose—
Mr. Henderson: Building on the success of the pilot scheme, I intend to expand the Military Provost Guard Service to replace the 1,400-odd full engagement regular soldiers currently employed on static guarding duties in the United Kingdom. The objective is to free up those soldiers from other tasks. The speed with which we are able to do so will depend on our success in recruiting this new kind of soldier. However, I am optimistic about our ability to do so.
This is an important initiative. I am determined that we should make maximum use of this new kind of soldier. It will help us to improve the quality of life for our regular soldiers. Those numbers represent about one sixth of the current shortfall of soldiers in the Army.
As we expect the provost guard scheme to appeal to a different sector of the work force from the rest of the Army, we shall be widening the pool from which we can recruit. We believe that those most likely to be attracted to the provost guards will be ex-regulars—those who enjoy the Army way of life but, now a little older, have had enough of overseas postings and are looking for greater stability and the opportunity to put down roots in one place.
I want to turn—
Mr. Mike Hancock rose—
Mr. Key rose—
Mr. Henderson: I give way to the hon. Member for Portsmouth, South (Mr. Hancock).
Mr. Hancock: I welcome the Minister's statement, and I am sure that most reasonable and sensible people would suggest that it is a step in the right direction. He mentioned the MOD police. I should be grateful if,

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before he leaves the subject, he would expose to the House what plans he has for the future of the MOD police and say how he envisages their future role.
Mr. Andrew Mackinlay: What does their federation say?
Mr. Henderson: I say to my hon. Friend the Member for Thurrock (Mr. Mackinlay), who asks a question from a sedentary position, that I have had lengthy consultations with the federation on these matters. I want the MOD police to have a successful future and I am confident that they will have such a future carrying out the tasks for which they were intended.
I shall now discuss recruitment.
Mr. Key: Will the Minister give way?
Mr. Henderson: I think that I have given way very generously. I am sure that hon. Members on the Opposition Front Bench will want to catch—
Mr. Duncan Smith: The Minister must give way to an Opposition spokesman.
Mr. Henderson: I am sure that hon. Members on the Opposition Front Bench will want to catch my attention later in my contribution, but I want to make some progress.
Our recruitment efforts have been increasingly satisfactory in the past 12 months. In the last financial year, recruitment figures were up 11 per cent. for the armed forces as a whole, in comparison with the previous year. That means that we recruited 26,000 people instead of 23,500. The Royal Navy's recruitment was up 4 per cent., the Army's up 10 per cent. and the RAF's up 20 per cent.
Our recruitment of women showed a steady improvement, increasing 3 per cent. between 1997–98 and 1998–99. Twenty per cent. of all officer recruits are now women. I believe that it compares very favourably with any other major organisation in the country, be it private or public sector, to have 20 per cent. of female middle management recruits.
In the black and Asian communities, recruitment doubled from 1 to 2 per cent. of recruits between 1997–98 and 1998–99, and we have made a good start towards achieving our target of 5 per cent. by the year 2002.
Those figures reinforce the Government's view that suitability and ability are not governed by colour, gender or social background.
It is never easy to know what motivates people to join the armed forces. I believe that it is a first-choice career, and obviously there are now more young people who believe that it is a challenging career. Young people recognise that they can learn essential skills, which put them in a position to pursue a civilian career later in life.
The armed forces have always strongly recruited on educational advancement. Black people in America have for many years improved their skills and made a more telling contribution to the American way of life by joining the armed forces. Their motto was,
"A way out and a way up".
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I believe that, in Britain today, people from all backgrounds can improve their education by committing themselves to serving the nation in our forces. They can join up and get on. It will make them not only better-qualified soldiers but better-qualified citizens. Our learning forces initiative is designed to achieve that. We have committed £10 million extra to that initiative in the current financial year.
As the House will be aware, today, the Territorial Army changes formally to the new organisation that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence announced on 17 November 1998. The new structure takes effect today and should be fully effective by April 2000. I am glad to say that the transition has been highly successful thus far.
I shall now discuss retention, which is crucial if we are not only to stabilise the overall figures in the armed forces, but to increase them to the levels that we believe are necessary and were stated in the strategic defence review. Obviously, if more people are recruited and retained and there is less overstretch, those who serve are more fulfilled and more contented, and therefore more likely to stay.
However, we are not there yet. We must take many more measures to make staying in the services more attractive. I believe that financial incentive is an important factor in retention.
Mr. John Burnett: I have previously raised in the Chamber the issue of conditions—especially those of Gurkha troops. We owe the Gurkhas a debt of honour that we can never repay. I am sure that the Minister will concede that, and I am sure that he will concede that, if Gurkha pensions were reviewed, it would go some way to help a country that is poor but very proud. Do the Government propose to review the pensions payable to Gurkha soldiers?
Mr. Henderson: I shall come to that issue in a little while, but first I want to deal with the question of financial incentive.
The pay settlement, which was not phased this year, was welcomed as a contribution to retention. I am considering whether different lengths of engagement for ranks in the Army would encourage retention and what might be the appropriate incentives to persuade people to sign up for longer.
We have recommended financial incentives for signallers to stay in the Army, and those recommendations have been put to the Armed Forces Pay Review Body. We have introduced incentive schemes to persuade pilots to remain in post longer, which involves paying for their training for civilian licences.
Our pay settlement for doctors and dentists in the three services, at 4.5 per cent., is 1 per cent. above changes that were made in national health service rates, and is designed to help retain those essential staff.
I shall now deal with the question asked by the hon. Member for Torridge and West Devon (Mr. Burnett). We very much appreciate and hugely value the contribution that is made by Gurkha soldiers to the tasks of the British Army. The death of Sergeant Balaram in Kosovo has raised the question of the provision of death-in-service payments and the pension arrangements for British Gurkhas.

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I am examining the pensions and gratuities paid to British Gurkhas, which are regularly reviewed within the context of the tripartite agreement between Nepal, India and the United Kingdom. The agreement has proved to be flexible over the years. It provides the basis for Gurkha pensions. This is an important issue in general terms given the principles on which our armed forces are based and in the retention of our Gurkha soldiers, who we hugely value.
Mr. Brazier: Is the Minister able to confirm that the Department of Social Security and the War Pensions Agency will be involved? The real scandals are in the treatment of Gurkha personnel from the wartime era, some of whom receive almost nothing. Some of those people have medals. They come under the War Pensions Agency, not the Ministry of Defence.
Mr. Henderson: I have been involved in assessing the background of Gurkha pensions over a long period. I have announced a new examination today, which will come on top of the assessment that has already taken place. It will involve all parties within government that have a contribution to make. I have not yet decided who will be on the committee, which I shall chair. I shall be making a decision on that very shortly once representations have been made.
Mr. Hancock rose—
Mr. Henderson: I cannot take interventions for ever, but I shall give way to the hon. Gentleman.
Mr. Hancock: I am grateful that there will be a review of pensions once Gurkhas have finished their service. Will the Minister review their status within the United Kingdom if, on retirement following service in the Army, they choose to remain here and take up other employment that involves working for the Government, rather than exposing them to the indignity of returning to Nepal to fight an endless struggle to get readmitted to the United Kingdom?
Mr. Henderson: I have said what I shall examine and I will not say any more than that. Members could put many hypothetical situations to me. It would not be fair for me to try to answer them without notice before I have examined all the various implications of these issues. I am not discounting anything as being unimportant. I want thoroughly to consider these matters once I have received appropriate advice.
I want to move on because I know that many right hon. and hon. Members want to speak in the debate.
Education is also important for retention. It enhances skills and I believe that, in future, it will be more and more valued by our armed forces. Young soldiers recognise that, when they leave service life and join civilian life, they must have skills. In addition to their military skills, I know that they recognise the importance of skills such as computer literacy and information technology. I was extremely impressed when I visited Albemarle barracks in Northumberland recently. I saw soldiers, who were primarily involved in dealing with
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Phoenix, sitting before computer terminals, clearly delighted to be learning computer techniques and improving their computer literacy skills. They believe that those skills are important for their time in the services and that they will hold them in good stead in the future. That is an excellent example.
The right hon. Member for Bridgwater (Mr. King) talked about families, about which I want to say one or two things. One of the disincentives to retention is often a sense of separation from family life. I put a high priority on measures to bring families closer to their loved ones who serve. We have increased the allowance for free telephone calls for personnel deployed abroad to 10 minutes a week. We have also introduced flexibility to permit any of the allowance unused in one week to be carried forward to the next.
I believe that families and friends should be able to communicate easily with their loved ones in the armed forces and, earlier this week, I announced a new service to enable them to do so using the internet. Those in the forces will know what I mean by the Bluey, which has been modernised and speeded up. After I made my announcement on Monday, I can tell the House that the system has been heavily used this week, especially between families in this country and those whom they love who are serving in the Balkans.
I want to see an improvement in telephone services worldwide for our troops. Many right hon. and hon. Members who have visited troops on any location will know that in many instances telephone facilities are not as good as they should be. That is inadequate and I intend to do something about it. I am conducting a review of the provision. I believe that our troops should have access to all the best and latest technology. Improvements have been made in Macedonia and we are extending them to Kosovo.
Mr. Key: I am grateful to the Minister for very generously giving way to me for the first time.
Will the hon. Gentleman tell the House why our service men and women in Bosnia have run out of telephone cards, which means that they cannot communicate with their loved ones in this country? It is good news that the length of time that they can call home is to be increased, but that will not work if there are not more telephones. The queues are getting longer, which means added frustration. What will the hon. Gentleman do about that?
Mr. Henderson: This evening, we will dispatch telephone cards to Bosnia from wherever we need to get them. The hon. Gentleman has my assurance on that.
I move on to the welfare of families. It is not enough to keep in touch with families; their welfare must be considered as well. I know that commanding officers—I meet many of them every day of the week—place a high priority on their responsibilities to look after the welfare of our service families. They know, as the House should know, that a soldier who knows that his family is being well looked after is a focused soldier, and we want our soldiers to be focused.
Mr. Nicholas Soames: Will the Minister give way?
Mr. Henderson: This is the last time that I shall give way.
Mr. Soames: I am sorry to intervene on the hon. Gentleman, and I am grateful to him for giving way.

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I urge the hon. Gentleman to examine carefully the disparities in the way in which family policy is run. For example, in my judgment, the Royal Navy has always looked after the families of its personnel more effectively than the Army has done. The Royal Air Force has an entirely different system. The standard throughout the Army varies very much from regiment to regiment and from corps to corps. Will the hon. Gentleman consider instigating a form of benchmark of best practice in each of the three services and examine how best we can bring all the services together, so that what he and everyone else want to do—to provide a first-class service for families—can be put in place?
Mr. Henderson: Building on some of the radical reforms that were previously made in the office, I regularly meet the family associations from the different services. They have raised with me the point that has been made by the hon. Gentleman and benchmarked certain issues for me, indicating where they think improvements have been made and how they could be extended. I take on board what the hon. Gentleman says.
I chair a task force that deals with issues such as education and health. I am pleased to say that we have had a number of meetings at officials' level and a meeting at ministerial level. Considerable progress is being made in improving the facilities for service families in education and health and in other areas. In consultation with the families, they agree that we should deal with those issues first and then move on to others that are important for them.
For example, when a service family moves from one location to another, how do they ensure that their children have access to a school of their choice? The Department for Education and Employment has taken that on board and modified the regulations accordingly. If a service family moves from one location to another and they are in a waiting list for a hospital facility, how will they be treated?
Those are two of the initial issues with which we are dealing. There are many more that I deal with that I believe are of the highest priority.
I have been pleased to be able to report to the House that we are doing everything that we possibly can for the people who serve this nation in our armed forces, and that we want to do more. The defence of any nation must be a priority for any democratic society. We value our freedoms and we must defend them, and our armed forces do so for us. We should all be indebted to them for their efforts on our behalf. That is why we must ensure that they have the right equipment and the right people to enable them to do the job. If we are to recruit those people, we must make service life attractive to soldiers and the other service men and women who serve, and attractive also to their families and the armed forces' community. That is the Government's objective, and it should be the objective of the House.
2.50 pm
Mr. Richard Ottaway: I thank the Secretary of State for his words of welcome at Question Time last week, and I thank the Minister for the Armed Forces for his words of welcome today, although I would rather be known as the spokesman than the spokesperson.
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Having joined the Royal Navy at the age of 16, serving for nine years at the height of the cold war, witnessing at first hand the withdrawal east of Suez, and then serving for 10 years in the Naval Reserve, I feel that life has come full circle as I find myself participating in this most important debate today.
The debate is about the men and women who serve in our armed forces. It addresses the central issue of their numbers, their welfare and their qualities. The Defence Committee's eighth report stated:
"The quality of its people is perhaps the defining characteristic of the UK's armed forces."
In recent months, world events have shown yet again that our armed forces are of the finest quality. In Kosovo, the Gulf, Northern Ireland and all around the world, British soldiers, sailors and airmen serve the country with great bravery and professionalism. In Operation Allied Force, as part of the NATO alliance, our airmen carried out hundreds of hazardous missions against a well armed and capable foe.
Following President Milosevic's withdrawal, British troops led the NATO spearhead into Kosovo. No one doubts the great dangers and difficulties that they face, but they face those dangers as the best trained and most professional soldiers in the world. The dangers facing our troops were underlined only last week when, as the Minister said, two British soldiers—Lieutenant Gareth Evans and Sergeant Balam Ram Rai—lost their lives helping to make safe unexploded munitions near a primary school in the village of Orlate. We join the Minister and pay tribute to them. Our thoughts are with their families.
There are many operational demands on our service men. Although Kosovo currently makes the news, no one should forget the contribution that our forces are making in Bosnia, Northern Ireland and the Gulf. Only last week, our Tornadoes struck three communications sites and two radar sites in southern Iraq, in response to aggressive Iraqi action.
We should not forget the impact of separation on the families at home. The point was made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater (Mr. King) and my hon. Friend the Member for Mid-Sussex (Mr. Soames). That burden is intensified when their husbands and wives are on active service, when danger is ever present.
Operations are the most fulfilling part of a service man's career. That is what they joined up for; they spend their time in the service training for such eventualities. However, continued commitment to operations can cause havoc for service men with families and the effect can be problematic. My hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury (Mr. Key) will deal with welfare issues when he winds up this evening.
Mr. Tom King: I thank my hon. Friend for giving way, and I am sorry to interrupt an excellent opening. We have heard about telephone cards and about all the ways in which we try to meet the problems of separation. However, there will be no recruitment and people will not join the armed forces in significant numbers unless their families know where they stand. I am deeply concerned that the Minister did not answer my question. I realise that it is difficult for him to say exactly what will happen, but for what tour interval for unaccompanied tours are the

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Government planning? If the Government cannot answer that question, what on earth are members of the armed forces or people considering joining supposed to think?
Mr. Ottaway: Perhaps the Minister for the Armed Forces wishes to respond to that intervention.
Mr. Brazier: As the Minister has not responded, may I remind him that the Chief of the Defence Staff reported to the Defence Committee that the tour interval for infantry units is down to 15 months, and for individual infantry men it is much worse, perhaps 12 or 13 months—half the length projected in the White Paper and unsustainable in the long run.
Mr. Ottaway: It is a pretty tale when the Opposition must supply such information in an important debate. I recognise the important point made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater. The matter is of great concern to the families. As I said, my hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury will deal with welfare matters in his winding-up speech.
That Government said that one of the most important elements of the strategic defence review was their policy for people. The supporting essay states:
"Addressing the personnel problems that affect the Armed Forces will take time, trust and money. Trust needs to be earned and will only arise from"—
this is the important point—
the delivery of tangible improvements in overstretch and undermanning."
We share that view.
Overstretch was well described in the SDR as a "vicious circle"—the armed forces have fewer men, so those men are deployed more often; they spend longer periods away from their families, so they become more inclined to leave, which leaves the armed forces with fewer men, and so on.
The SDR continued:
"We must break this vicious circle. To do so we must match the commitments we undertake to our planned resources".
We share that view too, but we question in this debate whether resources are matching the growing commitments.
Mr. Martlew: Does the hon. Gentleman accept that the strategic defence review examined the armed forces as the Conservative Government had left them?
Mr. Ottaway: Obviously, the SDR examined the armed forces that we left, but Labour tabled a motion in the last defence debate before the last election opposing the defence estimates and stating that it
"notes that the shortfall in the strength of the British Army numbers 4,000 personnel; is concerned that the resulting overstretch is undermining the morale and operational effectiveness of the armed forces."
As I shall shortly demonstrate, that seems to have been a golden era compared with the present position.
Mr. Soames: I thank my hon. Friend for giving way and apologise for interrupting him. I endorse the remarks
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of my right hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater (Mr. King). Of course telephone cards are important, and of course welfare issues are important, but what makes our troops so exceptionally brilliant and effective is the fact that they are highly trained and have superb confidence in their equipment and in their ability to undertake their task. What is so dangerous about the tour interval is that it means that the training is severely curtailed, thereby affecting the service men's confidence in their ability to do the job.
Mr. Ottaway: My hon. Friend is right. As the training cycle tightens, it affects the quality of training and the opportunities for training.
We agreed with the statement in the SDR that commitments should match planned resources, but we question whether resources are matching growing commitments. Are the assumptions in the SDR already out of date? The Government recognise that overstretch remains a major problem, as the Minister confirmed today. Nevertheless, even before major deployments took place in the Balkans, MOD figures revealed that more than 36 per cent. of Army personnel are currently committed to operations, with a further 22.5 per cent. warned to deploy for operations. Of Land Command personnel, 55 per cent. are committed to operations, with a further 34 per cent. warned to deploy for operations.
Mr. Brazier: Impossible.
Mr. Ottaway: As my hon. Friend says, it is virtually impossible.
Ministers tell us that recruitment is up by 18 per cent. this year. They point to a number of initiatives that have been undertaken as part of the SDR, which we welcome. However, the problem of overstretch remains and is getting worse. Only last week, the Secretary of State admitted that the Army is losing soldiers faster than it is recruiting them. The soldiers that it is losing are the trained, skilled ones, who are being replaced by raw recruits.
The review undertook to increase the Army's strength by 3,300 men, but it did not expect full manning to be achieved before 2004. That is five years away. In October 1997, the Army was 4,500 under strength. Today, it is more than 6,000 under strength.
The Chief of the Defence Staff told the Defence Committee inquiry last year that increasing the size of the Army by 3,300 would be a demanding challenge. Will the Minister confirm that if the Army is 6,000 below strength and its complement is being expanded by 3,300, he has to recruit 9,300 more men and women to get it up to full strength, and he has to do so when numbers are falling, on the Secretary of State's admission, outflow is more than 15 per cent., and the United Kingdom labour market is tightening? That is a huge challenge, particularly as most of the increase will be in signals, engineers and logistics troops, of which we are desperately short. We accept the Government's good intentions, but we shall judge their achievements by the number of people recruited.
Those manpower shortages give rise to our concerns over the nation's ability to meet the commitments made. The Chief of the Defence Staff expressed similar views to the Defence Committee only last week. Let us take a

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brief look at the armed forces' current major commitments. The deployment in Kosovo is moving towards 13,000 men. We have 4,000 men deployed in Bosnia, and I should be grateful if the Minister would confirm in his winding-up speech reports that that number is about to be reduced. We have 15,000 men deployed in Northern Ireland and a garrison of 23,000 men in Germany. We have a garrison of 3,000 men in Cyprus and the Falklands garrison numbers 1,000 men. With 89 per cent. of Land Command, which is the deployable Army, deployed or warned to deploy, we do not have a lot of room for manoeuvre to confront contingencies that may emerge.
Obviously, the future for Kosovo is unclear, but everything points to the deployment being long term; it would probably be better measured in years rather than months. In an article in the Daily Mail last month, General de la Billière, who knows a thing or two about these matters, said:
"It is a military rule of thumb that for every soldier seeing active service on the ground, you need one undergoing training and one unwinding in some less demanding environment.
In other words, to fulfil our planned commitment to Kosovo, we will need up to 30,000 troops. And if things go wrong—as they have a historic habit of doing in the Balkans—we may need to increase that number suddenly and sharply."
He then reviewed the commitments that I have set out and continued:
"In my judgment, these figures demonstrate that our armed forces are already dangerously and unacceptably overstretched."
Using the de la Billière formula, the overstretch can be measured as more than 20,000 at present.
At Defence questions last week, the Secretary of State said that he hoped to reduce our troop numbers in Bosnia and in Kosovo and that he expected a "significant reduction" after about "six months". I made that point in my intervention. The Chief of the Defence Staff also said last week that half our troops in Kosovo could be home by the autumn. The Minister's remarks have left the situation rather unclear. We want to know the criteria by which those assumptions are being made. That is an important point and it affects the overstretch situation.
Mr. Doug Henderson: Perhaps I can help the hon. Gentleman a little if my reply to his intervention was not clear. If one counts the beginning of June as the start date of the troop deployment, after about six months other nations will have had time to begin to assess what contribution they can make—they are doing that now—as well as when they can make it and how they can bring it to bear in Kosovo. At that stage, we would be able to bring back some of our troops and reduce our numbers to allow some to rest and some to train. That is what I said. It is exactly in line with what the Chief of the Defence Staff said and what my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State said. There is no difference at all between us.
Mr. Ottaway: I am grateful to the Minister for that. However, he has twice said that troops will "begin" to come back; that does not imply that they are coming back. Perhaps Ministers can confirm that we have received assurances from other nations that they will make up the shortfall.
No sooner do we receive indications that the overstretch pressures are being relieved than the Foreign Secretary—with the Secretary of State's agreement,
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I assume—commits 8,000 British troops to be put on permanent standby for peacekeeping operations all over the world.
Ministers must recognise that there are many "what if" scenarios on the horizon. What if the situation in Northern Ireland deteriorates and more troops are needed to ensure order? Developments today may enable the Minister to respond to that point later this evening. What if Saddam again threatens his neighbours? What if Milosevic foments disorder in Montenegro? Those are obvious scenarios, but in this uncertain world, and especially over the five-year time scale for achieving full manning of the Army, who knows what eventualities will emerge? We must be prepared for them.
There are two further factors to take into account. First, at St. Malo, the Prime Minister committed us to a European Union defence capability "within or outside NATO". Will the Minister please tell us the implications of that announcement in the context of our commitments and our ability to fulfil them? Secondly, in respect of what has become commonly known as the Blair-Clinton doctrine, the Prime Minister let it be known in a recent article in Newsweek that no dictator engaging in ethnic cleansing or repression would be tolerated. Fine words; that appears to be a global commitment to stamp out unacceptable practices. That huge commitment brings into question the Government's ability to deliver on the rhetoric.
The Government's response to questions about overcommitment and overstretch is that the SDR provides for flexibility. The Secretary of State said that the SDR
"was designed so that our forces will be able…to deal flexibly with the sort of problems that we face in Kosovo today."—[Official Report, 10 May 1999; Vol. 331, c. 8.]
However, it cannot in any way be argued that the Government's decision to cut the Territorial Army by 18,000 will create flexibility. As yet, TA troops have not been deployed in any great numbers in Kosovo, but no one could doubt the value of the role that they have played recently in Bosnia and in the Gulf.
As of 15 June, 393 members of the TA were serving in the Balkans. Of those, 355 were deployed in Bosnia, making up 10 per cent. of our troops in that country. The TA is much more than a recreational opportunity for civilians who want a taste of military life; it is a vital source of new recruits. It helps to train volunteer and professional recruits, provides support and back-up for the Regular Army and helps to create a link between the armed forces and local communities.
Mr. John M. Taylor: Can my hon. Friend tell the House whether the Government are the first to have simultaneously reduced and mobilised the TA?
Mr. Ottaway: I would have to read the reference books, but I strongly suspect that my hon. Friend is right. He has made an important point. One of the TA's vital functions is providing support to the Regular Army and it is cost-effective, absorbing only £350 million per annum, which is approximately 3 per cent. of the defence budget. The Army, which is 6,000 below strength and suffering from a turnover of 15,000 personnel a year, can ill afford to lose such a source of recruits.
The Kosovo crisis has exposed the difficulties caused by the current manpower shortage. There have been reports of regiments having to borrow men from other

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units to get up to strength. The effects of Government policy have already been felt by the Parachute Regiment, whose 1st Battalion was reported as having to borrow troops from 3 Para because reserves were not available. As a result, 3 Para is not up to battalion strength. The TA's Parachute Regiment, whose soldiers would usually make up any shortfall in regular paras, can no longer do so because of the cuts under the SDR.
Notwithstanding the cuts in the TA, as the Minister said, retention of our regulars is causing serious problems. Overstretch is inextricably linked with retention difficulties. Only last week the Secretary of State told us that
"retention figures continue to give us cause for concern".—[Official Report, 21 June 1999; Vol. 333, c. 751.]
He also told the Select Committee last week that men were still leaving the Army faster than they were joining.
The problem is exacerbated by the increase in recent years of premature voluntary releases. Pilot retention in the RAF and the Fleet Air Arm—
Mr. Andrew Robathan: I know that my hon. Friend is dealing with pilots, but does he think that officer retention in the Army is a problem? My sources in the Army—I am rather out of date, but I still know people there—say that young officers, in particular, are not staying. In five or 10 years' time, there will be a dearth of commanding officers and of the high-quality people whom we are used to seeing in command of regiments and higher.
Mr. Ottaway: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. I can be corrected if I am wrong, but I believe that premature releases among officers in the Army have doubled in recent years, compared with a 10 per cent. increase in other ranks.
I was dealing with pilot retention in the RAF and the Fleet Air Arm. The Government say that the RAF should be on target to meet its full manning level by 2000. I hope that the Minister can confirm tonight that that is the case. The retention of pilots is a real problem. It costs the taxpayer some £3 million to train each one, so it is of no surprise that they are of value to commercial airlines, which themselves face a shortage of pilots. However, it is fair to say that our need is greater than theirs, and I congratulate the Government on introducing a link-up scheme and on the £10,000 incentive to which the Minister referred in his speech.
Clearly, overstretch is at the core of the armed forces personnel problems. The Defence Committee said that there are two possible solutions to overstretch and undermanning: the first is to increase recruitment and retention and the second is to decrease commitments. The Government say that they are succeeding with recruiting, but they are clearly not matching capabilities to commitments.
In their response, Ministers will no doubt mention the overstretch that existed under the previous Government, but they must accept that they have now been in power for two years and that the SDR has cut the defence budget by £1 billion and slashed the TA by 18,000. They must accept that there is growing concern about the mismatch
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between commitment and budget. They must not shirk that issue, but must come up with concrete answers about how they intend to deal with the problem.
In April last year, the Government said that tackling overstretch would be one of the key elements of the SDR. In June 1997, the Secretary of State promised that the problem of overstretch would be seriously addressed. Now is the time for their deeds to match their words.
There is one other issue on which answers are urgently needed from the Government. In the last parliamentary Session, the Government introduced the Human Rights Act 1998, which incorporates into domestic law the rights and liberties in the European convention on human rights. It is expected to come into force in early 2000. Have the Government fully taken into account its impact on the armed forces?
The Act guarantees a range of political rights and freedoms of the individual against interference by the state. Once it comes into force and the convention becomes part of national law, the rights and liberties that it guarantees will provide litigants with a range of positive entitlements to assert in the course of a dispute with any public body. Once incorporation has taken place, the encroachment of the European convention on the armed forces will be immense. For example, article 3 provides that
"No one should be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment."
What impact will that have on reports of bullying in the services? Article 6 provides that
"everyone is entitled to a fair and public hearing within a reasonable time by an independent and impartial tribunal established by law."
That article, taken in conjunction with article 14, raises serious questions about the future of the court martial system. Do the Government have a view on that?
In my judgment, article 8 will cause the most problems. It provides that
"Everyone has the right to respect for his private and family life, his home and his correspondence."
That article inevitably questions the ban on homosexuals in the armed forces. There is a complete ban, which is non-discretionary and proscribes both homosexual orientation and homosexual conduct. The ban could constitute a breach of the applicant's rights under articles 8, 10 and 14 of the European convention on human rights.
Mr. Martlew: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Ottaway: No.
Four members of the armed forces who have lost their service careers because of that policy have already referred their grievance to the European Court of Human Rights. We do not know what that court's reaction is likely to be, but once the Human Rights Act becomes effective next year, the outcome of a complaint to the UK courts is predictable.
When considering an early application, Lord Justice Simon Brown said:
"I for my part strongly suspect that so far as this country's international obligations are concerned, the days of this policy"—
the ban—
"are numbered."

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Sir Thomas Bingham, Master of the Rolls, said that
"to dismiss a person from his or her employment on the grounds of a private sexual preference, and to interrogate him or her about private sexual behaviour, would not appear to me to show respect for that person's private and family life".
Those last words are exactly those contained in the convention.
Mr. Martlew: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Ottaway: No, I shall not give way.
Because the European convention was not incorporated in UK law at the time, those views expressed by the judges did not prevail. Will the Minister confirm, however, that following the introduction of the Human Rights Act, it is highly likely that the ban on homosexuals will be declared unlawful? How do the Government intend to respond to that? This is a most important issue and the forces must be ready for it.
Mr. Doug Henderson: May I offer some information to the hon. Gentleman? It does not relates specifically to the question of homosexuality, but we are currently examining to what extent the services discipline Acts need to be modified in the light of the incorporation of the convention under the Human Rights Act. We hope shortly to announce our proposals.
Mr. Ottaway: I am grateful to the Minister for that intervention, although I should have thought that the Government would think about those matters before introducing an Act, rather than afterwards.
Mr. Brazier: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way towards the end of his speech. As he implied, the Ministry of Defence has completely dropped the ball on this matter. Whereas the Department for Education and Employment got it right by acquiring specific exemptions for schools during the passage of the Bill, the Ministry of Defence acquired no exemptions for the armed forces. That just shows how far behind the kerb it is.
Mr. Ottaway: My hon. Friend makes the point very well.
Mr. Martlew: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Ottaway: No, I shall not give way again. I wish to bring my speech to a close and I have already given way to the hon. Gentleman once.
We live in challenging times. As we reach the close of this millennium, we have witnessed a century in which our armed forces have been at the centre of our lives and the nation's security. Our grandparents fought in the great war, when the huge loss of life brought home all the horrors and destruction of modern warfare. Our parents fought in the second world war, which brought the same violence and destruction to our very doorsteps. In the second half of this century, we have been fully involved in conflicts in Borneo, Suez, the Falklands, the Gulf and now the Balkans. The world remains an uncertain place.
Tensions in the middle east will, God willing, be replaced by peace, but new tensions arise all the time. The situation can change at short notice. In this troubled world, the defence of the nation and our interests are
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paramount so that young people can grow up, live healthy lives and expand the knowledge of the generations. That vision is utterly dependent on our armed forces. At its core are the young men and women who, without hesitation, risk their lives to protect those who live on this planet. We have every right to be proud of Britain's place in the world as a result of their efforts. We pay tribute to them.
3.19 pm
Mr. Bruce George: When these debates begin, I always promise myself that I shall not be controversial, then I listen to Opposition Members and my resolve dissipates immediately. I cannot believe what I have heard. I have been on the Select Committee on Defence for many years, and have used the same arguments about overstretch against the Conservative Government as the hon. Member for Croydon, South (Mr. Ottaway) has just used. We wrote report after report, on "Options for Change", for the Army, for the Navy, for the Air Force and for the Reserves. When we had done that, we went back to "Options for Change" for the Army—there was a sense of déjà vu.
The Government inherited many of the current problems. The Defence Committee argued strongly against the Conservative Government's cut in the number of infantry battalions from 55 to 29—which they should not have done—and the gross overstretch. We had nights out of bed. It got out of hand. Ministers blithely said time and again, "No, we've got it right. You're exaggerating. The world is a much safer place." Conservative Members should go to the doctor to get a cure for the amnesia that seems to afflict everyone who moves from the Government Benches to the Opposition Benches. They should recognise that they got it wrong: they saw the world as a wonderful place in which we could afford to cut our defence expenditure from 5.1 per cent. to 2.6 per cent.
The "Options for Change" process began when the right hon. Member for Bridgwater (Mr. King) was Secretary of State. When the Gulf war began, I thought that the Conservative Government would be forced to stop the defence cuts. "Options for Change" had been put in a drawer, and when the war was over the drawer was opened as though nothing had happened, and the cuts continued.
Mr. Tom King: The hon. Gentleman makes a fair point. The Defence Committee's most recent report shows the problems of overstretch down the years. He is a fair-minded man, and he knows perfectly well that when "Options for Change" was originally written, the only real problem of unaccompanied tours was Northern Ireland. The Government are involved in what is, in effect, a second Northern Ireland in terms of the commitment of unaccompanied forces in a hostile area. I have supported them in that, but the hon. Gentleman surely recognises that the problem is now infinitely greater than it was before.
Mr. George: I welcome that intervention. The right hon. Gentleman was a very able Secretary of State, and he is also fair-minded. He realises that the problems that have beset Government after Government are not unique. Governments get it wrong. When my party was in opposition, I did not always share its view; and since it

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came into office, the level of defence expenditure has, frankly, fallen too low. If the Prime Minister wants this country to punch above its weight, it will have to be with more than 2.3 per cent. of gross domestic product. I have not remotely changed my views. I criticised the previous Government three or four years ago, and I have not suddenly changed my views just because my party is in office.
We must have adequate defence, and we must be aware of the fact that wars happen when we least expect them. In the old days one could whistle and guys joined up, whereas that no longer happens. The days are gone when aircraft carriers can be built fairly quickly—in about 15 years. Aircraft cannot be made swiftly: it takes 20 years. We must anticipate that the worst will happen. It is too late to start whingeing about a change in the situation when we are unable to change our response to that situation. We have a common approach, but the fair-mindedness which the right hon. Member for Bridgwater advocated should be spread around.
Mr. Key: At one time, the hon. Gentleman and I served on the Defence Committee together, and my signature is also on the report on defence expenditure. He has been absent from some debates lately, and we have missed him. He bangs on about this issue, and says that he disagrees with what the previous Government did. Does it make sense that he should support a Government who are making matters worse?
Mr. George: I have yet to reach the conclusion that matters are worse: they have a long way to fall before they replicate the decline under the previous Government. I am not a mathematician, but I estimate that, if this Government had continued the downward path of defence expenditure, we would be minus about £5 billion a year within five years.
Dr. Julian Lewis: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. George: No, I shall not give way for the moment—perhaps later. I want to get on with my speech.
I welcome the new format of the defence debates. It is far more rational to have a debate on functional issues, rather than the nonsense of debates on single-service issues. It is a great shame, given that our armed forces have fought a war so recently, that only 25 right hon. and hon. Members can stir themselves to attend the debate. It is important for the House to scrutinise and to influence matters.
Last Friday was an important event in parliamentary history: it was the 20th anniversary of the establishment of the Select Committee system, which enabled the House to monitor, scrutinise, reinforce civilian control and sometimes have a degree of influence. Twenty years after that new Select Committee system was established, I hope that the Modernisation, Procedure and Liaison Committees will say that it is time to give Select Committees some power so that they can discharge their obligations more effectively.
I am pleased that many Defence Committee reports have been mentioned. The strength of the Committee is that we give hell to everyone. It is not our responsibility
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to cheer. There have been few occasions on which cheering has been necessary. I hope that the Select Committees are given some teeth.
I want to talk about what the Defence Committee has been doing and will be doing. Manpower is pivotal. The Defence Committee report on the strategic defence review is not a ritualistic eulogy. It states:
"The quality of its people is perhaps the defining characteristic of the UK's Armed Forces. The morale, quality, training and ethos of those people are fundamental to the UK's ability to undertake its military tasks, and the success of the proposals set out in the SDR in maintaining or enhancing these elements will be one of the most fundamental criteria by which it will be judged."
That is important. We often forget that the image of the British soldier was not always the image that that soldier maintains today. The collective image of the armed forces is infinitely greater in public esteem than our own profession. They are at one end of the scale and we are, perhaps deservedly, at the other.
Mr. Duncan Smith: What about journalists?
Mr. George: The hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr. Duncan Smith) was a sort of journalist when he worked for Jane's.
It took a long time to build the reputation and competence of our armed forces, and it has cost a lot of money to sustain that reputation, which could be undermined. It is important that the Defence Committee, the House of Commons and the Ministry of Defence—I am sure its commitment is as great as ours—and the country remain deeply grateful to the armed forces for their competence, professionalism, dedication, and willingness to endure danger, even to the point of putting their own lives at risk.
The Defence Committee took a great interest in meeting soldiers and their wives, taking beatings around the head that qualified us for battle honours. What we were told by the Army wives whom we met in the officers' mess was often of greater significance than session after session listening to platitudes from Ministers and senior civil servants. On one occasion, we were discussing lessons to be learned from the Falklands. On the table in front of us was a set of Army boots. I thought that it was commendable of the Defence Committee to be prepared to consider how we, as a nation, have failed to procure a satisfactory set of Army boots over the years. As far as I am aware, we have yet to produce a satisfactory set.
The Select Committee has always concerned itself with medical issues—with compensation, and with the need for Government to be reminded about such matters. It is not a sense of duty that prompts me to pay tribute, on behalf of the Committee and other hon. Members who are present, to our forces in Kosovo, Bosnia, the Gulf and Northern Ireland. At the end of the year, we shall visit the garrison in the Falkland islands.
The professionalism of our armed forces is legendary, and deservedly so. We hear that their numbers are to be reduced to give way to others, and the presence of others will be welcome; but we must remember—although it is difficult to say this to those "others"—that there must always be enough serious professional soldiers in Bosnia and Kosovo. Although their contributions are necessary in a military and political context, and although we need

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their mine clearance work and ambulance units, the ability to overawe is the essential prerequisite for a peaceful environment in which all the forces of NATO and other parts of the world will be working.
In its excellent report on the strategic defence review, the Select Committee made a number of commitments, and gave a number of undertakings relevant to personnel matters. It said that it would monitor whether readiness targets were manageable for individual service personnel and formations, and coherent across the three services. That is particularly relevant to the current circumstances in Kosovo and Bosnia.
My hon. Friend the Minister is absolutely right: our forces were deployed as swiftly as was humanly and physically possible. I do not think other countries could have achieved such a level of competence. However, I am still to be convinced that all the formations that were not deployed could have been deployed had it been necessary to mount a serious military operation. We are embarking on a protracted inquiry into the lessons of the Kosovo conflict.
The Committee also agreed to monitor progress in the tackling of problems in the defence medical services and to examine the work of the defence secondary care agency. An earlier report on the SDR—the Chairman of the Committee, the hon. Member for Romsey (Mr. Colvin), performed an excellent service—stated:
"the staff shortages in the Defence Medical Services are so serious that it is not clear whether it will ever recover. It is possible that the military ethos of medicine in the regular armed forces has been destroyed".
The endeavour to prevent that fearful apocalyptic assessment from becoming a reality is the responsibility of the Minister of State, who will give evidence to us.
I know that the Government are trying very hard, but, in some respects, the harder they try, the worse the situation becomes. Specialists in Haslar have been leaving. Morale is low; a bad decision to join Haslar might well be compounded by the worse decision to leave. The matter is subject to a continuing inquiry by the Select Committee.
The Committee also said that it would monitor progress towards the establishment of joint initiatives. Many such initiatives have already been launched: for instance, the joint helicopter command, joint force 2000, the joint doctrine centre and the appointment of a chief of defence logistics. The concept of jointery will continue to engage the Committee.
Sir Geoffrey Johnson Smith: The hon. Gentleman speaks of jointery. He has also referred to the shortage of medical staff in the armed services. Will he bear in mind the need for his research to be co-ordinated with the work of the national health service, in which there is a great shortage of doctors, especially consultants, who are willing to stay on and to accept the extra dimension that their work takes on once they become involved in work in the armed services?
Mr. George: As most hon. Members will know, it was decided to close Army, Royal Navy and RAF hospitals. We now have trust units, and doctors who deal with drug problems on Saturday nights. I am talking about non-service men. That is of some advantage, but when the Committee said that the military ethos was being
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destroyed, we were thinking of the fact that many doctors in the services were involved much more in the NHS and the treatment of civilians than in the treatment of soldiers.
When I asked whether injured soldiers who arrived in accident and emergency units benefited from any special facilities, I was told that they must take their place along with the rest. I am not entirely happy about that. It is wonderful for the NHS to have a supply of additional doctors, and it is wonderful for Gosport to have a special facility; but, ultimately, the Select Committee and the Ministry of Defence are concerned about medical facilities and services for the armed forces. There is still much more work to be done and much more money to be spent before some of the near-catastrophes of the last decade or so can be dealt with.
The Committee's report asks for future statements on the defence estimates. As I recall, the last was made in 1996. We want future statements to feature clear statistical analysis of actual training times and operational deployments under the Army's new "readiness cycle" structure, to identify the causes of significant deviations and shortfalls, and to set out MOD proposals to remedy them.
We have said that we will monitor progress to deal with Army manpower shortages, a task that will clearly keep us engrossed for some time. We have also said that we will monitor ethnic minorities, and the number of women in the forces. I recall the indifference—if not hostility—that greeted the Committee's reports on ethnic monitoring as long ago as 1986-87: some regiments, and the MOD, were opposed even to the simple task of monitoring numbers. In the mid-1980s, the MOD was unwilling even to identify ethnic minorities in terms of cap badges. It took adverse reports, a good deal of effort on the part of Ministers and the intervention of the Commission for Racial Equality in humiliating a particular unit for serious endeavours to be undertaken to bring about a degree of equality in personnel, and to protect members of ethnic minorities who sought to join the armed forces.
We have said that we will continue to look at pay restructuring, and I hope that many of our undertakings will be set out in the forthcoming defence White Paper. I am sorry, as we all are, that it was not published in May, but that is understandable. We look forward to its publication in the autumn.
Paragraph 377 of our report states:
"The challenge of recruiting and retaining service personnel of the quality, and in the quantity, that our Armed Forces need to deliver on their missions is one of the most critical and intractable challenges that the SDR faces. The whole package outlined in the Review will stand or fall depending on whether the MoD meets the challenges. The SDR outlines many welcome initiatives to improve recruitment and retention. Currently, though, these remain paper exercises. It will be difficult to assess objectively the impact of the various measures; we have been told that both qualitative and quantitative assessments will be made and we expect these to be made available to Parliament. For the moment, however, we feel that there is a great element of untested optimism that these measures will produce the improvements to recruitment and retention promised."
We ended optimistically by saying:
"It is our sincere wish that they will not founder on the rocks of reality, and we welcome the obvious commitment of Ministers to pursue these initiatives zealously. They must also be backed with the necessary resources."
The question of overstretch, like that of welfare facilities, is very important.

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On compensation, soldiering is a dangerous career. Those who want a quiet life should enter careers where there is less risk to life. We protect our armed forces as far as we can. It was refreshing, almost exhilarating, to hear the tributes to the two soldiers who died. In the conflict in the Caribbean during the Napoleonic wars, there were 100,000 casualties in a useless diversion to protect our sugar supplies. I doubt whether many there were many speeches expressing abhorrence at such loss, but I caution those hon. Members—I doubt whether many are in the Chamber now—who think that we will escape large casualties in future. In a sense it was not a case of escape this time, because we were careful not to put our soldiers' lives at too much risk, but cosseting and protecting soldiers to such an extent that they go nowhere near danger will make it impossible for the Government to achieve their military and security objectives; that applies even more to the United States.
One story concerned me. I apologise that I did not raise it earlier with the hon. Member for Salisbury (Mr. Key), which I should have done. He apparently said that the row over £27 million in damages for injured soldiers was "extraordinary" and an illustration of the "compensation culture" affecting the MOD.
One should not necessarily find it extraordinary that money paid in damages has risen from £11.9 million a few years ago to £26.7 million. Perhaps some compensation payments do make the blood of the Daily Mail reader boil. I hope that the information that the hon. Gentleman requested will be provided, but it is wonderful that the MOD appears to be more concerned about making payments.
Again, I recall from the Defence Committee the MOD being unwilling to accept that there was any correlation between attending the atomic tests in the Pacific in the early 1950s and illness. There was slowness in dealing with Gulf war syndrome. There were cases of soldiers on United Nations functions not receiving compensation because they were not in an active war. I hope that the MOD will feel it necessary to act. I am delighted that the Minister has announced that there will be a joint inquiry with the Department of Social Security.
A few years ago, the Defence Committee threatened a pre-emptive strike. I am delighted that the MOD is undertaking its own inquiry, which will, of course, be subject to scrutiny by the Defence Committee and the Select Committee on the Armed Forces Bill in due course.
Mr. Key: What I found extraordinary was that the MOD said that it could not tell me why it had had to pay that money except "at disproportionate cost". I agree with the hon. Gentleman. We reviewed the matter on the Defence Committee. We said that it was important that there should be a review of compensation arrangements in the MOD. Indeed, the Government pledged themselves to that some two years ago. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman, like me, hopes that they come to a speedy conclusion on the matter because it is an important part of the human resources package for our armed forces.
Mr. George: I thank the hon. Gentleman. I recall one of my constituents, the best shot in the Territorial Army, being on an exercise to raid an Army camp to test
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its security. To save the MOD some money, he and his colleagues drove in his vehicle. They got dressed, blacked up their faces and achieved their objectives. The soldiers who were on guard were so angry that they chased after them, rammed my constituent's car and destroyed it.
When my constituent wrote to his insurance company, it told him to go and jump in a lake because such a use was not within the terms of his insurance cover. When I wrote to the MOD saying, "Come on. Surely this is your responsibility," it declined. The result was that the best shot in the TA left the organisation. I suspect that, on occasion, the MOD guards public funding too well.
I am sorry that I am going on at greater length than I should. On the Gurkhas, I had no sense of guilt last week when I asked the Secretary of State for Defence ever so politely whether, in the light of the unfortunate death of two Gurkha soldiers, he would look again at the mode of payment and compensation. We all know the arguments, which are advanced loudly: "There is an agreement with India and Nepal; wages are low, but we boost them with incidentals; do not shout too loudly because, if the cost of Gurkhas rises too far, they will be dispensed with; the cost of living in Nepal is so low."
However, it simply does not look right. What the present and previous Governments have done is objectively right, but it simply does not look right. I am delighted that the Minister is reviewing the matter. Perhaps the families of those unfortunate Gurkhas will have the slight consolation—if there can be any consolation from such a disaster—that their deaths might have led to a review and an improved pension arrangement. The idea of £500 one year after death looks obscene.
On the Military Provost Guard Service, I have been interested in—indeed, obsessed by—policing and security in the MOD for a number of years. The Defence Committee asked for assurances that, when the previous Government's inquiry into the service ended, it would be consulted before any decision was taken. The commitment was made not by the present Minister, but his predecessor, who said that the Defence Committee would examine the experiment and produce a report before the implementation of any decision. I hope that the Government fulfil that commitment.
I was amused by the fact the soldiers' service will be limited to their travel-to-work areas. I recall the famous Army folk song, uttered in the era of Queen Anne, which perhaps would not apply today. It would probably go, "The Queen commands. We all obey. Over the hills as far as Wolverhampton." Anyone employed in the service in my area will, for 11 months of the year, be limited physically to Warley, Wolverhampton and the southern part of Walsall. It may not be quite the soldiering that one joined for, but the idea is right. Some people may not want to travel, or to indulge in the life and the nights out of bed that a normal soldier, sailor or air man is obliged to undertake. The scheme for the Military Provost Guard Service to relieve full-time soldiers has to be a step forward.
I enter a caveat. I am not a spokesman for the Defence Police Federation. It is the one police federation that does not need to pay people to speak on its behalf. One thing is certain—MOD policemen will be replaced. I am pleased by what the Minister has said—it will be reinforced in an inquiry that the Defence Committee is about to conduct.

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There is a critical mass in the MOD police. The Government say that it is 2,500 to 3,000. I would say that it is nearer 3,000 than 2,500. When we replace MOD police with soldiers or private security, God help us if the numbers go down to such a point that the police force becomes almost impossible to operate.
The Defence Committee is committed to many inquiries involving personnel. We are visiting the Falkland Islands. We hope to receive an invitation to visit Kosovo. We go to Northern Ireland every year. We are engaged in the continuing inquiry into Gulf war syndrome. We are engaged in a study of defence medical services. We are monitoring TA restructuring. We are looking at science and the MOD and, in particular, the Defence Evaluation and Research Agency. It is a personnel issue. In the Defence Committee's view—I say it in advance of the Committee report—if DERA is privatised, it will be an unmitigated disaster.
I know someone who could not get in the Army because he had asthma. He wanted to work within the public ethos, so he joined DERA; there are many such cases. If that organisation is shunted off into some form of semi-privatised status, it might do untold damage to its morale.
I am not certain whether our American colleagues will be prepared to be as free in sharing information with a privatised company as they have been with an agency of the Ministry of Defence. I therefore hope that my very good friend the Minister for Defence Procurement—a man of great and independent thinking, and of formidable stature—is not being bounced by the Treasury on the issue, and that the Government will not go down that route.
Mr. Brazier: I am very grateful to the hon. Gentleman—my Select Committee Chairman—for giving way on this point. Does he accept—and share my dismay—that one small indication that the decision on that critical, scientific issue may be going in the wrong direction is that the MOD's principal finance officer is chairman of the MOD sub-committee examining it?
Mr. George: I am sure that the hon. Gentleman has no intention of alleging any financial skulduggery or any impropriety—any more than I did by saying that, if the sale goes ahead and is a management buy-out, Barbados would be the appropriate place for the Committee to conduct its follow-up study of the sale. Management buy-outs, followed by a swift sell-off, usually result in a swift move to places nicer than those in which the Ministry of Defence currently operates.
The Defence Committee will continue to visit our armed forces, and to talk to their wives—and, consequently, to be brutalised.
I hope that our Committee will continue in its consensual manner. We, too, are suffering from great overstretch. The command authorities are pushing their forces intolerably. Similarly, last Session, the Committee had 100 meetings, which must be way beyond the number of sittings held by any other Select Committee. Nevertheless, we are doing our job in protecting the interests of this country and of our wonderful armed forces.
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I am an unashamed admirer of Rudyard Kipling, the most politically incorrect of all authors. In a poem on Thomas Atkins, he said:

"There'll surely come a day,

When they give you all your pay,

And treat you as a Christian ought to do,

But 'til that day comes round,

Heaven keep you safe and sound

and Thomas, Here's my great respect to you".

I hope that we will not need the intervention of the Almighty to ensure that our forces are properly paid, properly protected and properly armed. If that can be done, they will continue to serve our society, our alliance and the world community as effectively in future as, I am proud to say, they have done in the past and are doing now.
3.53 pm
Mr. Tom King: I certainly join in the final comments of the Chairman of the Select Committee on Defence, the hon. Member for Walsall, South (Mr. George), and pay tribute to the Committee's reports. I should add that I am sure that his confidence in the approach to the situation at the Defence Evaluation and Research Agency is not based on any previous acquaintanceship with Lord Gilbert on the Committee.
I have listened to the traditional—but heartfelt—tributes paid to our forces by Front Benchers on both sides of the House. However, those tributes are meaningless unless the people to whom they are paid know that those who made them really have their welfare at heart and are prepared to back up those tributes. The most obvious bit of initial training that any young officer receives is that the welfare of his men is his first responsibility. I certainly sought to employ that philosophy when I was a Minister, and I hope that current Ministers realise that the welfare of our armed forces should be their top priority if they are to achieve effective defence for our country.
I had not intended to speak in this debate—which is part of our new structure for defence debates: one debate on defence personnel, and another on defence equipment—but the issue of armed forces personnel is the greatest single challenge facing Ministers and the Ministry of Defence. I therefore regret the absence from the debate of the Secretary of State. I should not necessarily have insisted that he speak in the debate, but his presence would have been a symbol that he appreciates the serious situation facing him.
The Secretary of State did not create the current situation, but Secretaries of State for Defence have to inherit and resolve other people's problems. I had the responsibility to ensure that our country was able to discharge honourably its undertakings, whatever those might be. Nevertheless, the challenge facing the current Secretary of State is much greater than any we have faced before. I am worried about the situation, which is why I intervened on the hon. Member for Walsall, South.
As the Select Committee said, we can deal with overstretch in one of only two ways: increase recruitment or reduce commitments. The Select Committee's report on the strategic defence review was published almost a year ago, in September 1998. What has happened since then? The Minister was quite frank about what has

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happened: retention is poor; recruitment is difficult; and commitments have manifestly increased enormously. We now face an acutely worrying situation.
I tell the Minister for the Armed Forces that his speech gave me no reassurance. We know about the type of measures that he described, such as more home telephone cards. Such welfare measures are important—my God, they are—and were probably taken by us for the first time in the Gulf. However, they are only palliatives in trying to deal with the type of problems that we face. I worry acutely about whether the Government are seized of the seriousness of the problem.
I am not given much encouragement—I fear that the Select Committee will not have been either—by the Government's response on overstretch. The Select Committee devoted about 30 paragraphs of its report to the issue, but all it received from the Government in response was seven lines—in paragraph 97—stating:
"we do not believe that there is a single standard or correct method of calculating overstretch and associated family separation."
The Government went on to say that they wanted
"a greater degree of coherence across the Services…The feasibility of setting up appropriate mechanisms is being examined."
That was the totality of the Government's response to the issue of overstretch.
The hon. Member for Walsall, South knows as much about defence as any hon. Member—although I am not sure whether 20 years on the Defence Committee is an achievement or a punishment—and has a fund of knowledge. I recognise the absolute validity of his comments on overstretch. In my time as Secretary of State for Defence, there were criticisms about overstretch. I went to the Ministry of Defence from the Northern Ireland Office. Northern Ireland was the cause of unaccompanied tours. Although we had plenty of forces in Germany, those tours were accompanied, as were tours in Hong Kong and Cyprus, for example, to which people were happy to go and to take their families.
Northern Ireland injected into our forces a strong element of unaccompanied tours. Although some regiments had accompanied tours, many of them—in places such as Fort George, Londonderry and by the border—were unaccompanied. Therefore, when I went to the Ministry of Defence, I was conscious of the pressure that such tours created in the Army. I spoke with some of our service men serving in Northern Ireland—such as sergeant-majors and others with long Army careers—and asked whether they had been in Northern Ireland before, to which many said that they were on their sixth tour. The fact is that the frequency of those tours was a function of the number both of our forces and of our commitments.
In "Options for Change", I sought to tackle that problem, but the Gulf war put everything on hold. We froze everything and made no further reductions. I saw the challenge that we would have to face and my ambition was to ensure that, having made the sensible changes that were necessary following the end of the cold war and the reduction of our forces in Germany—which was the main consequence of "Options for Change"—we established some predicability about tour intervals so that people would know where they stood and we would not make unreasonable demands on them.
Mr. Brazier: I am grateful to my right hon. Friend and seek to expand the point he made, which also applies to
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the Falklands. Is there not a huge contrast in that, during our third major conflict in 20 years, the present Government have chosen not to put change on hold? They are going ahead with the cuts and the break-up of the 5th Airborne Brigade before we know when the conflict in Kosovo will be over and what the garrison situation will be there.
Mr. King: In my opinion, such action is foolish. We did not do that; we froze everything during the period of uncertainty because we could not be sure what our commitments would be and how long they would last. What the Government are doing is incredible. Obviously, the strategic defence review has been partly blown out of the water by events. The Government are not to blame for that as none of the recent major events could have been predicted—the Falklands, the Gulf or the long-term situation in the Balkans.
I watched with great disappointment because my ambition was not realised. As we moved through "Front Line First" and the defence cost studies to what seems to have been a period of continuing and permanent change, I felt deeply that the services were entitled to expect a period of stability. The Select Committee called for that on a number of occasions. I must say that I was deeply depressed by what happened. Political realities being what they were, I knew that we would face a review by the incoming Government. I hoped that they would get on with it and complete it as soon as possible so that the forces would have a measure of stability.
The Government gloried in how extensive the consultations were and how long the process lasted. I do not think that too many people within the services thanked them for that; they were longing for a conclusion and to know where they stood.
Our forces are now facing a quite exceptional additional commitment. As the Chairman of the Select Committee said, if war comes, we have to address it and our forces have to meet new commitments. The strength of the Army—and I worry about whether Ministers really understand this—is the willingness, enthusiasm and sense of responsibility of those who serve in it. When Ministers say, "Can we do it?" they have an instinctive desire to say, "Of course we can. We'll do it somehow, don't you worry. You can rely on us." Our armed forces are enthusiastic, determined not to appear inadequate and proud of what they can achieve. They face up to their responsibilities and they will do anything to meet any immediate challenge or emergency, but the present challenge is sustainability.
What is happening behind the scenes—not as a conspiracy or an undercover plot—affects every home. Every soldier serving in Kosovo is asked by his wife, "How long do you think you will be there? Will you have to go back? Do you think that you will have to go to Northern Ireland if problems continue there?" The frequency of commitment represents a serious challenge. That point was made by my hon. Friend the Member for Mid-Sussex (Mr. Soames), the predecessor of the Minister for the Armed Forces. I referred to unaccompanied tours and the need for some tour intervals in terms of family welfare; he spoke about the gap between tours providing an opportunity for training. It is no good paying tribute to how wonderfully trained our forces are—because they have had the opportunity for training—if we are so

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committing them to operational duties and activities that they never have time to pull back, take a break and get some more training.
Our armed forces comprise two types of person. Some young men and women may not be sure about what they want to do or they may want to see something of the world, so they enlist on a short-service basis. They may start on that basis, but then decide that they like the Army and stay on. Others wish to make the Army their career. They are the skeletal fabric of our armed forces—the majors, the captains, the sergeant-majors and the senior non-commissioned officers. They are the corporals commanding the brick whom the hon. Member for Tatton (Mr. Bell) knows so well and has seen operating in Northern Ireland and in Bosnia. Those people are the fabric of the organisation into which new recruits come. They provide leadership for the young men and women to whom the main recruitment drive will be directed. However, one sergeant serving his seventh tour of Northern Ireland told me, "I'm in trouble at home. The wife won't put up with it any more, so I'm getting out." That is the challenge.
I do not know whether Ministers accept this, but they have taken on another Northern Ireland. When I became Secretary of State for Defence, Northern Ireland was effectively the only place for unaccompanied tours. At that time, about 10,000 troops were sent on unaccompanied tours in Northern Ireland. Some of the other troops there were accompanied. Now, the number of troops on unaccompanied tours has been doubled. There must be at least 10,000 troops on active service in the Balkans. The position is unsustainable.
If I sound somewhat emotional, it is because I care deeply about our armed forces. One of two things will happen. Our armed forces will get thinner and thinner, and it will become a vicious circle. As my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon, South (Mr. Ottaway) among others, including the Select Committee, said, retention will gradually decline so that our forces will no longer have the key people that they need. Then, when the regiments change over, the outgoing regiment will have to borrow from the regiment that has just returned. Some people will do that for a short time, but eventually they will say, "I'm sorry, but I can't do it again. It is either my family or my job and I have to put my family first." As a result, our forces could rapidly crumble away.
I accept that the new situation in the Balkans demands a high standard of soldiering. We have paid tribute to our armed forces, and many television journalists who have recently come back from Kosovo pay the most glowing tributes to the way in which our armed forces conducted themselves. That is because they are highly trained and experienced. If that training starts to fall away and our forces do not cope quite so well, they will start suffering casualties as mistakes are made. The vicious circle will expand, there will be problems with retention and people will lose confidence in those with whom they are serving.
That is the challenge for the Government. The Chairman of the Select Committee is absolutely right to say that meeting that challenge will cost more money. There is no doubt about that. We have taken on extra commitments so we shall have to revisit the defence budget. It is not enough for the Prime Minister to say, "We will play our role in the world". It is quite clear that he will now have to fund that commitment.
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An exceptional effort will be needed on recruitment and retention, well beyond what the Minister has announced. The messages being given to us resemble those of a normal armed forces debate, but something exceptional is required. The Minister has been unable to answer questions about tour intervals or about how long we will be in Kosovo, and with how many troops.
The Minister has a duty to protect the integrity and capability of our armed forces by insuring against the worst. It is his urgent responsibility to take on the challenges that I have outlined. My sole purpose in speaking is to try to make the Government understand that the Select Committee's report is right. A major challenge lies ahead of the Government, and they must show our armed forces that they are prepared to address it.
4.11 pm
Laura Moffatt: It is easy for Members of Parliament to sound like Mr. Grace of "Are You Being Served?", who comes down from the board room to the shop floor to tell the workers, "You are all doing very well", but has no idea what is going on. However, the Members present in the Chamber clearly care about our armed forces.
I should like to share the experiences that I had when I accompanied the hon. Member for Romsey (Mr. Colvin) and my hon. Friend the Minister for the Armed Forces to Italy and Macedonia at the height of the bombing expeditions. Seeing people in action has left a lasting impression on me. We visited many bases in Italy, then went on to NATO headquarters in Macedonia. Before the British troops arrived, the headquarters building was a shoe factory that had been empty for five years. It was in a disgraceful state—filthy and uninhabitable—but within six weeks, it was clean and orderly, and three hot meals were being served each day. The improvement was admirable, and I send my best wishes to everyone we met.
In addition to seeing bases, we went to the front line in Kosovo, and a general told me that the Prime Minister could not possibly be taken there because it was far too dangerous. I thanked him for sharing that heartening information. We visited camps in which our armed forces were working diligently to provide clean water. The visit was an experience that I shall never forget. I saw professionals getting on with the job that they had been highly trained to do. We train them not only to fight, but to be able to deal easily with the locals, humanely and with understanding. They related well to what was happening in Kosovo, and they are doing much good.
On the ground, our troops were fully occupied, but it was different for those serving on HMS Invincible, where I was lucky enough to spend a night. The sailors said that their lives were like "Groundhog Day". It was symbolically important to place HMS Invincible in the area, and the ship was intercepted in order to be sent there specifically. The crew was pleased to be there, but the sailors felt that they wanted to take part more meaningfully, which was impossible as they were there to be used only if needed.
The major complaint of the sailors was lack of information. I was pleased by the Minister's announcement about ensuring that we upgrade technology to let armed forces personnel contact friends and family more easily. One young officer told me that he received all his information from his wife during his weekly

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10-minute free call. It is sad to think that someone so close to what was happening should find out about it from back home.
We must modernise our armed forces' equipment. On-line newspapers are essential, and information available to HMS Invincible was later taken by helicopter to HMS Newcastle. Satellite television is also critical. The Army had access to satellite television, but it was not available to those who served on HMS Newcastle. E-mail is a crucial means of contact; indeed, many Members of Parliament use it. One computer terminal is not enough—the armed forces need more, dedicated to allowing our personnel to pass messages home.
I am pleased to hear that 70 per cent. of armed forces posts are now open to women. However, unless we modernise, accommodation will not be available for women on ships. Modernisation is not appropriate for HMS Newcastle. The ship is an old lady, and it is not worth making the change, so consequently it has to be an all-male ship. I welcome the changes on HMS Invincible that will allow 110 women to play a part in engineering and in other areas. We must continue that process.
We must also modernise by allowing people to participate in debate. The armed forces are ready for a proper debate on whether homosexuals should be able to serve. The forces are grown-up people, fully able to consider that question. It would distress me if a decision was forced on the House of Commons. It would be better if an inclusive way forward could be found, so that the armed forces could say that life had moved on in many areas and change was acceptable. They could then debate areas in which there would be no problem, and those in which there would be difficulties. We should discuss the matter with our armed forces personnel. I do not want a human rights decision to be imposed on the Government. I sincerely hope that we will take the step ourselves.
I saw our professional forces working together—Army, Navy and Royal Air Force—but it was tremendously uplifting to see them work well with forces from other countries. We should be extremely proud of them.
My hon. Friend the Member for Walsall, South (Mr. George) has alluded to the investigation made by the Select Committee on Defence into defence medical services. As a former nurse, I have taken tremendous interest in that, and I know the difficulties.
The Government have tackled the problems of overstretch. Many methods can be used to encourage people into the armed forces. We cannot rely on just one means. Encouragement cannot rely only on pay. We should be proud that the numbers entering and leaving the forces are almost in balance. In fact, the number entering is increasing, and we should congratulate the Government on that. I very much welcome the increase of 2,000 in establishment for the defence medical services. We must encourage people to volunteer for the reserve forces for the defence medical service.
My word of caution results from my experience of recruitment campaigns in the NHS. We face enormous difficulties because of the enormous difficulties that the NHS faces. I only hope that the discussions between top-level NHS personnel and armed forces personnel are
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going well. We must encourage our trusts to get nurses and doctors to think carefully about joining the armed forces in the medical service.
Mr. Brazier: Does the hon. Lady agree that it is time that the Ministry of Defence took the British Medical Association's military committee and the nursing unions seriously on this subject?
Laura Moffatt: I believe that that is beginning to happen, and that pressure is being brought to bear by the Select Committee on those concerned to get around the table. Those bodies must understand the difficulties in terms of recruitment.
Having spent two years on the Defence Select Committee and having visited our armed forces personnel, I can say that it has been a tremendous experience. It has enriched my life—although I doubt whether I have enriched the lives of the armed forces personnel.
I repeat that it is easy from this cosy Chamber to say that our armed forces are a wonderful bunch, but we have a duty to make sure that they are highly trained, and I think that the Government are tackling that well. We must ensure that they are provided with the best equipment, and smart procurement is beginning to do that job. We must ensure that they have a modern outlook, particularly in terms of encouraging those from different backgrounds and women into the armed forces.
We must ensure that our armed forces are commanded by people of stature and principle, as that is important to keep the confidence of the armed forces. Those armed forces must know that they have the whole-hearted support of the House.
4.23 pm
Mr. Mike Hancock: I welcome the hon. Member for Croydon, South (Mr. Ottaway) to his Front-Bench post and I wish him well for the future.
I wish to address one of the points made by the hon. Member for Crawley (Laura Moffatt). She referred to communications from ships or shore to the UK. That is all very well, but we must make sure that e-mail is a two-way thing, and that kit for families in the UK is provided at a time and a place that are convenient for them. I represent many service families, and I have learned of the great difficulties that they face and the distress that is caused when telephones are out of action or delays occur, and when people have to wait many hours for their turn to use the telephone. It is no good extending capability if that is done in only one direction. If the Ministry of Defence is serious about that issue, it must address the situation here as well as abroad.
Like many others, I welcome the change in the style of defence debates, which is long overdue. The old single-service debates had long passed their useful purpose. A general debate covering procurement, the general role of our armed forces and personnel matters is a more serious attempt to get to grips with the problems.
The debate is opportune, as it follows yesterday's publication of the National Audit Office's report on major projects. If I were serving in the armed forces today, I would be concerned that a £3.5 billion overspend is identified in the report at the same time as we are seriously undermanned and overstretched. I hope that we can address some of those problems.

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I was somewhat heartened when the front page of last night's edition of The Portsmouth News—representing the home of the Royal Navy—carried a story by the paper's defence correspondent, Adrian Wills, who was able to get a quote from the Defence Secretary on overspend. The right hon. Gentleman referred to great mistakes, and said:
"I find this personally offensive as Defence Secretary, as our troops don't get their equipment on time and they don't get it in an efficient way."
I could not agree more. There is no better way of sapping the morale and confidence of our forces than to tell them that they must do more with less, and that the promise of new equipment is many years late.
Of the 25 projects identified in the report, eight will miss their in-service date by more than five years. What on earth do Ministers believe that will do to the morale in the services? The average delay for any project assessed was three and a half years, and only two of the 25 will meet their in-service targets. We have heard that those 25 projects have overrun, and overspent to a cost of more than £3 million. I would be interested to know by how much the next 50 projects in the procurement budget have overrun, and how much they have cost. Those costs are important.
It is all about what resources are available—whether it is to keep pilots in the RAF, or to keep ships at sea with a full crew deployed for less time. It must be disheartening and frustrating for sailors in the Portsmouth area to read that the crewing costs for HMS Intrepid—which has been tied up in the docks since 1991—have been in excess of £12 million.
Fully trained and well-qualified sailors have been on HMS Intrepid for that period. At the same time, we have sent 46 ships to sea in the last year undermanned. Where is the logic in that? HMS Intrepid has been in reserve since 1991, and probably will be there until she is finally scrapped around 2004. What on earth do Ministers believe that that expenditure and that waste have done to service morale on board undermanned ships in the Adriatic and the Gulf?
Was it right to have sent HMS Invincible to sea on her last deployment, even though she was delayed coming home? No effort was made to bring the crew size of HMS Invincible up to its recommended complement during that deployment. At no time did HMS Invincible have her full complement on board. Those issues are real, and difficult for crews to understand and for commanders to manage—but they do it.
As hon. Members have rightly recognised, this House and our nation owe a debt of gratitude to those men and women who serve in our armed forces. From time to time, they question the decision-making processes in the House and the Ministry of Defence. They do so openly and—as the hon. Member for Walsall, South (Mr. George) suggested—in a rather pushy and forceful way, which left the hon. Gentleman in no doubt of the sincerity of their concerns about the issues.
Recently, the hon. Member for Salisbury (Mr. Key), the Minister of State and I went to visit our airmen who had been flying missions to and from Former Yugoslavia, including Serbia and Kosovo. It was with great pleasure—and with a great deal of pride for all three of us—that we met those men and women who have dedicated their lives to the service of this country. Many are very young, and they have served their country with great distinction on three occasions in times of war.
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We met one squadron which had flown more than 900 missions. However, on leaving Bari, they expected not to return to the United Kingdom or to Germany, but to be sent to the Gulf—another deployment on the back of their current one. They told us of the strain, not only on the pilots who had flown 900 missions, but on the several hundred men and women who put the planes in the air, kept the pilots briefed, and kept them fed and safe on the ground. The enormous strain on those units was apparent to all. People did not spare our embarrassment by confronting us with their strong concerns.
The RAF is not unique; the experience is the same for the Royal Navy.
Mr. Key: I agree with the hon. Gentleman's every word. At one point, the small number of pilots, who had carried out more than 900 bombing missions, realised that their night-flying and low-flying skills had slipped from lack of use, so they returned to the UK in the middle of the conflict to get their training up to standard. Does he agree that that was a particular mark of the professionalism of those RAF people? I bet that not another air force in the world would do that.
Mr. Hancock: I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. I support his remarks. We were all gobsmacked when the young wing-commander in charge told us that seven members of his squadron had returned to the UK to bring their night-flying skills up to date. That was a measure of the commitment not only of those young men but of the RAF, because it ensured that there were people with the competence to carry out those missions. However, one might seriously question whether their training was sufficient in the first place, because, although those young pilots had been deployed in a battle scenario, they had to return to the UK to ensure their continued competence to fly those missions.
During the past two years, 19 ships of the Royal Navy were deployed for more than six months; it had not originally been planned to deploy any of them for that length of time. However, the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs continues to widen our commitments and to take on more pressured jobs that pose more problems for the Royal Navy. It is neither right nor fair that significant shortfalls in personnel are still a major problem. The Navy alone is short of 1,600 personnel; in the Army, the figure is 4,700, and in the RAF, it is 1,800. Those figures were given in parliamentary answers as recently as early June. Ships at sea—HMS Gloucester, HMS Exeter, HMS Birmingham, HMS Illustrious and HMS Sheffield—have significant shortfalls in particular warfare branches. Those branches are vital both in wartime and, more important for the crews, in maintaining the defensive capabilities of the ships.
As other hon. Members have pointed out, we continue to have a problem of pilots leaving. The Navy is short of about 12 pilots and seven squadrons are undermanned. We are aware of the saga of the plight of RAF pilots, who constantly decide to leave the service early, and of the Government's approach to that problem.
I was heartened by the Minister of State's response to those pilots, some of whom were weeks away from having to make a decision whether to leave the RAF. All of them thoroughly enjoyed their life as pilots; they were grateful

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that the nation had invested £3 million in training them. However, many of them had already decided to leave, and were in their final two years of service. They told the Minister, the hon. Member for Salisbury and me of some of the problems that they faced at the age of 32 or 33. They had joined the service as unmarried young men, and enjoyed their life, their training and the experience of developing new skills. As they grew older, they had married and started families. At that point, they faced decisions about their long-term future.
One of them calculated that, if he left the RAF when he was 39—having given 20 years of service—he would leave with a £55,000 cash pay-out, plus a fairly substantial pension. He suggested that he might stay in the service if part of that £55,000 could be paid at times when it was most needed—for example, when the family were looking for their first permanent home, or wanted to pay for the children's education, or for the other things needed by a young family. He put that point to the Minister, who said that he would find out whether such payments could be included in a retention package for pilots.
An American pilot, who was on attachment with the Harriers, told us, and had no doubt told those pilots, that, as soon as he left the United States, his pay was tax-free. Perhaps that point should be considered when we send people to the front line on active service. We must consider what can be done about the retention package. That matter applies not only to the front-line personnel such as pilots, but to air and ground crews.
Like the hon. Member for Crawley (Mr. Soames), I was mightily impressed by the number of women who now hold senior positions and control the effectiveness of squadrons of aircraft. They are responsible for the engineering capabilities of three of the four squadrons we visited. It is a pleasure to see the success that they have made of their careers in the armed forces.
I wholly accept that major breakthroughs have been made in recruitment; I applaud them. It would be silly and selfish if any of us failed to appreciate what Ministers have done in encouraging recruitment to our armed forces. However, the problem is retention. As fast as we recruit personnel, we lose them. We must be more positive and proactive in considering what can be done to retain service men. As the representative of so many service personnel, I am aware that housing and long-term employment are among the biggest problems that they face. They do not want to live in married quarters for ever; they do not want to live for ever in multi-occupation in cities such as Portsmouth, and in the surrounding area. They want better opportunities to buy a permanent base while they are still young enough to put down roots somewhere. We should examine how we can help service men to achieve that goal. We must do much more if we are to keep those people.
We must also address some of the issues that affect the forces and the civilians around them. In past debates, I have spoken of the need to address our obligations to past service men and women—I hope that the Under-Secretary will consider those issues. I want to tackle some of them today. I was disappointed in the most unhelpful—indeed,
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apparently unfair—dismissal of the points that I made, and that had been made many times, on behalf of the nuclear test veterans. I quote the Under-Secretary's reply:
"The hon. Gentleman said that the case of the nuclear test veterans had not been examined. The case has been extremely well examined. I regret that he does not accept the answers that we, and the best scientific advice, have come up with. The case has been considered by the National Radiological Protection Board, not once but twice. People are entitled to make criticisms, but if they do so from a scientific standpoint, they should do it in proper scientific papers. Those papers should be published in peer reviewed journals so that they can be subjected to the scientific method."—[Official Report, 10 June 1999; Vol. 332, c. 873.]
We are talking about a period from the early 1950s until the beginning of the 1960s, when young men aged 19 were asked to sweep down the decks of ships that had sailed through nuclear bomb clouds. In shorts and khaki shirts, they brushed down those decks. We are talking about men who were asked to pick up debris on islands where nuclear devices had been exploded, and who were not given proper protection or clothing. In the main, they were national service men, who had been in ordinary jobs. Many of them were subjected to horrendous illnesses, and we asked them produce that sort of evidence. We as a nation owe those men and their families a great debt, and we must do all we can to help them. Like many of them, I was hurt by the dismissive way in which the issue was treated the last time.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence (Mr. John Spellar): I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman cannot accept scientific analysis. Once again, he has come up with emotive arguments, but has not dealt with the fundamental issue, which is that two scientific studies, properly published, have indicated no greater incidence of cancers and other conditions among nuclear test veterans compared with the general population. If there is an argument to be made against those studies, a proper scientific study must be carried out, published and subjected to proper scientific criticism. That is the way in which we make decisions; we do not base our decisions on arguments that do not use objective figures or on emotive statements.
Mr. Hancock: That is a fair challenge, but let me challenge the Minister. These people do not have the resources or the scientific background to do what he says that they should do. They are normal men who, when they did their service for this country, were subjected to duties that no one in this room today would volunteer to carry out, and they and their children have suffered because of that. Lives have been lost.
Is the Minister prepared to state that the Ministry of Defence will fund a study on behalf of the veterans—a final conclusive study? Will he take up the matter with the veterans, make them that offer and give them the opportunity that they need? They do not have the necessary resources to do it themselves—many of the men are now in their late 60s and early 70s, and many have not worked for many years because of illness. Do not, in a cavalier and dismissive way, suggest that someone will finance a £1-million study—that is not a viable suggestion. The Minister uses the same excuse that the Conservative Government used. Let us be more constructive and more helpful to the veterans.
The second issue is that of the Gurkha soldiers, and I am delighted that so many hon. Members have already raised it. My association with the Gurkhas in Hampshire

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goes back 20 years. I was proud on behalf of the county to present the Gurkhas with the freedom of Hampshire in recognition of their long and devoted service to the nation and the role that they have played in the community of Hampshire, especially in the Church Cookham and Aldershot area.
I welcome the promise of the Minister for the Armed Forces to review the position, but the tripartite agreement between India, Nepal and the United Kingdom is flawed, because there is, in effect, a veto on the part of Nepal and India. We all know that we have done a great injustice to the Gurkhas and their families, who have served this country so well. No one can doubt their commitment—one only has to spend five minutes in the museum in Winchester to learn what those men have done for this country during the past 100 years.
Mr. Cotter: I am sure that we welcomed the commitment made by the Minister this afternoon to carry out some sort of review, but does my hon. Friend accept that we are talking about Sergeant Balaram, who died only two weeks ago and whose family is in grave circumstances? Should we not be insisting that something be done now in respect of that individual case—perhaps a discretionary payment or some other such measure?
Mr. Hancock: Of course we should, and I hope that the Under-Secretary will address that issue when he winds up the debate. Both Gurkha soldiers died in the service of this country; both died to save the lives of others. What a pity it is that the families of both are not entitled to the same compensation to safeguard their future. Both of them gave their lives on behalf of this nation and its ideals, so we should at least extend the courtesy of ensuring that both of them can be treated the same way in death and that the compensation due to the families of both of them is the same. We should not discriminate because the family of one of them happens to live on the side of mountain in Nepal, rather than in the United Kingdom.
The issue is not merely that of pensions, but of the rights of Gurkha soldiers when they cease to serve as soldiers. I have made representations to both the Ministry of Defence and the Home Office on behalf of Gurkha ex-soldiers who have not wanted to return to Nepal, because their chances of obtaining work there are extremely slim. They now work as laundry men on Royal Navy ships, but they are being hounded out of Britain by the immigration service and told that, if they want those jobs, they will in future have to apply from Hong Kong, or they will have to apply in Nepal for citizenship. Do we treat soldiers from other countries who have served in the British Army the same way? I think not.
The Gurkhas have long since proved their devotion and commitment. It is about time that this nation stopped saying how grateful we are to them and how proud we are that they serve in our armed forces, and instead showed them how proud we are by treating them the same as other soldiers. Let us give the Gurkhas the equality that all Members of this House demand from each other.
The next issue is the on-going problem of asbestos-affected service men. I should like to bring the Minister's attention to the case of Mr. Leslie Terry,
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of 4 Dale Park house, Portsmouth. Mr. Terry's case is well recorded and well documented and I wrote to the Minister for the Armed Forces about it. His reply was:
"In the case of Mr. Terry, as his exposure to asbestos dust and fibre in the Royal Navy was before 15 May 1987, he is prevented by law from receiving compensation from the Ministry of Defence. The legal position is that even if an ex-Serviceman only now discovers he has asbestos related disease, he cannot sue for compensation if exposure was before the repeal of Section 10 of The Crown Proceedings Act 1947. Given that controls over the use of asbestos were introduced in 1970, this is and will be the case for the vast majority of ex-Service claimants. (The time between exposure to asbestos dust and fibre and the first signs of disease is typically between 15 and 40 plus years)."
Therefore, the MOD has no jurisdiction or right to help Mr. Terry.
Mr. Terry served in the Royal Navy from the age of 19 until the end of the second world war. Throughout that time, he served on board ships and, because he was a stoker, he was exposed to the delagging of boilers. His life is now threatened by illness, and there is ample proof as to how and why the illness came about. It is not good enough for Ministers to say that, if exposure to asbestos occurred before 1987, this man has no claim. Asbestos does not recognise the artificial barriers that we have erected, and, when he joined the Royal Navy, Mr. Terry did not know that he would have no recourse to compensation.
No reasonable person would suggest that service men should be treated differently from the miners who have recently, and rightly, been given blanket compensation for illnesses related to the mining industry, with no discrimination based on when, how or where the illnesses were contracted. The same should now be given to service men, whether they served in the Royal Navy or the Army, and to civilian workers similarly affected. We need to tackle that issue. As the Chairman of the Select Committee on Defence, the hon. Member for Walsall, South said, we need also, with vigour and enthusiasm, to continue to address the issue of the Gulf war veterans.
We must also deal with the latest shameful example of the way in which the Ministry of Defence treats its personnel. I refer to the two crew members who were flying the Chinook helicopter than crashed on the Mull of Kintyre. Those men are dead and buried, but they are also shamed by the report of the latest inquiry, and that is unforgivable. Evidence now suggests that the inquiries were flawed, and the evidence used needs to be re-examined.
I did not, for one minute, accept a word of the Minister's answer to my question about that crash. I cannot believe that nobody in the Ministry of Defence recognises the moral obligation to re-examine that case. What effect do Ministry of Defence personnel think such cases have on the morale of pilots and ground crew? Those two officers—two of the top pilots in the RAF—have had their careers stained. It is bad enough that they were killed in that crash, but it is worse still that the stigma attached to them by the inquiries remains.
Dr. Julian Lewis: In support of what the hon. Gentleman is saying, I draw the attention of the House to the fact that the rules for the allocation of blame in such accidents state that dead flying crew personnel should never be blamed unless there is no doubt whatsoever that

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they were responsible. As the Chinook crash remains a mystery, there is doubt. The rules are therefore being broken and the men are unjustifiably being blamed.
Mr. Hancock: I could not agree more. It is a shame on this nation that senior officers and Defence Ministers are prepared to allow that disgraceful situation to continue by not permitting another inquiry. I do not know what it would take to make the Minister reconsider that issue. If the report in Computer Weekly is not enough, sheer compassion towards the families of those two service men should be enough to make Ministers say, "Let's give them the benefit of the doubt, re-examine the case and take care of the problem."
If the Minister is so convinced that he is right, will he explain to the House tonight—I am sure that he has been briefed on this—how the Chinook's hydraulic system became contaminated? Your inquiries did not explain that—
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Lord): Order. The hon. Gentleman must use the correct parliamentary language.
Mr. Hancock: I apologise, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
The Minister will appreciate that the inquiries into the crash did not establish how the contamination occurred, and answers to parliamentary questions have not established how it happened. I am sure that the Minister must have been told how the Chinook's hydraulic system was contaminated and what part that might have played in causing the crash.
Mr. Key: I am delighted that the hon. Gentleman has also taken up this cause, on which there is cross-party agreement. All three main parties have considered the matter most carefully, and we understand the sensitive situation faced by Ministers. It is extremely difficult for them, but it cannot be allowed to go away. A fundamental injustice has been done to those two young men and their families. This is not, as the hon. Gentleman knows, simply a matter of arguments about technology and computer software; there is also a question about legal processes in Scotland and in England. The case will continue, and I hope that Ministers will realise that they must consider it in a new light.
Mr. Hancock: I acknowledge the hon. Gentleman's support. His colleagues on the Select Committee were very supportive when I tried to persuade the Committee to consider the matter. I shall work with them and hon. Members from both sides of the House to try to get justice for Jonathan Tapper and Rick Cook. We can do nothing for them except restore to them the honour that they deserve. The RAF should want to pay that debt of honour to them. I hope that Ministers will do all that they can to prevail on people in the Ministry of Defence to allow a third inquiry to take place and questions to be answered. People have a legitimate reason for asking those questions and for expecting them to be answered correctly in due course.
I welcomed the remarks of the Minister for the Armed Forces about the role of the Military Provost Guard Service and his recommended changes. As I said in my
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intervention, those changes are reasonable, sensible and long overdue. We should welcome the redeployment of 1,600 service personnel in a role that will be much more rewarding and fulfilling for them and the nation's defence.
The issue of the military defence police remains to be resolved, and the hon. Member for Walsall, South was right to flag that up again. I know from my involvement with MOD policemen in my area that they will want to comment on their future.
In the past few months, we have had three or four opportunities to discuss defence-related issues. We know that no one could have predicted the dramatic and dreadful consequences of the collapse in the stability of the former Yugoslav republics.
As a nation, we are fully committed to playing our part. We will not be out of Bosnia—with the best will in the world, a sensitive presence will be required—for a decade or more to come. At least a generation will have had to grow up with some semblance of peace before Bosnia is secure. The democratic processes there are not stable; we need to give much more help.
It is obvious to anyone who has even just glimpsed at the situation in Kosovo that the province will be a volatile issue for years to come. Our on-going commitment must a be real and proper one. The style of soldiering will undoubtedly change, but the requirement for a British presence is apparent to all.
We would be foolish if we did not think that that will have a knock-on effect on the defence capabilities of the British armed forces—whether naval personnel providing air support in the Adriatic or men and women on the ground. Such support will go on, but at a price. That price will be continued overstretch. Equipment will continue to be run down and deficits in training will continue to open. To address such problems, we must secure the commitment that the procurement budget will not degenerate into farce.
When the report was published last year, Ministers said that it was not their responsibility and that it was about the failure of the outgoing Tory Government. This year's report is about this Government's performance. It has examined their performance and, my God, it has not been much better—has it?
Something must be done, and in a way that gives the men and women of our armed forces confidence that they will get the kit and equipment that they need, that they will get it on time and that they will not have to pay a price for it by continuing to have to work, undermanned time and again, in pretty dour conditions, often with substandard equipment.
We owe our forces more than that. As the right hon. Member for Bridgwater (Mr. King) said, if we are to say, "Thank you", we must do so in a way that they can believe. The best way is to deliver the best equipment at the best price and on time. We must get that right, and get the equipment to them now, when they need it. If not, morale problems in our armed forces will deteriorate. The one thing of which we are all sure—are we not?—is that overstretch is having a dramatic effect not only on families but on the men and women who are at the sharp end of our armed forces. Before long, they will tell us so by leaving the armed forces in increasing numbers, and we will not be able to stop it.
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Mr. John Grogan: I shall make three points in a brief contribution to this debate.
First, I shall address the role of women in our armed forces, the figures for which are now quite striking. Of all jobs in the Army, 70 per cent. are now open to women—as opposed to less than 50 per cent. a few years ago. Of jobs in the Royal Navy, 75 per cent. are open to women, as are 96 per cent. of jobs in the Royal Air Force.
If we are to inspire the generation of young women in schools such as Tadcaster grammar and Selby high school in my constituency to join the armed forces—those with an aptitude and skills with which they may make a contribution in the next century—we must recognise the role that women have played in our armed forces over many years, particularly during the second world war.
We are one of the few countries that fought in the second world war not to have a memorial to women who fought. In Australia, Canada, the United States and New Zealand there is such a war memorial, but in Britain all we have is an empty plinth in Trafalgar square. It is time that we filled that space, because it would inspire a generation of our young women to join the armed forces.
It is worth reflecting on the fact that 700,000 women fought in a variety of roles in the second world war. They were air gunners in Britain and pilots of unarmed planes abroad—Amy Johnson was killed flying such a plane. Women were agents behind enemy lines, too. Also, of course, they were members of the Women's Royal Voluntary Service and air raid protection wardens. That must be recognised.
Mr. Martlew: I agree with everything that my hon. Friend says, but I am sure that he did not mean to miss out those who worked in the munitions factories. I must declare an interest: my mother was badly injured in a munitions factory. It is time that the Government set up a memorial to the women whose major contribution enabled us to win the war.
Mr. Grogan: I agree.
Fairly recently, the Daily Mail pointed out that women who contributed to the war effort probably outnumbered men. We must recognise the roles played by the mothers and grandmas of today's young women if we are to inspire them.
I, like many hon. Members, welcome the commitment that has been made regarding Gurkhas' pensions. The figures are stark. Sergeant Balaram's widow will get an annual pension of £770. A British staff sergeant of equivalent rank would get £15,000. The words of Sergeant Balaram's widow, as reported in the Daily Mirror, struck a chord with me. She said:
"I am sure the British army will look after us—maybe."
There must be no "maybes". The only possible—the only really acceptable—outcome of the review would be full pension rights for Gurkhas. The 1947 tripartite agreement between Britain, India and Nepal need not be an obstacle to that. Amendments have been made to that agreement; further amendments can be made.
The issue of pensions for the Gurkhas reminded me of a case that came up in my constituency which, although it involved a very different group of people, shows that, when we talk of the armed forces, we should also think
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of the terms and conditions of the many people who may not be members of the armed forces but who support them in many different ways.
One of the first letters that I received when I was elected Member of Parliament for Selby was from Mrs. Sheila Steenson, a long-term unit cleaner at Imphal barracks in Fulford in York. She is employed on an agency basis by the Navy Institutes Army and Air Force, and she has the responsible job of cleaning very secure accommodation—the officers and sergeants messes. She gave me a surprising letter from the NAAFI pension fund, saying:
"Naafi carries out the cleaning tasks as agent for the Armed Services on repayment by them of all charges. They repay wages, and over the years they have developed a gratuity/terminal benefits system which we apply as agent. Because of this system, the category of Unit Cleaner has never been eligible to join the Naafi pension fund."
A gratuity terminal benefit system seems to me to be more appropriate for a student doing a holiday job in a restaurant than for someone who serves our armed forces for many years.
Very recently, after a long campaign headed by Mrs. Steenson, I was delighted to receive a letter from the Under-Secretary of State for Defence, my hon. Friend the Member for Warley (Mr. Spellar), confirming:
"The NAAFI Main Board has now reviewed its position and agreed at its meeting on 26 March to invite the Unit Cleaners to join the pension fund".
It may seem a small matter, but there are 270 such employees in the country, and it is important that we concern ourselves with their terms and conditions.
Finally, I shall discuss compensation. I welcome the fact that the Government are soon to produce a consultation paper on the subject. In a recent ministerial reply, my hon. Friend the Minister for the Armed Forces said that that issue could be more complicated than expected—which is probably true of most political problems. I also note that he promises a paper mid-year. We are pretty nearly in the middle of the year, are we not? It is 1 July. I note what he said in his opening remarks. Such a paper is needed.
We should reflect, as a House, that it is only 10 years since we passed the Crown Proceedings (Armed Forces) Act 1987, which for the first time allowed members of the armed forces to claim compensation from the Ministry of Defence when they were badly injured, if they could prove negligence. That is often very hard to prove against the mighty Ministry of Defence. Some people have suggested that the onus of proof should be changed and that the Ministry of Defence should have to prove negligence on the part of service men and women who are injured.
The figure of £27 million may seem high, but when the 1987 Act was passed the Government assumed that, at 1987 prices, £15 million would have been paid out after 10 years. The sum is not that much more than was expected, given the nature of inflation. However, it is an area that needs to be considered. Members of the armed forces expect to put their lives on the line, but they expect also due care and attention from the Ministry of Defence and proper compensation when things go wrong.
A feature of the Defence team is that they have tried to reflect in practical ways the deep respect and regard with which the armed forces are held in the Chamber.

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They have tried to manifest that regard in personnel policies. It is not only a matter of retention, although it is important to keep the ablest of our young men and women in the armed forces once they have joined them and to encourage them to consider it to be a career for life rather than for a few years. In many instances, it is a question of doing the right thing, of implementing natural justice, and of putting right wrongs that should have been put right long ago.
5.6 pm
Mr. Michael Colvin: The hon. Member for Selby (Mr. Grogan) is right to draw attention to the problems of compensation. I join him in congratulating the Minister for the Armed Forces on his announcement that the Ministry of Defence and the Department of Social Security will be jointly reviewing arrangements for compensating members of the armed forces who suffer illness, injury or death as a result of their work.
No doubt the consultation paper will appear before the House rises for the summer recess. That will bring the number of consultation papers issued by the Government to almost 200. It is all very well to go through the process of consultation, but it tends to delay action. Consult by all means, but if a way could be found of speeding up the process, that would be much appreciated. Following the consultation, it will be the armed forces Bill of 2001 that will introduce a new scheme of compensation. That means that the scheme will not be effective until 2003. That is too long to wait for a change in the existing regime.
The hon. Member for Selby referred also to the importance of women in the defence of the realm, in whatever role. I much endorse what he had to say about that. In Select Committee terms, the last bastion or the last male preserve has been breached with the arrival in the Defence Committee of the hon. Members for Crawley (Laura Moffatt) and for Stockton, South (Ms Taylor). I warmly congratulate them on climbing the learning curve with enormous speed.
I congratulate the hon. Member for Crawley on her contribution to the debate. I was with her on the visits to our forces in Macedonia, the Adriatic and Italy. She will recall that our very first meeting was at Vicenza, which was the headquarters for all the air operations which were being undertaken. She will remember what the United States air force general had to say about the air operation. I will not use the typically lurid American terms which he used to describe it, but he certainly indicated to us—my right hon. Friend the Minister for the Armed Forces was present—that we should have bombed Belgrade far harder and earlier on instead of having targets all around Serbia. He said that really hard strikes on Belgrade on day one would have had a profound effect on Mr. Milosevic and on the Serb people. I think that he was absolutely right. The general also deplored the fact that it took 72 hours to get approval for individual air strikes. That was too long. Many of the hold-ups were apparently in the White House.
Now that the operation is virtually concluded, although it has already been accepted by the House generally that the job of peacekeeping will run for years to come, it is important that there is a full and independent inquiry into the conduct of the war and the diplomatic action that led
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up to it. We had that after the Falklands war and the Gulf war. I think that such a inquiry should now take place after the war in the Balkans.
I know that the Foreign Affairs Select Committee will be undertaking its own inquiry. The Defence Committee has said that it will undertake one. It may be that the two Select Committees will join forces to take evidence in some instances. An independent inquiry into the conduct of the diplomatic representations and activities, and then the war, is also extremely important. That will run on to the peacekeeping operation as well.
In her excellent speech, the hon. Member for Crawley referred to the difficulty of changing our laws to permit homosexuals to serve in the armed forces. She made the valid point that that will vary from one force to another, and possibly even from one unit to another.
We saw evidence of a similar situation with regard to women when we visited the Royal Navy in the Adriatic sea. On HMS Invincible, with a crew of 1,200, there were many women serving—about 10 per cent. of the crew, I think—with no difficulty at all. It worked superbly. However, on the Newcastle, with a crew of about 200, there were no women on board at all, simply because such a ship does not have the facilities to keep the sexes apart, and all sorts of difficulties could arise. The example of HMS Invincible proves that the rules can be adjusted to take account of the units involved.
I am very sorry, as are other hon. Members, about the poor attendance at this debate. When I entered the House, a debate on any defence matter was a big occasion and the House was always full. That may reflect the composition of the House. In those days, as an ex-soldier, I would never dare to take part in a defence debate, because the House was stuffed full of retired soldiers, sailors and airmen, all covered in medals, and it would be more than I dared do to venture into what I saw as their preserve.
These days, it is important for us to try to preserve a military connection in the House. I hope that selection committees in constituencies, choosing parliamentary candidates from all parties, bear that in mind. We are losing a great deal of expertise, and with the departure of the hereditary peers, we shall lose a wealth of military experience in the other place. That is greatly to be regretted. None the less, I welcome the arrival on our Front Bench of two who should be described as honourable and gallant Gentlemen—a new shadow Secretary of State with experience as an officer in the Scots Guards and an ex-sailor who opened today's debate.
We have heard much praise today for our armed forces. Even as an ex-Grenadier Guardsman, I would pick up the motto of my hon. Friend the Member for Blaby (Mr. Robathan), who was in the Coldstream Guards. Their motto is "Second to None", and it could well be applied to the British armed forces. They have certainly been put to the test recently in Kosovo and in Bosnia, and they have come through with flying colours. It is all very well to praise them, but we now want action to ensure that they are able to continue their work.
The mission of our armed forces was well set out in the strategic defence review. It was made clear by the Government that the United Kingdom is to be
"a force for good in the world".
On several occasions the Prime Minister has spoken of the UK's global commitment to security.

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We have enormous worldwide interests—for our size, probably more than any other country. Trade is a higher percentage of our gross domestic product than any other country that I know of. We have enormous investment worldwide—more in the United States than has even Japan or Germany. We still have immense influence around the world. We are a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council, and we belong to all the best clubs—the G8, the Commonwealth and many others.
We still have a number of overseas territories that must be looked after. We have 1,000 service men and women in the Falklands, 3,000 in the sovereign bases in Cyprus and many others deployed elsewhere. There are 33 locations around the world where British service men and women are stationed, some on active service, some not.
If we are to become a world policeman, there is the problem of getting our troops to where they have to perform. The SDR proposed joint rapid reaction forces, which are to be in operation by October 2001. I should like the Minister to tell us whether that date will be met and, if so, what progress the Government have made on delivering the ro-ro ferries and the aircraft support that will be required.
The SDR limited our involvement in overseas military operations to two brigade-sized operations, as we originally had in Bosnia and Kosovo, or one divisional-sized operation, such as the Gulf war. However, our current deployment is about double that because we have 4,000 men in Bosnia and 13,000 in Kosovo. We are already way over that limit, which raises the question of how long those operations will last. When the Defence Committee put that question to the Chief of the Defence Staff, he said that he did not think we could maintain those operations in the Balkans for more than six months. We all know jolly well that they will be much longer term than that.
To meet those commitments, new establishment levels have been set by the Government which are planned to be achieved by 2004, but what are we to do in the meantime? We have heard many contributions on the increasing pressures on our service men and women and their families. What has been said about the problems of unaccompanied tours rings a bell with most of us in respect of our talks with service men, women and families in our constituencies. The number of operational tours has doubled, which should be of real concern to the Government.
On overstretch, I was struck when an hon. Member quoted General de la Billière as saying that our Army is 20,000 men short. That is a sobering figure. The SDR plans for 3,300 more soldiers, many of whom will be specialists, but we are 6,000 soldiers—mainly infantry men—short. I congratulate the Government on what they have said about teaching infantry men skills. Fewer men join the infantry because they will not learn a skill that they can use when they leave the Army. Giving infantry men a skill will attract more recruits.
We are aware that 36 per cent. of Army personnel are committed to operations and a further 22.5 per cent. have been warned that they could be deployed on operations at any time. That shows the degree of overstretch in clear terms. The Minister for the Armed Forces was asked about the Government's target for tour intervals. The previous Government's target, which they had difficulty
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meeting, was one six-month operational tour every two years. That left plenty of time for retraining and all the other things that had to be done between tours. The figures for current tour intervals are worrying and the Defence Committee will be studying them carefully when it undertakes its inquiry into the Kosovo operation. There is no doubt that there is far less time for retraining. That lowers morale and has an impact on recruitment and retention.
In Kosovo, the hon. Member for Crawley and I were lobbied by a number of forces personnel about pay. It was drawn to our attention that, whereas the pay of an unmarried Army captain who was sent to Kosovo would fall by nearly £5 a day, the Germans were receiving £40 a day extra. Members of the American forces do not pay tax on their pay. Many of the future operations in which British troops take part will be multinational so it is important that the Armed Forces Pay Review Body takes into account the difficulty of soldiers serving alongside soldiers from other nations who are on completely different pay scales for doing the same job. The so-called "X" factor must be revisited and the longer separation service allowance must also be looked at urgently. Will the Minister say something about that when he responds to the debate?
I was horrified to find, when I visited the Irish Guards in Macedonia, that in one platoon there were not one or two but four different cap badges. The Irish Guards were so under strength that their numbers were made up by the Green Howards, the Royal Artillery and the Royal Engineers. I believe that when the 1st Battalion the Parachute Regiment was deployed it was 120 men short and the numbers had to be made up from 3 Para. That is not good enough.
When I visited Haslar hospital the other day, I was reminded of the seriousness of the situation within the defence medical services. I discovered from a recent parliamentary answer on this matter that the figures for medical posts with consultant status compared with those deployable within the defence medical services were staggering. The number of posts for anaesthetists should be 130, but the number deployable is 31; the number of posts for orthopaedic surgeons should be 29, but the number deployable is 13; the number of posts for accident and emergency consultants should be 23, but the number deployable is three; and the number of posts for burns and plastics, which one would think was important in the Army, should be 10, but the number deployable is two.
Although the Government believe that those numbers should be made up from the reservists, the national health service is incapable of doing that; and as the Government have reduced the numbers in the Territorial Army overall by 18,800, it is hardly surprising that it is proving difficult to find reservists to fill any gaps. I accept what the Minister said in his opening remarks about the improvement in recruitment, but although there may be more recruits coming into the armed forces, more are leaving. Since 1997, 12,000 more people have left the armed forces than have joined them. That is extremely serious.
The Army is the most obvious victim of overstretch, but in two years 12,000 people left the Royal Navy and only 8,500 joined. A similar problem exists in the RAF. When civil aviation emerges from its current business

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trough and there is a greater demand for civil airline pilots, many RAF pilots will push off for higher-paid jobs. That problem will have to be faced.
A big debate is going on about the restructuring of our armed forces in Europe. It started before the NATO summit in Washington and has certainly continued apace since. It concerns the whole question of the development of the common foreign and security policy, the relationship between NATO and Europe, perhaps via the Western European Union, and whether the European security and defence identity should be within or outside NATO. Which is it to be? The Prime Minister at St. Malo seemed to say that it should be both inside and outside, which gives all the wrong signals. Moreover, what he said is different from what the Secretary of State has said, which adds to the confusion.
It is not just me who is confused; our friends in the WEU, with whom I debate these matters in the WEU Assembly, are also confused about the mixed signals being given by the Government. The more cynical among us feel that what the Prime Minister said at St. Malo was meant to act as a smokescreen for the Government's backing down on the single currency and the whole question of economic and monetary union.
It is crazy to start worrying about and debating defence and security institutions in Europe when we should be debating our capability of meeting the commitments that we are making, not only as a single nation but with our allies. America spends $270 billion a year on defence. The Western European Union countries combined—the European members of NATO—spend only $170 billion. When we discuss these matters with our American allies, it is hardly surprising that they complain to us about Europe's failure to meet its proper burden of international security. That has a big knock-on effect on the way in which we perform collectively.
We must seriously consider the shortfalls, and not just in the budget—we have seen with the SDR how the defence budget is planned. There is this ominous £250 million to come in the last year, which we suspect is from the sale of the Defence Evaluation and Research Agency. As a hard-nosed privatiser, I strongly support what the Chairman of the Defence Committee said about resisting the privatisation of DERA either in part or in whole.
The Government should consider carefully the National Audit Office's report on the delivery of equipment—late and overpriced. A large proportion of our current budget—40 per cent. or so—is spent on procurement. That is an ever-increasing amount. We should also urgently examine the lack of training facilities, especially for the infantry. Since the armour came back from Germany, the infantry have been pushed out of some of their training grounds.
We must build up personnel strengths—both numbers and capability. The Government owe that to our armed forces, who have never failed to meet their obligations and objectives. From the speeches we have heard, I think the House agrees that our armed forces are finding it increasingly difficult to meet those obligations.
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. Before I call the next speaker, may I point out that quite a number of hon.
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Members are seeking to catch my eye, and unless contributions are shorter, several of them will be disappointed.
5.27 pm
Mr. Steve McCabe: I am grateful for this opportunity to make a short contribution to the debate. I confess that I have no special knowledge or experience of the armed services, but in recent months I have taken part in the parliamentary armed forces scheme with the RAF. My comments are intended to reflect the issues that RAF personnel, at all levels in the structure, raised with me during the time that I spent with them at various stations around the country.
My overwhelming impression was one of admiration and respect for the level of training, professionalism and sense of duty of all those whom I met. It is an interesting time to be involved in the RAF scheme, because the service is experiencing change on a broad front. As its own material says:
"In recent times, RAF personnel have been deployed on a broader range of tasks than at any time over the past 50 years."
The RAF suffered a 30 per cent. front-line cut as a result of "Options for Change", and, as we have heard, it is experiencing overstretch, which the service feels was not adequately addressed in the strategic defence review and has been brought into sharp focus during the simultaneous operations in the Gulf and the Balkans.
By April 1997, the RAF had lost 8,000 personnel through redundancy. It is now down to a uniformed, trained strength of about 52,000 supported by a range of civilians and contractors. Much of the contracting and private finance ventures have brought benefits. I was particularly impressed with the new £15 million investment in flight simulators at RAF Valley, which will improve the quality of training and save money on flying hours for pilots who are trying to overcome weaknesses or skills deficits. Officers to whom I have spoken say that contracting has generally produced benefits, and at the moment it also creates well-paid jobs for persons who have recently left the service.
Some stations boast large numbers of contractors, vastly outnumbering the number of service personnel. It can be difficult to raise a team to take part in sporting events, or even a detachment to parade at local civic events. When efforts are made to involve civilian personnel in the sporting and cultural activities that are such an important feature of life on an RAF station, problems relating to insurance or working hours usually develop. There is also resentment among service personnel who have to work alongside contract staff who are paid overtime, and sometimes enjoy better working conditions.
I am particularly impressed by the standard of training. Selection standards are high, training is tough and assessment is rigorous. I understand that 25 per cent. of those who train to become jet pilots fail to complete the course, so punishing and demanding is the schedule. Of course, many of those men and women are not lost to the service; they go on to fly other kinds of aircraft in war zones and on humanitarian missions throughout the world.

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I quite fancied the idea of being a jet pilot myself, but after undergoing the augmented motor skills test I had to abandon that fantasy. I managed to score one out of nine, which, they tell me, equals no jet pilot potential. I clearly cannot rely on all the tests!
Mr. Doug Henderson: I scored two.
Mr. McCabe: The training does not come cheap. Personnel and Training Command has a budget of nearly £800 million, but I have the strong impression that the money is wisely spent. I was particularly impressed by the recruit training that I witnessed at RAF Halton: there was a noticeable difference between fresh recruits and others of a similar age after only six weeks of training. However, some recruits to whom I spoke did not seem to have a particular appetite for a long-term service career. That applied both to officers entering training at Cranwell and to those undergoing basic training at Halton, and it underlines a problem to which many hon. Members have referred today.
I do not think that the main difficulty relates to recruitment. As others have pointed out, retention is an increasing problem, which—given the demands that we are making on the service, and the costs of training—we should consider as a matter of urgency.
I was impressed not only by the training of officers and other recruits, but by the quality of other sorts of training. When I visited the department of specialist ground training I witnessed some of the work being undertaken on the advanced system engineering course, which can lead to an MSc accredited by Loughborough university. A high-quality award is now given to aero-engineers who meet the required standards. It makes them very employable when they leave the service.
Men and women to whom I have spoken have made a number of points about retention. On the positive side, I welcome the efforts that have been made to improve communication and contact between service personnel and their families. I welcome the Minister's announcement about the use of the internet. I do not know what we are going to call them—service cyber cafés, or something like that—but we should welcome the notion of speeding up and improving contact between our service men and women and their families.
I welcome some of the changes in catering facilities. That may not seem a crucial point, but young people who are brought up in a climate of choice and consumerism are unlikely to be impressed with the limited choice and service-style meals, no matter how nutritious. Allowing service personnel the same choices over the food that they eat as the average civilian will do nothing to limit their effectiveness, but may help with morale and retention. Contracting out such services delivers substantial savings.
I ask Ministers to pay attention to the concerns that many service personnel are expressing about their security, particularly their pension entitlements and other benefits after a life of service. We need to acknowledge that the Defence Housing Executive needs to make substantial improvements in delivering and refurbishing accommodation, and in improving its customer service performance. I saw some examples of excellent new housing at RAF Cosford, but I have also heard countless horror stories involving people trying to sort out decent housing for their families, and families being needlessly separated because of the housing executive's failings.
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I refer to an issue that may be a bit controversial for some hon. Members. A number of non-commissioned officers to whom I have spoken expressed their dissatisfaction with the effectiveness of existing channels in representing their concerns. They are clear that they do not want to unionise the service, and they have no plans to go on strike or to work to rule, but they are interested in having an association or federation that would represent them and ensure that their genuine grievances and concerns were heard.
We are asking those men and women to put their lives on the line. I do not want to risk losing highly trained, competent and dedicated people. I am not convinced that, as we approach the end of the century, it would necessarily diminish our armed services if we were to create opportunities for them to have their views properly listened to and properly represented.
5.38 pm
Mr. John M. Taylor: In the late 1950s, boys born in 1941 were told that they would not be called up to do national service. So it was that I never became a service man. However, I did do five years in the combined cadet force, including two "corps camps", as we called them. One was at the age of 14 at Rhyll, where it rained every day until the duck-boards floated away. The other was at the age of 18 at Catterick, where I helped to build a Bailey bridge, which was much more gratifying.
Last year, I went back to cadet camp near Catterick for the first time in almost 40 years as part of my campaign to do my best for cadet forces in my constituency. I have one of the best and most numerous corps in the midlands. Sea, army and air cadets all parade at the Territorial Army centre in Haslucks Green road in Shirley, Solihull.
The army cadets are part of Warwickshire and West Midlands (South) corps, with Colonel Bob Carruthers in charge; he it was who invited me to camp last year. The sea cadets are corps No. 481, Shirley and district, training ship Gamecock, chairman Alan Cupples. The air cadets are 492 (Solihull) squadron, air training corps, chair Ann Pearmain.
Last year, and in the early part of this year—in parliamentary questions, and in the light of uncertainties about economies expected in the Territorial Army under the Government's strategic defence review—I asked Defence Ministers for reassurances about the future of those cadets. The Government's general message was that there would indeed be economies in the TA, but that the cadets would be all right.
I am afraid that that reassurance rang a little hollow in Solihull when the news that we had feared finally broke: the Territorial Army centre in Haslucks Green road was to close. The fact is that that secure site housed transport, classrooms, a miniature range, a secure armoury and an adult presence. In short, it was just the ideal environment for the sea cadets, army cadets and air cadets to parade.
Unless really convincing alternative facilities are to be found, I fear that we shall lose something really valuable in Solihull. I admire the work of cadets and their instructors. I believe that the whole exercise is socially and educationally worthwhile; that it is good for confidence and for what the services call "attitude"; and that it builds team work and provides discipline, loyalty and something of which to be proud. Moreover, those who are responsible for recruitment into the armed services

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proper will say—in fairness to them, they have always said it—that former cadets are the very best recruits, as they tend not to drop out or seek to leave, because they have a good idea of what they are committing themselves to and seriously want to do it.
I have a word of apology to the Minister for the Armed Forces, the occupant of the Chair and the House, as a constituency commitment might prevent me from staying to the end of the debate to hear the Minister's reply. However, I shall be content if the Minister will write to me, particularly if his letter gives me some good and reassuring news about the excellent cadet forces in my constituency of Solihull.
5.42 pm
Mr. Eric Martlew: Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for calling me—I was starting to worry whether every hon. Member in the Chamber would be able to speak. I am a bit of an old lag at these debates, and noted that one or two hon. Members said that today's debate is poorly attended. Based on my experience, I think that it is better attended than many previous armed forces debates. On one occasion, when I was the then Opposition spokesman, I spoke for an hour, and subsequently received a letter from our Chief Whip asking why I had talked for so long. I told him that no one was on our Back Benches, so that I had to speak for an hour. That situation does not apply to this debate.
The right hon. Member for Bridgwater (Mr. King)—who has left the Chamber—was rather unfair to the Secretary of State for Defence by commenting on his absence from the debate. I have made inquiries, and discovered that he is attending the opening of the Scottish Parliament. If one considers the contribution that the Scots have made over the years to our forces, one might expect him to be there. He is also a Scottish Member. I therefore hope that the criticism might be retracted.
Many Opposition Members have spoken today about overstretch. Perhaps we should not go into the history of the overstretch issue, because when I was an Opposition Member I used to speak about it, too. Quite recently, however, current Opposition Members—especially the current Leader of the Opposition—made one demand after another for preparation of a land task force to invade Kosovo. They certainly made no mention of how such a task force would overstretch our forces. Regardless, the Government were right that we did not need a land task force, and we achieved our objectives by bombing. Such a task force would have caused tremendous overstretch.
After demanding more forces for Kosovo only a few months ago, it is not right for Opposition Members now to be carping about overstretch. The hon. Member for Salisbury (Mr. Key) shakes his head, but a land task force would have required many more soldiers.
Mr. Key: I should, for the record, make it clear that the Opposition stayed absolutely alongside the Government on the issue. The Government told us that they did not want an invasion force. We said, "All right—you have the information; we don't—we trust you."
Mr. Martlew: I am sorry, but that is not my recollection. I remember the Leader of the Opposition
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demanding of the Prime Minister that we took a decision by June to send in a task force otherwise the winter would be upon us, so the hon. Gentleman is wrong.
I should like to say a lot of good things about what the Government have done, but I am conscious of time so I shall concentrate on overstretch.
To some extent I am a delegate here today as I have made a commitment to the families of the King's Own Royal Border Regiment to express some of their views and concerns. During Defence questions recently, I asked my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State whether the regiment would be sent to Bosnia for the second consecutive Christmas. Fortunately, my right hon. Friend gave me the right answer. Following that reply, some soldiers' wives contacted me and we arranged a meeting at the Catterick garrison. Many of their concerns have already been mentioned today. They appreciated the fact that my hon. Friend the Minister for the Armed Forces had taken the time to see them, but as they are rather sceptical about politicians, they were not too impressed by some of his answers. I am sure that they were no more impressed with mine.
One problem relates to accommodation. I have the general impression that privatising the accommodation has not worked. The senior officers are glad that it was done as it is now no longer their problem, but there is still a great deal of substandard accommodation, some of it in Catterick.
Although the telephone allowance has increased from three minutes to 10 minutes—and that is welcome—there are still problems. After all, how many hon. Members phone home for only 10 minutes a week, and many of us go home at weekends? We have to consider the advances in mobile phones and the fact that they can be used in most parts of Europe. The Minister mentioned the use of the internet and I presume that he was also referring to e-mail, which is another welcome development. The King's Own Royal Border Regiment used it in Macedonia, but it was cut off without any explanation and that created problems for the families.
The worst problem is overstretch. The families wanted me to raise the matter earlier, but when problems arose in Kosovo, they told me that they wanted to be seen to be totally behind their husbands and fathers who were in Macedonia at the time. They are committed to the regiment and we often take their loyalty for granted. However, the regiment has been abroad for much of the past two years. It is in great demand and whenever there is a problem, it seems to be involved. Instead of being sent on one tour in 24 months, they are more likely to be sent on two tours in 18 months. That affects the morale of the troops and their families and increases the work load of those left behind. There is no doubt that when soldiers are sent abroad, those who are left have to double up and their families are also put under pressure.
The statistics for my local regiment are interesting. Between April and December 1998 it recruited 42 soldiers, but lost 48. Although the regiment has a good recruitment record, retention is still poor. The best retention record in the Army is a unit that recruited 127 soldiers and lost 70. In the worst example, 34 were recruited and 74 lost.
Statistics also show the effect of separation on families. From September 1997 to March 1999, the battalion has experienced eight divorces, and 17 more are pending.

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Reasons given include the general pressure of service life, but in nine cases, current operational deployment has been specifically cited as a cause. Accommodation and education are problems for families, as is health care. Finding national health service dental treatment is difficult for everyone, but it is especially so for service families who are not allowed forces' dentistry.
Anyone who needs hospital treatment and who moves to a new area will go to the bottom of the new waiting list, and I am glad that the Minister will say something further on that. The military hospital at Catterick is being closed. There will be new facilities at Northallerton, but closure is a blow to forces' families. Buses are infrequent, and someone from Catterick who has a family member in hospital at Northallerton will find it hard to see him or her.
Women want careers of their own. There are two types of service family—the traditional forces families who follow the flag, and families in which the woman has a career and in which, to some extent, the husband's job is just a job. The armed forces must adjust to changing society. One simple point could be addressed. If a husband moves, the wife is not allowed jobseeker's allowance if she is deemed to have given up her job voluntarily. That does not seem right, and I hope that the Minister will think about it. We must address social change in a changing world. We have not yet fully accepted the change in women's roles. Change has been accepted within the Army, but not externally, and we must rethink our approach.
I have asked the Opposition about their attitude to homosexuals in the armed forces, but have had no reply. Are they opposed to allowing homosexuals to join the forces? I believe that homosexuals should be allowed to join. The current bar is discriminatory, and we should do away with it as soon as possible. If a vote is called on the matter in the House of Commons, will Conservative Members be allowed a free vote?
Families tell me that the Government must deal with the serious problem of overstretch. We must decide whether we should increase our armed forces. If we do not, and if there is another crisis somewhere in the world, the Foreign Secretary and the Prime Minister will have to conclude that, even if we would like to help, we do not have the forces to do so. We cannot continue as we are. The Chief of the Defence Staff cannot continue to say that we can cope in the short term, but that the Army will be overstretched in the medium term. That will affect the morale of the forces, and people will leave them.
5.54 pm
Mr. Martin Bell: I plan to make the shortest speech of the debate, but I have a few points to make, particularly while the Minister is in his place. I welcomed his announcement about the promised Guards service. I did not entirely welcome his next statement—that the Ministry of Defence police has a future. It does not deserve a future. It is unaccountable and out of control, as the Minister will see if he studies the Stankovic case.
For 20 months, the police investigated that case. The man has been cleared, because there is no evidence against him—and still he is under a cloud of suspicion. This is the man who should be alongside his commandant General Jackson in Kosovo—he is the man who is needed. It is the greatest single scandal affecting any serving soldier, sailor or air man in the term of office of this Government, and I wish the Government would address it.
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I spend a lot of time with soldiers at Army seminars, regimental dinners and the like. I know that the Ministry of Defence police is held in contempt by the armed services—and nor is the force admired by other police forces. I welcome the forthcoming inquiry by the Defence Committee. I hope that the committee will call the chief constable, Walter Boreham, and Major Stankovic.
I have in past years spent a lot of time beside serving soldiers on unaccompanied tours of duty. I know their fears, I know their hopes and I know the pressures that they are under. I know that it was routine for a battalion in Bosnia at the end of a six-month tour to count among its casualties not only its dead and wounded but the 10 per cent. or more of its marriages.
The MOD does not keep—or, at least, does not announce—the figures for divorces in the armed services. An example was brought to my attention yesterday concerning the Light Dragoons, who bore the greater part of the burden of light reconnaissance in Bosnia and underwent seven tours of duty. There were 85 divorces—in a formation of much less than battalion strength. That is a good index or measure of the crisis facing our armed forces.
Routinely in this House we pay tribute to our service men and women. We do that rightly—it is a compliment that is well deserved. However, the best tribute that we could pay them is to make sure that we treat them properly.
5.58 pm
Ms Julia Drown: Given the nature of conflicts in the world, the quality of our armed forces is crucial, and probably the most important subject for the military to concentrate on. It is wise to spend a greater proportion of the Ministry of Defence's money on personnel and less money on huge equipment and weapons which, under the previous Government, always seemed to cost far more than was first estimated. It is better to spend money on armed forces personnel than on weapons of mass destruction, which we should not contemplate using in the first place.
I pay tribute to the brave men and women of our armed forces, both full-time and reserves, who join the armed forces never knowing what will be expected of them. In Kosovo, our armed forces' actions in supporting the refugees in camps was remarkable, and something of which we can all be proud.
The Government, in turn, want to support our armed forces and their families. The families of armed forces personnel often pay a large price in terms of disrupted life styles, loss of contact between family members and, in times of conflict, having to endure great anxiety. For that reason, I congratulate the Government on taking steps to make the lives of armed forces personnel easier by giving improved leave arrangements, more contact time, and help with health care and school places, as well as more choice in terms of where people are posted.
One of the issues that caused anger in my constituency was the closure by the previous Government of the RAF Princess Alexandra hospital in Wroughton in south Swindon. It was well used and much admired by military and civilian patients alike. It is still much missed by my constituents. That closure was another example of the bad decisions made by the previous Government, which left a terrible legacy in my constituency.

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By contrast, this Government are taking the views of everyone in the country seriously, and they deserve praise for making the armed forces better reflect the composition of the United Kingdom. The percentage of posts open to women has been increased from 47 per cent. to 70 per cent., but I would like it to be increased further. The target of getting 5 per cent. of all new recruits from all ethnic minorities by the year 2002 is admirable.
In relation to the recruitment and deployment of young people in the armed forces, it is of great regret that there are about 300,000 child soldiers throughout the world. Recruits in Uganda are sometimes as young as 13; the UK recruits at 16. That is of concern to the general public, as evidenced by constituents who raise the issue with me, who want an end to the use of child soldiers in armed conflict and in peacekeeping forces. They are supported by UNICEF, Save the Children, Amnesty International and others, including 110 hon. Members who signed an early-day motion that I tabled on the subject. I thank all those hon. Members for their support.
The Ministry of Defence has announced that UK service personnel under the age of 17 will not be deployed, but that means that 17-year-olds are deployed in military actions. In many aspects of our law, someone of 17 is recognised as a child—although I am aware that 17-year-olds would rather be referred to as young people. Whether we describe 17-year-olds as young people or as children, they rightly deserve protection under the Children Acts, because they can be vulnerable. Those aged 17 cannot buy an alcoholic drink in a pub in our country, but they can be deployed in operations and die for our country, even though they cannot vote for the Government who send them on those missions.
This is not an academic argument. Two brave 17-year-olds lost their lives for our country in the Gulf war. In paying tribute to them, I hope that we all agree that that is too much to ask of such young people. At present, UK 17-year-olds are members of the international peacekeeping force in Kosovo; there are 4,500 16 and 17-year-olds in the British Army. If we compare our record with that of our European partners, it is not good. Belgium is the only other country that generally recruits at 16. Neither France nor Germany will deploy young people until they reach the age of 18.
I am pleased that the Ministry of Defence is keeping its deployment policy under review. I strongly urge the Ministry to review the policy soon, with a view to changing it. Not only is the matter important for our own armed forces and for our reputation in the world, it is important when we negotiate with international colleagues to achieve the worldwide elimination of the use of child soldiers and of the worst forms of child labour.
There has been progress in that matter. Only two weeks ago, on 16 June, a new International Labour Organisation convention was adopted unanimously by 174 member states. The convention intends to eliminate the worst forms of child labour as a matter of urgency. It provides the first, specific legal recognition that the use of child soldiers is a form of child labour. It states that the age limit for child soldiering should be 18. I urge the Government to ratify the convention as soon as possible. The worst examples are to be found among the 13 and 15-year-olds who are recruited throughout the world,
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and in the forced and compulsory recruitment of children. We are not involved in any of those activities. However, if we are to play a strong hand in negotiating the achievement of the convention, we need to apply the arrangements in our own armed forces.
One of the reasons given by the Ministry of Defence for recruiting at 16 rather than 18 is that, if potential applicants are not recruited until they are 18, they will take up educational and other opportunities that lead them into other careers. That could be interpreted as, "Let's get them early—before they know any better", but that is not what we want. The Government are rightly committed to making membership of the armed forces a more attractive career. I have every confidence that they will succeed in that aim. That is the appropriate way to recruit people. We should all be concerned that, when people are too young, they may not have the maturity to take such an important decision with due thought and consideration. By ensuring that people are mature enough to make the decision to join the armed forces, we would be sure that we recruited those who are most suited to a military career.
Three facts are relevant to the attitude of the Ministry of Defence in relation to recruitment at 16 and deployment at 17.
First, there is a European Council directive of June 1994 on the protection of young people at work. It provides that young people under the age of 18 should be protected
"from any specific risks to their safety…which are a consequence of their lack of experience".
Work that is likely to contain specific risks includes the
"manufacture and handling of devices…or other objects containing explosives."
That clearly has an impact on under-18s in our armed forces.
Secondly, last October, the United Nations announced that all peacekeepers in UN missions should be at least 18 years old, and preferably over 21. Again, we should bear that in mind when considering the appropriate age at which we recruit to our armed forces.
Thirdly, let me take the House back to 1914, when no one under the age of 18 could be recruited into the armed forces. Now, 85 years later, there are 1,700 16-year-olds and 2,800 17-year-olds in the British Army. That cannot be described as progress. Instead, in that respect we are providing less protection to the young people of this country.
I thank my hon. Friend the Minister and the House for listening to my comments, and I congratulate the Government on the additional support that they are giving to members of the armed forces and their families. I hope that the Minister will work with colleagues throughout Government to stop the deployment and recruitment of child soldiers, both in the United Kingdom and throughout the world.
6.6 pm
Mr. Julian Brazier: Time constraints prevent me from pursuing the comments made by the hon. Member for South Swindon (Ms Drown), although I must say that I profoundly disagree with them. However, I commend the courageous words of my Select Committee colleague, the hon. Member for Crawley

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(Laura Moffatt), on the importance of consulting the armed forces before any hard and fast decisions are taken on the issue of homosexuality.
If the words of Ministers in this and other debates are to be believed, our strategic policy is an unparalleled success: Saddam Hussein was punished last year; Ulster is responding to the Prime Minister's statesmanship; and Milosevic's thugs have been driven out of Kosovo by British-led forces—half of whom, we were assured last Wednesday, are likely to be home by Christmas. Meanwhile, our forces are undergoing a healthy modernisation process in the strategic defence review, which is a model much imitated around the world.
It is interesting that not a single speech by a Back Bencher on either side of the House has conformed to that picture. In opposition, the Prime Minister deplored publicly—and rightly, so many Conservative Back Benchers thought—the overstretch in our armed forces. In 1997, at the time of the general election, we had the smallest Regular Army since the Crimean war, and the most thinly spread since 1945, measured in terms of operational commitments. As Leader of the Opposition, the right hon. Gentleman promised, in a now notorious newspaper article, that things were going to change. They certainly have.
Since taking power, the Labour Government have launched major operations involving members of all three services in large numbers in the Gulf and in Kosovo, yet they have continued to cut the defence budget substantially. Morale in the armed forces has been further damaged by the Government deciding, immediately on taking office, to phase last year's modest 3.7 per cent. pay rise, in spite of the manning problems at that time. This year, it is difficult to exaggerate the impact on Army morale of the shocking potential exposure to terrorist threat of the families of a group of ex-soldiers, courtesy of Lord Saville's inquiry.
Last week, the Secretary of State admitted that the Army is still shrinking, and we have heard the figures in more detail today. A small upturn in recruitment has been outweighed by the haemorrhage—in the case of the Army, that is the correct word—of talented young men and women, especially men, from the ranks of junior officers and experienced non-commissioned officers. We were told that unaccompanied tour intervals for infantry units are running at 15 months, compared with a target of 24 months; but, because of the need to back fill, overstretch on men is far worse than the paper figures on units, so we are in fact achieving less than half that target. The figures for the Cavalry and the Royal Engineers are even worse.
The strategic defence review planned two trade-offs for the Army. One was the amalgamation of the elite 5th Airborne Brigade with our only other air manoeuvre brigade, 24 Air Mobile. That was to release funds to pay for a sixth armoured brigade. The second trade-off was a halving of the Territorial Army combat units to pay for 3,000 extra regular soldiers.
As a result of the lamentable manning figures and the Kosovo operation, both increases have been postponed indefinitely. The Regular Army's projected date for full manning has slipped again from 2004 to 2005, and no one in the Army to whom I have spoken believes that it will be achieved by that date. We were told last Wednesday that the formation of the new sixth armoured infantry
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brigade has been deferred by between 15 and 18 months. In practice, without a large upturn in manning and a draw-down from the Balkans, it cannot happen at all. However, the corresponding cuts are happening as we speak.
Members on both sides of the House have commended the extraordinary success of the lightning intervention by 5th Airborne Brigade. No other brigade in the British Army could have achieved that. There are parallels. In the Gulf in 1990, the 81st Airborne Brigade of the US armed forces was in position within a week. The Israeli forces who achieved the extraordinarily successful raid on Entebbe are another example. In each case, the action was nothing to do with parachuting, but concerned an air manoeuvre that could have been carried out only by paratroops and organised only by an airborne headquarters. Yet that elite centre of excellence, which took 10 years to build up, is to be broken up as soon as the brigade headquarters can be replaced in Kosovo.
The other cut is also taking place. Territorial Army units are being broken up in disbandment parades throughout the country, although the 3,000 regulars have disappeared off the radar screen.
I shall briefly consider those issues in more detail. The Under-Secretary has taken the trouble to reply in detail to procurement questions, but each time I have tried to raise with his colleagues either of the armed forces issues to which I have just referred, they have replied with woolly generalisations. First, on the airborne point, 24 Air Mobile Brigade caused embarrassment to this country when it took six or seven months to get to Bosnia in 1992. I do not want to attack any part of the British Army, but nobody believes that 24 Air Mobile's readiness to deploy remotely compares to that of 5th Airborne Brigade.
We are cutting down to one airborne brigade to pay for a sixth armoured brigade. That change takes us in the opposite direction of most other armies, which think that they need more fast and light troops and less heavy metal. Nevertheless, if we are to make that transformation, why not base that brigade around the 5th Airborne Brigade headquarters, which has just proved itself so effective? I should like to know the specific reason for the decision. I am not asking the Minister to respond in this debate, but I would like a proper written answer from him or his colleagues.
The second detailed issue relates to the Territorial Army. Each time I have raised the need to suspend the cuts in the TA, at least while we are unable to recruit extra regular soldiers, I have been given the same reply. As recently as last Wednesday, the Secretary of State said that the reforms—he keeps using that word—in the Territorial Army have made it easier, rather than more difficult, to use territorials. We introduced reforms in 1996 when, with support on both sides of the House, we passed legislation that made it much easier to use territorials. The Defence Secretary has not explained how halving the number of territorials in combat units will make it easier to use them.
Let us consider the infantry. It used to be possible to put for a fortnight a territorial infantry battalion in the place of a regular infantry battalion. I once took part in such a deployment. That could give a regular battalion a break. However, under the new configuration, there is no proper battalion headquarters, so such battalions cannot be used in an emergency to take the place for a short time of a regular battalion.

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The lack of such headquarters and the decision to cut most all-arms training for TA units will inevitably mean a decline in the quality of training of officers. In future, officers in those battalions will lack the experience of collective training—experience that has so far stood in good stead the many TA officers who have been through Bosnia. The future TA will not only be much smaller in its combat elements, but in some parts, particularly the infantry, much less usable.
I turn to the commitments that our forces are likely to face. Yes, we should be proud of the fact that British forces led the way into Kosovo—although it was after the humanitarian disaster that our intervention was designed to avert. None the less, Milosevic pulled out with virtually no damage to his armed forces. We have found virtually no knocked-out armoured vehicles, despite all the extravagant claims of NATO, British Ministers and senior officers. Our forces in the Balkans are poised between a Yugoslav army, which is largely intact, and the forces of the KLA, who have already begun to shoot at Serbs, peacekeepers and each other.
The situation looks more and more like that in Palestine—an unhappy one in which my father served and on which, after three years of trying to uphold a League of Nations mandate, a Labour Prime Minister took the courageous view that it was time to pull the plug.
The Gulf has hardly been mentioned in this debate, but Saddam Hussein has not gone away. Just a year ago, the Secretary of State said in answer to one of his hon. Friends that action would cease when Saddam Hussein responded to the United Nations resolutions. He has not, and the inspectors—and with them most of our intelligence on his weapons programmes—have left Iraq. To the Arab world, Saddam Hussein is getting stronger not weaker.
In Northern Ireland, we all wish the Prime Minister and the parties to the negotiations well, but with the release of 200 murderers, the challenge to our armed forces will be greater not smaller if trouble starts. Meanwhile, the Army is shrinking.
It is no good Ministers saying that they are planning to do something about overstretch and to mention some welcome, but very small announcements. Our commitments are already larger than our capability—and the threats have the potential to be larger still. The Army is still shrinking, cuts are still being made; it cannot go on like this.
6.18 pm
Dr. Julian Lewis: The novelist and statesman John Buchan referred in his autobiography, which was published shortly after his death in 1940, to his youngest brother Alastair, who fell at the head of his company of Royal Scots Fusiliers on the first morning of the battle of Arras in the first world war. He said of him:
"I remember that when I occasionally ran across him during the last stages of the battle of the Somme I thought him the only cheerful thing in a grey world…I wonder if the future historian will realise how much of the strength of the British army was due to the boys of twenty who brought the kindly ardour of youth into the business of war and died before they could lose their freshness."
One of the other young men who died—a little later in his career than young Alastair Buchan—was Flight Lieutenant Samuel Kinkead, who is buried in my
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constituency. He was killed in 1928 at the age of 31, having previously, in the space of two short years, between the ages of 20 and 22, won the Distinguished Service Cross twice with the Royal Naval Air Service, then the Distinguished Flying Cross twice with the Royal Air Force and finally, fighting the Bolsheviks in 1919 in Russia, the Distinguished Service Order when he and another pilot, in a Sopwith Camel, drove from the field of battle 4,000 Bolshevik cavalry men.
Such stories inspire us. They still inspire people in this cynical day and age—so much so that when the Reverend Gary Philbrick, Mr. Brian Lamb of the Calshot activities centre in my constituency, where Flight Lieutenant Kinkead was based when he was killed trying to break the world air speed record in 1928, Councillor Alan Rice of Hampshire county council and I decided to commemorate the 70th anniversary of Flight Lieutenant Kinkead's death, and we invited the family along and told them not to be disappointed if only 40 or 50 people turned up. We should not have worried. Between 300 and 400 people came along to celebrate and commemorate the life of this hero—a man who had died 70 years before. Even as I tell that story, I feel a bit of a thrill of excitement that such a person could have lived and died in such an outstandingly brave fashion.
Both those two young men died unmarried. But what would have happened to them if they had been more fortunate—if they had lived to complete their military career and had postponed any question of getting married until after the completion of their term of service? Today, that situation confronts many people who fought in the war and who gave great service to this country after the war.
I refer—very briefly, because of lack of time—to a letter published in The Daily Telegraph on 5 April 1999. It was written by a gentleman by the name of I. G. Aubrey-Rees, who wrote:
"As a terminally ill recipient of an Armed Forces pension, after serving for 34 years, I believe I am very well cared for by the RAF, but when I die in the next few weeks, my widow and family will not be so fortunate."
That was brought to my attention by Major Tom Spring-Smyth, president of New Forest, East Conservative Association, my local association, who writes that,
"since I married after retiring from the army, my pension will die with me and Jennifer"—
his wife—
"will get nothing, yet I was fully paid up".
The Officers Pension Society has been campaigning on the issue of post-retirement marriages for many years. It has got nowhere under Conservative Governments and it is getting nowhere under the Labour Government. Major-General Bonnet, general secretary of the Officers Pension Society, has written to me and explained that post-retirement marriages occur much more frequently in the armed forces because officers are discouraged from marrying before the age of 25. The age used to be 30. They must retire at 55—many are forced to leave earlier—and opportunities for marriage in-service are invariably limited by military service abroad.
On 6 April 1978, it was first accepted that the widow of a service man who married or remarried after retirement should receive a forces family pension, which is the formal title of a service widow's pension. However, that change of the rules was not applied retrospectively to

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those who had retired before 1978, and who had subsequently married after retirement. The absurdity of the situation is that those whose plight prompted the change in the armed forces pension scheme are the very widows who are now left permanently disadvantaged. Many of them are the widows of men who served a full military career and fought for the nation during the second world war.
The Government—the previous Government as well as the present one—argue against change because they say that alteration in the rules of the armed forces pension scheme would be bound to read across to the whole public service. There will certainly be pressure from other public service groups, but that can easily and legitimately be resisted. The Government recently argued that the armed forces were unique and excluded them, and only them, from the national minimum wage legislation. If the armed forces can be dealt with separately on the minimum wage, they can certainly be dealt with separately on pensions.
For many years, the Officers Pension Society has been seeking a full pension for service widows of post-retirement marriages. In late 1997, the society co-ordinated an application on behalf of 22 representative applicants to the European Court of Human Rights on this issue. The Government believe that that application will fail, while the society hopes that it will succeed. Whichever is right, it is a shame that the widows of officers who served this country gallantly and paid into pension schemes should have to resort to the ECHR to try to secure the recompense, reward and right that they should have in respect of their husbands' service, the pension contributions they made and the sacrifices that they also often had to make by delaying their marriages until after their military careers were completed.
6.26 pm
Mr. Robert Key: The pity of it is that our debate will not be widely reported in the press or in the media, nor on television. With luck, the BBC will pick up something of it for a little soundbite here and there. As hon. Members on both sides of the House have said, it is a matter of regret that, for an issue that is so important in our national life, there is apparently little interest. It is true, however, that we have filled the time available. Indeed, we could fill it twice over given the level of expertise and commitment of many of those who have spoken in the debate.
I thank my hon. Friend the Member for New Forest, East (Dr. Lewis) for his contribution and for his dedication to his constituency and to the cause of pensions. My hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury (Mr. Brazier) made another notable speech setting out his passionate belief in the difficulties of overstretch. The hon. Member for Tatton (Mr. Bell) made a particularly telling speech and I am grateful to him. I do not entirely agree with some of his remarks and I think that I have rather more sympathy for the Ministry of Defence police than he has. Nevertheless, he made an important contribution.
My hon. Friend the Member for Solihull (Mr. Taylor) made a telling speech on cadets. I agree entirely with him. I served in the cadet force for five years. I rose to the dizzy heights of company sergeant major and had a—
Mr. Doug Henderson: Hence the nasty streak.
Mr. Key: As the Minister says, that is the nasty streak.
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I learned a huge amount in that period in terms of self-discipline, becoming a team player and having the good fortune to serve in an Army camp at Celle in Germany. From there, we visited Belsen, which was just up the road. That visit was very early on after the war. That was an incomparable experience for a young man.
My hon. Friend the Member for Romsey (Mr. Colvin) made an important plea for an independent inquiry. This is not meant to be—I am sure that my hon. Friend would agree—in any sense derogatory. It is simply that we need to get to the bottom of how things happened over the past few months in the Balkans.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater (Mr. King), as ever, shared his great wisdom with us in demanding a period of stability. We are grateful to him. The contributions from my right hon. Friend the Member for Wealden (Sir G. Johnson Smith) and my hon. Friend the Member for Mid-Sussex (Mr. Soames) were similarly extremely welcome.
The Opposition have supported the Government in pursuit of their overriding duty of defending this country and our national interest. We shall continue to do so. There is consensus on unequivocal support for our military forces and their families as well as for the administrative, scientific and industrial civil servants who support them. This support extends to the private sector contractors who provide goods and services and to the 400,000-plus citizens who work in defence-related industries.
Yesterday, Mr. Deputy Speaker—I shall share a little secret with you—I crept off to the Library at 8 o'clock in the morning to prepare for the debate. I worked there for some hours re-reading the speeches of each of the three Labour Defence spokesmen in the year before the 1997 general election. It was not a Herculean task. It did not take very long, but it yielded many words for eating by present Ministers. It also made me realise just how different Labour's policy is in government from its policy in opposition. Labour Members said one thing and they are doing another. They constantly called for consensus between the parties on the fundamentals of defence policy. If we had agreed with their defence policy in opposition and stuck to it, there would no longer be consensus.
Of course, that has not stopped the Liberal Democrats from drifting around and formally linking themselves with the Government on defence and foreign policy, although, typically, having made a speech or two, they have gone before we have reached the end of the debate.
On 14 October 1996, the then shadow Defence Secretary, the right hon. Member for South Shields (Dr. Clark) said:
"I also support the White Paper's arguments in paragraphs 127-28 against the European Union having responsibility for Britain's defence policy. Again in our policy document we state quite clearly—I shall quote it to the House so that there can be no misconceptions—
'Labour does not support the establishment of a European army or proposals to give the European Union a military competence…We believe that efforts to develop a common defence policy should concentrate on strengthening the Western European Union as the European contribution to NATO.'"—[Official Report, 14 October 1996; Vol. 282, c. 491.]
That was during the debate on the defence estimates. We have not had any defence estimates since 1996. The Government have twice postponed publication of new

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defence estimates. We understand that there has been a little local difficulty, but the House has not had an opportunity to scrutinise defence estimates since 1996.
That does not make it easy to find consensus on the budget. We have a moving target. However, we had the strategic defence review. Parts of it were extremely good. It built on much of the work that we had done, and we welcome that, but it was not strategic, as the Defence Committee pointed out. The foreign policy base lines remain secret to this day, so we cannot have consensus on them. There were gaping holes in the SDR. Home defence was virtually ignored, as the Defence Committee pointed out. There was no serious attempt to address the percentage of national budget spent on defence and security, so we cannot have consensus on that.
As we enter the third year of the Labour Government, they will be held to account for their defence budget. They must find a new soundbite. No one is listening any more as they blame the previous Government for post-cold war contractions in the defence budget and the size of the forces. People remember that, at the time, Labour Members were unilateral nuclear disarmers and Labour activists demanded deeper cuts than the Conservative Government were prepared to make.
That was then; this is now. If the previous Government were criticised by new Labour for defence cuts, why have the Labour Government gone on cutting the budget and increasing the commitments year after year?
In the run-up to the general election in 1997, the present Prime Minister wrote an article for The Daily Telegraph on 3 February. He stated:
"My pledge to our armed forces is that we will offer a period of stability."
He condemned Conservative defence cuts. He wrote:
"The people who have had to bear the burden of these cuts are our servicemen and women, overstretched and under strength as never before. The strain on our Armed Forces is huge."
He continued:
"It would be dishonest to promise to reverse the cuts in defence spending which the Government has made…We will keep to the spending plans already laid down for the next two years…Our services should not be subject to the same lack of coherent strategy and piling on of new demands".
Two years, and still the Government are cutting and piling on new demands. Only last Friday, the Foreign Secretary said that we would be committing another 8,000 troops on standby for UN operations, on top of those in Kosovo, Bosnia, Northern Ireland, Cyprus, the Falklands, and the RAF in Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Italy. Did he spare a thought for the families, or for the retention of our current service men and women, who are prepared to die for their country, but not to sacrifice their family life indefinitely?
What did the pre-election consensus add up to? On 14 October 1996, the shadow Secretary of State for Defence said:
"Since taking on the shadow defence portfolio, I have striven to establish consensus, wherever possible, on issues that affect Britain's defence and our security.. The Opposition have done that because we believe that it should be possible, in many spheres, to strike a bipartisan approach on many of the fundamental issues…We in the Labour party are willing to offer a consensual approach on the critical matters that affect the security of our country."
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So far, so good. He went on:
"Although we seek consensus, we also have the right to be critical of many aspects of the Government's approach such as the absence of strategic planning; the dominance of short-term and ad hoc decision making…Such matters annoy us and make us critical of the Government."—[Official Report, 14 October 1996; Vol. 282, c. 490–493.]
That is fine; I know what he means.
On 24 October, the shadow Defence Secretary went further, saying:
"I have tried to argue that there are areas on which there is consensus and areas on which there is potential consensus. There are, however, some things that we believe the Government have got completely and utterly wrong. Their obsession with privatisation really is bizarre…
What is worrying is that the Government's privatisation mania knows no bounds. They really are sell-off mad. The Defence Secretary's dogma has overcome his common sense."
I take his point, but the boot is on the other foot now. The 12,000 people employed by the Defence Evaluation and Research Agency know exactly what Labour meant only two and a half years ago, but the DERA dither is no joke.
The consultation paper issued recently is wholly inadequate. It provides no basis for any counter-proposals. We understand that the Secretary of State will now not announce a decision on the future of DERA before the summer recess, as he previously told the House that he would. Instead, he has apparently invited the private sector interests for tea and sympathy at the MOD main building in Whitehall. I should be grateful if the Minister confirmed that that is the current situation.
On 24 October 1996, the shadow Defence Secretary also said:
"Although we are prepared to try to reach a consensus with the Government as far as we can, that does not mean that we slavishly accept all the details of Government policy. Far from it. We believe that in many areas the Government's approach is harmful and destabilising to our armed forces and our security."—[Official Report, 24 October 1996; Vol. 284, c. 216–219.]
I could not have put it better myself.
Most important of all are the people who serve in our armed forces—the professional service men and women and the people who follow the flag. There is complete consensus about that, but may I have a grown-up word about overstretch? There always has been, and always will be, overstretch, but official figures rarely give the whole picture for families. Tour intervals are very brief indeed. I was told only last weekend of a family in a specialist branch whose tour interval was only five months.
Consensus is difficult to achieve, but let us be grown up about it. Under this Government, overstretch is different in two ways. If the Secretary of State wants consensus, he will have to recognise that; if he wants to improve retention rates, he will have to do something about it. First, the European security and defence identity, which was agreed by Michael Portillo in 1996 and enshrined in the Petersberg declaration, was based on strengthening the Western European Union's role and common defence of NATO countries as well as
"humanitarian and rescue tasks; peacekeeping tasks; tasks of combat forces in crisis management, including peacemaking."
It was not about the new NATO doctrine of international intervention, as announced by the Prime Minister at

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Chicago on 22 April, nor was it about overstretched British troops providing, in the words of a Government press release:
"Crack UK troops available for UN peacekeeping.
Crack UK peacekeeping troops, able to go anywhere in the world at a moment's notice are to be made available to the United Nations under a new arrangement announced today."
Would it not have been nice if the Government had told the House of Commons about that? Would it not have been nice if there had been one word in that press release about forces families, without whose support the whole thing would be impossible? If the Government are going down that road, we need a new national debate on the percentage of the national budget required to achieve that new international role and we need a reappraisal of the size of the armed forces.
The Blair doctrine is incompatible with the current size of our armed services. That is what new overstretch is all about: we have had smart procurement; now it is time for smart families. The Government are failing to implement family-friendly policies, and the strain on forces' families is building rapidly. The time has now come for the Government to invest in families. I know that that is their express intention in the SDR. We support them and want consensus on this matter, but the ball is in their court.
Before the election, Labour promised the earth to our service men and women and their families. At the top of the list was a commitment in last July's defence review to achieve tour intervals of 24 months. The hard reality is that, for some specialist units, a tour interval that is some 15 months on paper is, in practice, as little as five months.
The Foreign Secretary then made his major defence policy announcement last week, to which I have just referred. That will add dramatically to the problems of overstretch, including further reductions in the tour interval. At the recent Army Families Federation conference in Germany, an attitude survey was carried out among forces families. Wives and families are bearing the brunt of overstretch and finding it difficult to come to terms with the pressures put on all three services. I understand that the Chief of the General Staff's briefing team is to talk to units and their families. That is a welcome development but, ultimately, talking will not be enough.
Naturally, the men and women posted to theatre have good morale—it is what they are trained for. That does not mean to say that real issues associated with overstretch are not having a serious impact among married couples when it comes to retention in the forces. The situation is particularly bad among specialist units, such as the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers and the Royal Signals. Back-filling is leading to substantial fragmentation of units. I have even heard of a family in my constituency who were informed that they were about to be posted to Ireland; the soldier was suddenly sent to Kosovo instead, but the Army insisted that his wife packed up the family house on Salisbury plain and moved to Ireland, because her home had been reassigned to an incoming unit.
This month, in some of the Salisbury plain garrisons, 80 per cent. of the heads of household will be absent on service in Northern Ireland, Bosnia, Kosovo or Cyprus. I pay tribute to the men and women of the Army welfare services and to the volunteers of the Soldiers, Sailors and Airmen's Families Association and the Army Families
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Federation, but they cannot cope indefinitely with the problem. Hugely important decisions regarding education, housing and finance are being taken in the absence of husbands and fathers by wives who endure the double strain of knowing that their husbands are in danger of their lives, while routine domestic issues assume a frightening significance for those left behind.
Our soldiers are seeing terrible things in Kosovo, and last week an Army wife asked me how wives will cope when their men come home. The wives see on television the horrendous sights in Kosovo. The soldiers are professionals and know how to cope; the wives are not—and do not. What arrangements are Ministers putting in place to help the Army welfare services and other units to cope with family traumas in such circumstances?
Now that the initial task of entry into Kosovo is complete, our soldiers will have to settle down to many months, if not years, of alert discipline and tension—and perhaps boredom for long periods. It is therefore essential to support their quality of life. I have been told this week of wives at home in Germany having to send basic kit, including socks and shower bags, to Kosovo because of shortages in supply. I am grateful to the Minister of State for his commitment on telephone cards. Such matters seem trivial to us in this grand debate in the House of Commons, but such detail is immensely important to service men and women in the field.
I am glad to report that Army families have told me that they are generally happy with the Defence Housing Executive. It has been a great success, and I commend the work that it does.
I could go on, but I shall not because I want the Minister to have a fair crack. One message that has come through loud and clear in this debate is that we should be able to agree that there is a problem of overstretch and, above all, that it is time to invest in families.
6.44 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence (Mr. John Spellar): I am pleased about the broad welcome for the new style of these debates. That has been borne out by the nature of the speeches, as the hon. Member for Salisbury (Mr. Key) pointed out. Those who spoke have a lot of expertise and experience, and that was apparent again tonight. I fear that I shall be unable to cover all the points that were raised, so we will write to hon. Members on those.
I can think of no better time to hold this debate, as just over a week ago we welcomed the First Air Squadron back from duty over Kosovo. The country is rightly proud of those dedicated professionals. As their squadron leader rightly reminded the media, although they were pleased to be back, his thoughts were with their Army colleagues on the ground. They are doing a difficult job in a professional manner. Those who have expressed concern about our commitment of troops should propose an alternative to the action that we have taken to stop genocide, murder, rape and slaughter in the Balkans.
Once again, our forces have shown why they are world leaders. We must also play our part. We must ensure that our forces have the equipment they need—we debated that subject a couple of weeks ago, and I shall come on to the National Audit Office report in a minute. We should also look after their conditions. As the hon. Member for Salisbury and others have rightly emphasised,

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that includes the conditions of our forces and their families, because they are the most affected by pressures of overstretch.
We welcome the opportunity to tell the House about the many measures that we are taking to recruit and retain men and women in the armed forces. We also welcome this opportunity once again to pay tribute to the dedication and professionalism of the people who serve in and support our armed forces. I am not just paying lip service to our armed forces: my comments are based on our day-to-day experiences of dealing with them and the work that they undertake.
We are working hard to meet our targets to achieve full manning, as my hon. Friend the Minister for the Armed Forces said in his opening remarks. The operation in Kosovo will inevitably have an impact on our ability to meet those targets at the moment, particularly for the Army. We remain committed to bringing the services back up to full manning on schedule. We recognise that overstretch is a problem—we have aggressive measures in place to address it, and we are introducing others.
We know that we need to do more to encourage people to join the forces, but we are having considerable success—that should be widely welcomed in the House—and recent figures have shown a further increase. We must convince people to serve for longer. We are considering innovative ways in which to accomplish that. My hon. Friend gave two good examples: the link-up initiative and the introduction of learning credits.
I am pleased that the hon. Members for Croydon, South (Mr. Ottaway) and for Portsmouth, South (Mr. Hancock) highlighted the need for pilot retention, and the link-up project is working on that. The problem of pilot retention is faced by all air forces around the world. It is ultimately a matter between the armed forces and the airlines. This welcome initiative is good for the armed forces and for individual pilots. I should like to thank the hon. Member for Portsmouth, South for highlighting the professionalism of the pilots who go back to the United Kingdom to upgrade their training and to ensure that they keep their flying techniques current.
I know from first hand the value that the armed forces, at service and individual level, place on education and training. My hon. Friend talked about his experience with the Royal Artillery in Newcastle. The other week, I spent an enjoyable morning with the RAF at Cosford during this year's adult learners week. Cosford is the RAF's largest training establishment with 2,000 trainees. I was impressed by the learning opportunities provided at the station and by the participants enormously positive attitude towards learning. They often undertook those courses in extremely difficult circumstances, even in theatre.
I also commend many of the educational colleges, which, contrary to practice a few years ago, are now much more flexible in their approach to people who are out on service. That shows positive co-operation and real action, and both sides are to be commended. We believe that most service people want to develop their careers and we plan to give them the means and opportunity to do just that, both for their own advancement and as a valuable tool for the retention of armed forces personnel.
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Understandably, a number of hon. Members—including the hon. Member for Canterbury (Mr. Brazier)—spoke of the numbers deployed in theatre in Kosovo, the increasing pressures and the impact on tour intervals. At present, we have some 10,600 ground forces in Kosovo. As has been said, we expect other nations to send more troops over the next few months, and to be able to reduce our own contribution in six months. We are discussing the position with other countries—not just NATO countries—and trying to establish what their contribution will be in respect of a number of roles.
The right hon. Member for Bridgwater (Mr. King) asked about tour intervals. He rightly said that the SDR assumed average tour intervals of 24 months once all its measures had been implemented. Considerations include the size of the Army and—this was mentioned by the hon. Member for Salisbury—differences in different units, according to their specialisations.
Owing to both the interruption caused by Kosovo and the period that must elapse before the implementation of the SDR, tour intervals will remain shorter than we would wish. We recognise that that is a problem and that we must deal with it. We also recognise that certain conditions of service detract from the quality of life of our service personnel and their families. It would be possible, with a bit of thought, to introduce cost-effective measures to deal with that problem.
My hon. Friend the Minister for the Armed Forces and the hon. Member for Salisbury have raised the question of phone cards and phone queues. We have not got those things entirely right, but I think that the best test of an organisation is how quickly that organisation reacts to a problem, and I think that there has been a rapid reaction in regard to telephone services. Nevertheless, we aim to have much better packages of such services when troops are deployed in theatre, and we are working towards that. I am thinking not just of telephones, but of, for instance, television. We need to provide services at a fairly early stage and to provide the necessary equipment—including, of course, receiving equipment.
That does not apply only to the Army, although, because of Kosovo, attention has focused on the Army. We are now installing equipment on our ships to improve reception, with the aim of moving closer to real-time television. Following the end of the cold war, there are longer periods of patrol in the Navy. That means a different life style. Moreover, there are different expectations in the outside world.
Mention has been made of the dramatic changes that have taken place, even in this country, in access to e-mail systems. I think it was my hon. Friend the Member for Crawley (Laura Moffatt) who pointed out that it was not just a case of improving facilities in theatre, or improving equipment; the facilities enabling messages to be transmitted must also be improved. There have been big changes in regard to the availability of e-mail in people's homes, but we, too, can improve facilities and security. That is important because it helps to maintain communication. We have good experience from other services on which to draw, and we are drawing on it.
The right hon. Member for Bridgwater described our proposals as a palliative. They may seem small to some, but they are important to those who are working extremely hard in theatre, and who want some recreation and some improvement in contact. We need to look at

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how we can improve services and—most important—we need to respond rapidly when criticisms are made, and when the position needs to be examined.
Mention has been made by my hon. Friend the Member for Crawley, with her experience in the medical service, my hon. Friend the Member for Walsall, South (Mr. George) and the hon. Member for Romsey (Mr. Colvin) of the Defence Medical Services. In Defence questions only recently, my hon. Friend the Minister for the Armed Forces announced that we were moving to the next stage, looking at partnerships with academic institutions on the Defence Medical Services. That is enormously important for not only military effectiveness, but morale.
My hon. Friend the Member for Walsall, South was, I think, the only Member to draw attention to the important change in relation to the creation of the chief of defence logistics and the Defence Logistics Organisation. That is important in terms of both servicing rapid reaction and achieving value for money. The new chief of defence logistics, General Sir Sam Cowan, and his staff are setting a cracking pace in reforming that organisation, in achieving joint activity and in getting the best out of the different services.
The hon. Members for Portsmouth, South and for Romsey both drew attention to the National Audit Office report. It rightly identifies many of the problems that have arisen in procurement. That is precisely why, under the strategic defence review, we have created the smart procurement initiative and integrated project teams. Some of the projects that are identified in the report are already the subject of improvements and considerable gains, for both us and industry. Therefore, we have already taken those on board. We are already working on the matter. Indeed, that is acknowledged by the National Audit Office.
Mr. Brazier: The Minister's comments would carry more credibility if he could explain why it is necessary to raise the comparatively small sum of money by compromising DERA's neutrality, integrity and excellence.
Mr. Spellar: Those are entirely different issues: the work that we are undertaking on smart procurement and the critical mass at DERA. The hon. Gentleman often makes good points, but he rides his hobby horses almost into the ground. He refuses to acknowledge that, although in many other areas there are significant issues, they are
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by no means the whole picture. Integrated project teams and smart procurement are already working. We will demonstrate that over coming months.
The hon. Member for Portsmouth, South made a good point about those who wish to set up homes. He will be aware that in the Royal Navy, for example, an advance loan scheme already exists to assist in that process.
The hon. Member for Solihull (Mr. Taylor) talked about the cadets. Indeed, we have put additional resources into the cadets, which has been welcomed. We should not only remember that they are excellent youngsters, many of whom go into the services and have good careers, but acknowledge the work of those who act as their officers and trainers.
My hon. Friend the Member for South Swindon (Ms Drown) raised the question of under-18s in the armed forces. I shall clarify the position. The International Labour Organisation proposes to ban the forced or compulsory recruitment of children for use in armed conflict. United Kingdom recruitment is entirely different from the abusive, forced involvement of children as members of militias or paramilitary forces. We are talking about properly organised, properly supervised, voluntary recruitment into our armed forces, and the excellent future that it gives to many youngsters.
The hon. Member for Portsmouth, South raised a number of other issues, including nuclear test veterans, the Chinook and asbestos. He keeps asking for new inquiries. That is mainly due to the fact that he does not like the answers that the inquiries have already given. Other Members also raised the question of the Chinook. In both of the former cases—asbestos is different and is being reviewed—there has been careful study.
If people have better scientific evidence that negates the basis of those inquiries, they should come forward with it, but both radiological protection studies have stood their ground. We are funding an additional survey on one area—multiple myeloma—because there has been an increase in the problem among both groups: the veterans and the standard group.
The debate has allowed us to—
It being Seven o'clock, the motion for the Adjournment of the House lapsed, without Question put.

FINANCE AND SERVICES COMMITTEE
Ordered,
That Mr. George Mudie be discharged from the Finance and Services Committee and Mr. Keith Bradley be added to the Committee.—[Mr. Keith Hill, on behalf of the Committee of Selection.]

Teaching of Philosophy
Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Hill.]
7 pm
Mr. Tony McWalter: I am grateful to the House for giving me the opportunity of raising in this forum the subject—perhaps the plight—of philosophy. I told some hon. Members the subject of the debate, and some of them exhibited a certain pleasure, whereas others demonstrated some perplexity. Those who viewed the subject askance expressed two rather negative views about the subject of philosophy and its role in education.
The first view was that philosophy is a trivial subject that is not worth bothering with. The second view was rather different—that philosophy is the most profound and complex subject in the universe, but that its atmosphere is so rarefied that only geniuses, such as Einstein, need bother with it. Some people hold those views at the same time—although they are contradictory, as something cannot be both trivial and profound. Either view can be used to support the idea that the subject should be marginal to the educational process.
How do people arrive at such strange views? On the trivial side of the argument, it might be said that most people have thoughts that are broadly philosophical in character—so why bother studying them? Children, for example, often ask questions that are broadly—but fundamentally—philosophical, such as: "How can I tell what is right and what is wrong? Why should I obey the law? What is the point of studying history? Are people naturally selfish? Is everything made up of something else?"; or even, "Does God cry?" Those are among the thousands of philosophical questions that children and teenagers ask.
Our education system should make provision not only for those questions to be answered, but for children and young people to learn that such questioning is of value and should be encouraged. Part of the value of such questioning is that, in our lives, whether adult or child, we have to find answers to at least some of those questions.
Education should assist that process. However, it does little to develop young people's capacity to take philosophical matters seriously. Moreover, much of the time, education treats such inquiries as not worthy of pursuit—as if to say, "Ha! That is a philosophical question", with the shrug of the shoulders. It is the Pontius Pilate system:
"What is truth?…and would not stay for an answer."
It is a mistake to trivialise philosophy for many reasons, but I shall list only three. First, its subject matter is fundamentally important. Whatever else we want the education system to do, we want our children to grow up with a strong sense of right and wrong, and the strength of character both to live by their judgment and to develop as moral beings. It seems strange to expect to accomplish that goal by ignoring the subject that has most to offer in moral education.
Secondly, by refusing to take seriously young people's philosophical questions, we neglect a very valuable educational tool. Young people have some provisional answers to some of their philosophical questions.
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However, if they could be brought to realise that their answers were, for example, inconsistent or insufficiently argued, their grasp of matters of the first importance could be developed.
Much practical education provided to people starts not with an inquirer and a provisional answer, but with some authority who "knows" an answer and whose only interest in the process is in getting the other person to absorb it. That is the so-called "blotting paper" theory of education.
Philosophy has the power to deal with the questions about which young people—but not only young people—are really thinking. It treats their confusion not as something to be instantly eliminated, but with respect. People grow from a confused state. Indeed, Aristotle said that the sense of wonder is the source of all knowledge. The teacher of philosophy—who does not have the answers to those fundament questions, but perhaps has more adequate answers—is more like a facilitator of the pupil's thought process than the purveyor of truths. He is, in effect, a Socratic midwife to the pupil's process of learning.
There is some evidence that if one takes seriously the way in which young people think, some of those who are alienated from the education system because it does not address where they are at or what they are thinking might be more willing to stick around.
Thirdly, philosophy opposes what might be called the Gradgrind theory of education—that it is about "facts, facts, facts". Not all questions that human beings address have the character of a question in a pub quiz. Questions that have philosophical complexity are worth asking and addressing even though no single human being has a final answer to them. The answers that one generates to such questions are partial, provisional and hesitant and as a result they are often derided, but they have an interesting feature: other people may have a perspective that, once encountered, might make one's hesitant, provisional answer a great deal better. That makes a conversation with those who have other perspectives purposive. When we address philosophical questions, we recognise that our answers could well have been improved if only we had engaged in more conversations with people with different perspectives. A philosophical education can teach us intellectual humility and that the best available answer to a question is not necessarily a final answer. It can also produce equality and co-operation between the teacher as Socratic midwife and the pupil as inquirer, which Gradgrind would never have countenanced.
I have dealt at some length with what should be said in response to the claim that philosophy is trivial. I shall deal more summarily with the idea that it is not relevant to those of us who are more limited in our understanding because it requires the brain of Einstein to cope with it. Of course, every subject has pinnacles that are inaccessible to the beginner and in the case of philosophy one would not expect school students to tackle the "Critique of Pure Reason". However, philosophy can be taught at school level and I suggest that strong benefits could be obtained if the subject were less marginalised.
Antipathy to philosophy is strongly embedded in English culture as opposed to the culture of the Celtic fringe. I once worked in a bar where one of the regular customers found out that I was a student of philosophy. "Finking," he said, "is the curse of our age". Although I do not share that judgment, I recognise it as an unargued but potentially philosophical thesis.

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Previous Governments have put into practice their view that thinking is to be discouraged. In 1983, the then Secretary of State for Education decided that those with a degree in philosophy would not be eligible to teach. I think that he subscribed to the Einstein view of philosophy rather than to the view that it was trivial. Although over the years the ferocity of that judgment has been attenuated, the immediate effect of that decision was that seven university departments of philosophy closed and most teachers in schools today have taken no course in philosophy, not even in the theory of education.
I hope that we can start to repair the damage that that decision caused. I have a personal axe to grind as my own interest in philosophy was sparked by two mathematics teachers, both of whom had degrees in philosophy and taught mathematics with considerable flair and a profound understanding. Because of the previous Government's hostility to philosophy, today's students have no Mr. Donovan or Mr. Coffey to show them why certain mathematical ideas are important. I should like the Government to make a commitment to re-establishing the older, wiser view that an education in philosophy is not something from which the young need to be shielded.
Damaging consequences result from the neglect of philosophy in our schools, a neglect that other cultures would find strange. I have time to mention only one problem—the difficulties that young people have with moral concepts. My short disquisition must therefore represent the many other arguments that I could marshal to show the intrinsic importance of philosophical debate.
Most children grow up trained in a moral system—as a father, I undertake such training myself—in which the first commandment is, "Thou shalt obey". Early in our lives, therefore, there are persons who are the accusatives of that obedientiary ethic—the people whom children obey, such as parents and teachers. In adolescence, an obedientiary ethic proves ineffective, and those whom the child had obeyed are increasingly—perhaps sadly—seen as fallible and limited.
How does our education system facilitate the transition from an obedientiary ethic to a set of moral beliefs founded on a more wide-ranging or synoptic basis? Our schools make little effort to address the problem. Some believers in religion maintain that only an obedientiary ethic can work, saying that God should replace parents as the accusative of the obedientiary prescription. However, even many religious thinkers feel that that argument is not compelling. In our society, a considerable number of young people do not have the belief in a God that could support an obedientiary ethic for adult life.
Young people are left in a moral void, even though all of us agree that what we most want from an education system is that graduates should have high moral standing. The result is confusion, with young people thinking of morality as a maze—I wanted to get in an aside about a well-known radio programme—as a matter of taste, as vacuous or as a mechanism by which the bourgeoisie suppress the proletariat. But those positions are held without any kind of critical analysis, an analysis that could happen only if teachers and pupils were equipped to handle it.
I was a university teacher of philosophy before I entered the House. In my experience, most students arrive holding a strong view that moral beliefs are subjective, simply a matter of taste. They hold the view that any
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argument about such a topic would lead nowhere and would be a waste of time. The relatively few who did not subscribe to that belief held instead to a relatively primitive obedientiary ethic derived from childhood religion.
Morality has something to do with an obligation to respect others, but our education system is producing people who can provide no reason why others should be treated with respect. Virtually no attention has been given to the nature of morality. On the most important subject of all, our education system is silent. The miracle of our system is not that many people go off the rails, but that those who can give no good reason for behaving in a way that respects the rights of others nevertheless frequently do so.
The tendency of our system to produce ethical subjectivists is regrettable. Those who have studied philosophy usually reject ethical subjectivism as an incoherent position, partly because it offers little scope for distinguishing between what is in the realm of the ethical and moral, and what lies outside it. Would a taste be ethical, if, like Humpty Dumpty, my view of the moral realm was what I said it was?
To counteract subjectivism, those with no interest in philosophy often demand a reintroduction of ethics to the curriculum. However, these demands often amount—particularly from the Conservative party—to a demand to reintroduce an obedientiary ethic. They are often made by those who are "in charge" who ask those who are not "in charge" to conform to their imposed standards of behaviour. However, those "in charge" are sometimes wrong, and young people can cite examples to demonstrate the fact. The efforts to impose an obedientiary ethic are unlikely to succeed—unless, of course, we cease to be a democracy. The difficulty in replacing an emphasis on ethics by an emphasis on citizenship is that those who are good as citizens might be bad as people if the laws that they obey are inhumane—the example of apartheid can be mentioned in that vein.
In the meantime, we should be equipping young people to think seriously about moral matters. One feature of a moral person is that he or she has actually spent some time thinking about these things. "What will the repercussions on others be of my behaviour if I do this?" However, our education system does not provide the facilities for that extended process of reasoning or for that thought process.
I have submitted, using inadequately a single example of ethics, that the subject matter of philosophy is intrinsically important. I have submitted also that the teaching methods it engenders are beneficial: that in teaching it, we are required to respect the deeply held views of pupils and students; that it provides pupils and students with scope for developing independent thought; and that in addressing its questions, we become aware of what I can only call the majesty of the human intellect.
I ask the Government to signal clearly that they do not subscribe to the damaging view of philosophy held by the previous Government, who did not value the contribution that philosophy might make to our system of education and our system of teacher training. I ask the Government to confirm that they value that contribution, and that they will involve philosophers in the development of the curriculum in the areas of thinking skills and citizenship

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and when they are reflecting on how best to equip school teachers to respond to the welcome, if searching, philosophical questions raised by their pupils.
Descartes once said that philosophy was, in part, like having a conversation with the greatest thinkers of the past. We would be reluctant to shut away the greatest of paintings in a vault somewhere so that they could be viewed no longer. However, the works of the great philosophy masters—which have a transcendent beauty in their own right—are effectively shut in the vaults, for the skills needed to appreciate those works are being suppressed.
By marginalising the subject in our education system, we undermine the capacity of our young people to have that conversation with the great intellects of the past and to appreciate the beauty of their works. In doing so, we deprive them of the potential to appreciate some of the greatest intellectual achievements of humankind.
7.18 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education and Employment (Mr. Charles Clarke): I begin by congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead (Mr. McWalter) on securing this debate, and on the powerful, effective and entertaining case that he has just made.
I declare my interest in the subject. My mother's degree was in philosophy—she was tutored by Wittgenstein at university. She has been a constant pressure on me to raise the value and worth of philosophy in our education system—not only now, but for a long time. When I was involved in educational policy some 15 years ago, I remember her sending me newspaper cuttings detailing how philosophy had been brought into classes in primary schools in the Bronx in New York—precisely the kind of alienated area that my hon. Friend mentioned—because it developed the skills of thinking and articulacy which could counter the alienation that otherwise existed.
I am not quite sure whether I was the product of a Socratic midwife. However, I assure my hon Friend that I am wholly committed to the general approach that he set out so clearly today.
The Government attach great importance to teaching pupils to think flexibly and to make reasoned judgments. We consider those skills to be a vital part of young people's education and preparation for life, and for lifelong learning. To emphasise the quality of thinking skills is a critical means of raising standards in schools; it is a key element in our overall drive to raise educational standards.
I agree with what my hon. Friend said about the contribution that philosophy can make in developing pupils' thinking processes and skills. Those philosophical skills are already covered by a wide range of subjects throughout the curriculum. We develop children's thinking by making it more explicit; for example, by encouraging pupils to hypothesise, to experiment, to discuss and to reflect—all of which are key thinking skills. Modern information and communication technology frightens some people because of the obedience issues raised by my hon. Friend. However, it can be shown to provoke precisely the kind of thinking skills that must be a key part of our overall curriculum and of the educational process.
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Several of our current policies aim to develop further the teaching of thinking skills—in many cases, in ways that will offer access to philosophical inquiry. We have specifically asked the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority to consider ways of integrating thinking skills into the revised national curriculum—especially at key stage 3—as part of the current review. The literacy and numeracy frameworks both include references to thinking processes, such as investigation and problem solving. This afternoon, I visited the "Tomorrow's World" exhibition at Earls Court, where I saw some exciting maths work that showed games of problem solving as a means of exciting children's interest in those important matters.
Moreover, our recent proposals for a framework for personal, social and health education and for education for citizenship, which are currently out for consultation, will encourage the development of the skills of inquiry, reflection and debate. Citizenship is not about the obedient citizen, as my hon. Friend might fear; it is about the active citizen, who is enabled to participate in, control and determine—in all the ways that we know—a fantastically rapidly changing society. Through that process, children will have opportunities to engage with some of the important moral, social and political issues of today's society—perhaps even with the eternal issues mentioned by my hon. Friend—and to practise the skills of citizenship through discussion and debate, and through active involvement in the life of their schools and communities.
"Articulacy"—a word that perhaps does not exist in the "Oxford English Dictionary"—is an exceptionally important part of our education. It is important to ensure that children are able to articulate their thoughts in a number of ways and, in so doing, to respect the articulate views of others. That is how we have to operate in our society; citizenship will play an important role in doing that. As an aside, I pay tribute to the work done by so many schools in developing school councils, which are an important part in the life of many schools. They fulfil precisely the kind of role recommended by my hon. Friend. I very much support the campaigns by the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children and other organisations to promote the activity of school councils.
The Government are currently considering the development of a strategy on the way ahead for thinking skills across existing and new policies. In October 1998, the Department for Education and Employment commissioned Carol McGuinness of the school of psychology at Queen's university, Belfast, to review the effectiveness of different approaches to the teaching of thinking skills in primary and secondary schools. The research report—a copy of which I have here—was published on 4 May this year, and my hon. Friend the Minister for School Standards attended the launch. A copy of the report has been placed in the Library for the convenience of Members and others.
The report is entitled "From thinking skills to thinking classrooms: a review and evaluation of approaches for developing pupils' thinking". It contains a great deal of interesting material. It reviews examples of structured thinking skills: some focus on a philosophical approach, such as Martin Lipman's "Philosophy for Children"; and others take subject-specific approaches, such as the "cognitive acceleration through science" education programme, which takes thinking skills forward in a

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science context but aims to accelerate thinking more generally and to infuse thinking skills throughout the curriculum.
It is the latter approach that the Government look to the QCA to take forward, but many schools already use that approach successfully as part of the curriculum. I am attracted to the idea of developing thinking classrooms in which philosophical approaches to learning play a part. We are considering how best to take that forward in the light of the report's detailed findings. My hon. Friend's success in securing today's debate and his powerful expression of these important issues will accelerate and help that process.
I am fortunate in having in my constituency, a few metres from my home, Tuckswood first school, which actively uses philosophy and thinking skills in the classroom, with five and six-year-olds. The head of the school, Sue Eagle, has been a pioneer in the field and has participated in many of our national discussions on the subject. The purpose of thinking skills is to help children to learn how to think for themselves, ask questions and develop their ability to listen, analyse and discuss. Those skills improve pupils' powers of reasoning and inquiry, which are relevant at all key stages of maths, science and other subjects. I welcome the school's initiative in introducing the scheme, which is representative of smaller scale teaching experiments that show that mathematical problem solving and scientific reasoning can be enhanced through cognitive learning.
A couple of months ago, I went to observe philosophy lessons in the school, so that I could see for myself how the subject could be taught to children so young. The experience reflected the points raised by my hon. Friend in his speech tonight. Discussions about what the children liked or did not like brought out a range of important and interesting perceptions. Another philosophy class looked at and discussed fossils, which led to creation issues and
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the other problematic philosophical issues inherent in that area of inquiry. At that age, children are perfectly able to question and think about such issues, and it is important that they do so.
I can give my hon. Friend the assurances that he seeks. The Government regard thinking as a key part of the national curriculum, and philosophy is critical in that respect. At A-level, philosophy is available as a separate subject and, of more than 1,500 A-level philosophy candidates last year, three quarters passed. Under the Government's A-level reforms, which are to be introduced from next September, philosophy will continue to be available as a separate subject both at full A-level and as one of the new AS-level qualifications. In addition, the QCA is considering proposals for a new AS-level in critical thinking. That is in response to a specific recommendation by Sir Ron, now Lord Dearing in his 1996 report on 16 to 19 qualifications, for a new qualification designed to develop critical understanding of the various forms of knowledge.
The main thrust of the Government's A-level reforms is to encourage young people to take a wider range of subjects than the traditional two or three A-level package. We hope that, in that way, more young people will have the opportunity to include an AS-level in philosophy or critical thinking alongside their main programme of study. I hope that I have been able to reassure my hon. Friend that I and the Government as a whole are strongly committed to the contribution that philosophy and thinking can make to our education system, and that we do not accept the ideology of past Governments. We hope to develop the subject further in the curriculum of the future. I thank my hon. Friend for giving me the chance to make these statements in today's debate.
Question put and agreed to.
Adjourned accordingly at twenty-nine minutes past Seven o'clock.