Westminster Hall Sitting of 15 September 2004

Preamble
[MR. JOHN MCWILLIAM in the Chair]

Strategic Defence Strategy (Scotland)
Motion made, and Question proposed, That the sitting be now adjourned.—[Derek Twigg.]
9.30 am
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Before I call the hon. Member for North Tayside (Pete Wishart), may I encourage brevity from everyone? A quick glance will tell hon. Members that the numbers present do not divide very well into an hour and a half.
Pete Wishart: First, may I say how pleased, grateful and just a little flattered I am to see the Secretary of State in his place? I think that that shows his real appreciation of the deep concern and anxiety that is felt throughout the defence community in Scotland about the plans for the infantry and for our military bases and installations. He also appreciates the deep concern that is felt in my constituency and in those of other hon. Members; we have a deep attachment to our historic regiments and we appreciate and admire the work that they do on our behalf.
The Secretary of State's presence makes a contrast with the approach taken by his Armed Forces Minister. My hon. Friend the Member for Perth (Annabelle Ewing) and I wrote to the Minister a couple of months ago to make a simple request for a meeting about the plans for the Army. In response, we received a message that more or less said, "Get stuffed". It took two months to get that reply, so it is good to see that the Secretary of State is here. I am might not be too pleased about what he might have to say, but I am glad of his presence.
May I also thank the large number of hon. Members who have turned up for this debate, particularly the many Scottish Members? It shows the concern about our armed forces that exists in every corner of Scotland. I am glad to see so many people here.
I will be brief to allow as many hon. Members as possible to contribute to the debate. I also intend to be as generous as possible with my time and if any hon. Members wish to intervene to give their support for our historic regiments, I will be prepared to take the interventions. Perhaps they can make their remarks to the Secretary of State through me. My remarks will almost exclusively be on the plans for the infantry in Scotland: the plans to do away with one of our historic regiments and subsequently to amalgamate what is left.
This debate is part of the ongoing campaign to save our regiments and a way of life in our infantry that has served us so well and with such distinction through the centuries. The infantry has tremendous links with the local communities that we have the privilege to represent. I do not need to tell the Secretary of State that there is almost overwhelming hostility to the plans for the infantry in Scotland. Campaigns and protests have sprung up all over Scotland, where the proposals, have in a way, galvanised communities. The plans have
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attracted criticism from very senior officers who previously served in the armed forces and they are starting to attract it from current senior officers in the infantry, most notably General McColl, who commented on Monday about the overstretch in Iraq. I am glad to see serving officers breaking the Ministry of Defence's three-line whip of silence, which has been imposed upon the military on this issue. It is great to see them breaking ranks.
Sir Robert Smith: The hon. Gentleman made an important point when he highlighted overstretch in Iraq. As well as our keenness to support our specific regiments, at the heart of this debate is the fundamental fact that many of us believe that the Government have made a mistake in seeing the peace process in Northern Ireland as a chance to cut the size of the Army, rather than as an opportunity to redeploy that strength to ensure that we can fulfil our overseas commitments more easily.
Pete Wishart: The hon. Gentleman makes an important and valid point. We are already beginning to see the results of overstretch. The Black Watch regiment, which has recruited from my constituency, is on its second tour of duty in Iraq because it is the only regiment that is equipped to deal with that particular task.
The current campaign has been fantastic. Usually when we as hon. Members get the petitions board out and head down to town centres to try to recruit an unsuspecting public to whichever campaign we are backing this week, we are met with indifference and scepticism—not with this campaign. People are queuing up to sign the petition to save our regiments. I have not encountered anybody who has refused to sign the petition—or who has not been prepared to do so. That has not only been the case in regimental constituencies such as mine, but throughout Scotland.
May I, at this early stage, pay tribute to the excellent campaign that has been conducted to save our regiments. It has done a fantastic job and has been ably backed by some of the national media such as The Scotsman and The Herald, and by publications such as The Courier and the Perthshire Advertiser in my area. They have created a very vocal and passionate campaign. Our voice will be heard on this issue and we will not go away.
I am fascinated about why there has been such a passionate and vocal campaign to save our regiments. What is it about the way that we organise our infantry that inspires the public with such confidence and respect? There may be a number of answers to that, some of them to do with traditions. People like traditions; they like the way in which such things have been organised. They respect the fact that they still work, and there is value in that.
Such public confidence may have something to do with the fantastic community links that the regiments enjoy; the fact that they are there, and always have been there. It may have something to do with respect for the way in which our regiments perform an almost unimaginably difficult task. However, I think that it is about more than that; it is about reassurance and our

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confidence that our armed forces are the best in the world. They are the best in the world, not because of accident but because of the way in which they are designed, arranged and structured. Our armed forces are the envy of the world and the way in which the regimental system works is the envy of many armed forces throughout the world.
Like the Secretary of State, I have never been a soldier. Before he became an esteemed and distinguished senior politician, the Secretary of State was a barrister—not, I would suggest, a particularly dangerous occupation. I was a musician; probably the most dangerous position that I was ever put into was when I faced an army of unsuspecting rock fans, which was not a particularly dangerous task. Neither the Secretary of State nor I have performed dangerous tasks, and it is important that we take on board the views of existing and former soldiers, although not in the form of the sham consultation produced for the infantry in Scotland, in which soldiers were asked whether they preferred one, two or three battalions or whatever. That was like asking what sort of wood they wanted their gallows made out of. We should speak properly to soldiers about the type of infantry that they want in the future.
I have spoken to a lot of soldiers since the defence review was initiated and spent a lot of time debating with them the type of infantry that they would seek. I received a number of interesting responses, but the one that impressed me most came from an old soldier who had served in the Black Watch in the second world war. He said that our regiments work because soldiers are doing it for their pals; it has nothing to do with esoteric concepts such as Queen and country. It is about a soldier's pals, and the fact that they were recruited in the same town and may even have gone to the same school. It is about the fact that a soldier's father and grandfather had fought in the same regiment. It is about pals that one can rely on when the going gets tough. We tinker with that loyalty, determination and comradeship at our peril.
My local regiment is the Black Watch; I have the Black Watch hackle on today and my tie was given to me on a visit to Balhousie, the regiment's headquarters, on Monday. The Black Watch is in Iraq serving its second tour of duty. The regiment goes back 300 years. It was formed in Aberfeldy, on the banks of the Tay in my constituency. It was called the Black Watch because it was formed to watch over the highlands for brawny highlanders who might come into my constituency years and years ago. Sometimes I wish that it would come back and continue to perform that useful task.
In Aberfeldy, there is a monument of a kilted soldier who looks down at the very spot in which the Black Watch was mustered. It is a beautiful place, to which people come to pay their respects for fallen comrades or for people who have served with distinction in the regiment. It is that sense of history and attachment that creates the special culture in our historic regiments. Men want to join, and fight for, those proud regiments with their special camaraderie. How can we expect fighting men to have the same affection for abstract formations designed in Whitehall? How can one compare such a romantic name as the Argyll and Sutherland
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Highlanders to the third battalion lowland regiment? Large battalions may seem sensible to Whitehall pen pushers, but they are nothing but synthetic creations to fighting men.
The most important question to consider when talking about the reorganisation of the infantry is whether it will work. Will the Jackson proposals mean that our armed forces will be better prepared to meet the challenges of a rapidly changing world with new, developing, evolving military theatres? Sure, it looks like we are going to have a lot of smart bombs and smart technology to fire at and obliterate all sorts of appropriate and suitable targets. However, will our armed forces be able to meet the challenges of the new world, in which peacekeeping and conflict prevention will be the major task that our infantry have to face? Is it not bizarre that we have a regimental system that is supremely prepared to meet such challenges, but that we are thinking about doing away with it?
We have to take on board the views of some of our senior officers. I was impressed by what General John McColl, one of our most senior officers serving in Iraq, said about the situation. He said that if the Jackson proposals go through,
"You either work the army harder or do less with them."
He went on to say that
"our capacity to conduct a number of these commitments"—
that is, our current commitments—
"is reduced with a reduction in the number of infantry battalions."
As the second most senior officer serving in Iraq, he should be listened to. I hope that the Secretary of State takes his remarks to heart.
I suppose that the amalgamation of regiments makes perfectly good sense to the Ministry of Defence. We are always told how reasonable the proposals are, and how they take on board what has been said, but those of us who have a problem with what has been suggested, and who have concerns about the way that the issue is going, are always presented as traditionalists or sentimentalist. Well, call me an old-fashioned sentimentalist but, given that our infantry is the envy of armed forces all over the world, that our armed forces command such respect and confidence from the public and that we have the finest fighting men in the world, I make no apologies for being a traditionalist and a sentimentalist in this respect.
I suspect that the real reason for the amalgamations is that larger battalions will be easier to cut at a future date. Once the local connection has been severed and the regiments are submerged into a great, amorphous blob, they will be much easier to cut; there will be a lot less local protest next time around.
Why are these changes being suggested now? It is no mistake that these proposals are called the Jackson proposals. General Sir Mike Jackson will retire next year, and he is keen to cement his place in history with these proposals. That is why they are being rushed through with undue haste. Where is the national debate on the way forward for our infantry? Where are the debates in the House about what has been proposed? Where are the proper consultations?
Mr. Alex Salmond: Will my hon. Friend accept that, whatever the rights and wrongs of the Secretary of State's proposals, there is

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something deeply unpleasant—indeed, unacceptable—in effectively eliminating regiments when they are in the line of fire in Iraq, where the Prime Minister has placed them?
Pete Wishart: My hon. Friend makes a good point. I have received many letters—as, I suspect, he has—from soldiers serving in Iraq who are appalled at the prospect of the changes. They know that they have been placed in unimaginable danger, and know that what has been proposed is a betrayal of what they are doing abroad by those who are supposed to be in positions of responsibility at home.
Why are the changes happening now, especially given that our armed forces are overstretched as never before, as the hon. Member for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine (Sir Robert Smith) mentioned in relation to the situation in Iraq? The Jackson proposals make absolutely no sense, given that the bulk of the armed forces' operational commitments involve peacekeeping, for which our forces are supremely prepared and well equipped after their experience in the Balkans and elsewhere. High-tech military hardware and smart technology will not win hearts and minds on a hostile street. It takes men on the ground in berets and Tam o' Shanters, men such as those who serve in the Black Watch.
I hope that the Secretary of State has listened carefully to the sheer crescendo of opposition to what has been suggested for our infantry. Our regiments have served us well. They are respected and admired the world over. Men continue to want to fight in them.
Mr. Lindsay Hoyle: The hon. Gentleman rightly talks about the benefits of cap badges, and the local community that regiments serve. Is he aware that many in the Black Watch are recruited in Lancashire? He is supportive of Scottish regiments, so will he be as supportive of Lancashire regiments continuing? There are such close links between them and the Scots Guards and Black Watch. I hope that he will support the Queen's Lancashire Regiment when there is a debate on that subject.
Pete Wishart: I am grateful for those remarks. Of course we support what is happening in Lancashire. In fact, I was there with some soldiers serving in that regiment. They asked me to sign their petition, which I was more than happy to do. We know that there are such issues across the UK, and I am impressed by some of the campaigns to resist the plans that have been put forward.
I do not wish to speak for much longer, as a number of hon. Members want to speak. I just hope that the Secretary of State has listened to the voices of opposition. We will not go away. We will continue to fight for our regiments, and we hope that the Secretary of State and other hon. Members will join us and help us save our regiments.
9.44 am
Rachel Squire: I begin by congratulating the hon. Member for North Tayside (Pete Wishart) on securing this important debate. It is usual parliamentary practice for the parties to engage in
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political point-scoring, but I do not intend to do so because I want to use this time to emphasise to the Secretary of State for Defence the strength of feeling that I have observed among all ranks of serving and retired personnel and their families, and the public, about some of the proposals that he made on 21 July. I ask my right hon. Friend not to proceed with any decision, and to hold a full consultation with all ranks and all communities involved.
May I briefly, as I am sure others will, pay tribute to our armed forces? They have a reputation throughout the world for their professionalism and high standards. Their skill and their commitment to conflict prevention and peacekeeping are second to none, and the role that they have played in promoting this Government's global agenda has become ever greater and more important. The Government's proposal to cut back on the numbers serving in our Army, Navy and Air Force when they are already overstretched and overcommitted is not something I can support. Linked as it is to the removal of four regiments, it is seen by service personnel, families and communities as an act of backstabbing, particularly given the commitment that they have made to put their lives at risk, knowing that they might pay the ultimate price.
If the Government go ahead with the cuts, they need also to decide from which operations to withdraw service personnel. The hon. Member for North Tayside mentioned the Black Watch, which recruits particularly from Dunfermline and the area that I represent. Like other hon. Members, I am very proud of the Black Watch and its history, as well as its example of professionalism and high standards, and am mindful of the ever-increasing demands that are made on its serving personnel.
For instance, the Black Watch was in the Balkans in 2002, and served in Iraq in both 2003 and 2004. An average tour now takes place within a year, rather than every two years. Its personnel were supposed to be at Warminster, serving for two years as the Army's training battalion, yet they were called on to return to Iraq at very short notice due to the lack of available highly-trained personnel. The Black Watch stands out as a regiment that has ever-greater demands placed on it, yet which, due to the Government's proposals to remove a Scottish regiment, is at risk of disbandment and is experiencing low morale, particularly among personnel serving in an extremely challenging and dangerous environment.
While some have said that contemplating larger regiments could be a good idea, they have qualified it by adding that before we reflect on cutting or merging regiments the world needs to be at greater peace than it is at this time of such active engagement. The Member for North Tayside mentioned what I would call the importance of bonding, which is always emphasised to me by veterans. The way that those in our services, particularly in our regiments, bond during training and the development and maintenance of their skills, professionalism and commitment are very important, particularly when they are under fire.
May I conclude with a brief mention of the Royal Navy dockyards and the Royal Air Force, although I am sure that others will speak about them? Hon. Members would be surprised if, as the hon. Member representing Rosyth dockyard, I did not say that while

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I welcome the commitment that has been made with regard to the future aircraft carrier, I am not at all happy about the reduction in the size of the fleet, because of the impact that that has on the work load at Rosyth dockyard and elsewhere, and because of its contribution to the active and full service being undertaken in all parts of the world by the Royal Navy.
While there is no RAF base in Dunfermline and west Fife, I would not like to fail to mention RAF Leuchars in Fife, which includes part of the constituency of the right hon. and learned Member for North-East Fife (Sir Menzies Campbell), and emphasise its contribution, along with the outstanding contribution of RAF Lossiemouth and RAF Kinloss.
Angus Robertson: On that cue, as represent both RAF Kinloss and RAF Lossiemouth, does the hon. Lady agree that the Ministry of Defence should listen to the arguments put by the local community and take it on board that any run-down or closure of either facility will have a disproportionate impact on Moray and the north of Scotland compared with a run-down or closure elsewhere in the UK?
Rachel Squire: I certainly agree on the strong importance of RAF Lossiemouth and RAF Kinloss not only to the RAF, but to the local communities and their future.
I hope that the Secretary of State for Defence, the Prime Minister and the Cabinet will listen to the views and widespread concern, and recognise that they need to—I shall use that very Scottish phrase—"go back and think again" and consult fully all ranks of service personnel, as well as veterans, families and communities. They must ensure that we maintain the UK's reputation for the outstanding professionalism and commitment of our armed forces.
9.51 am
Mr. Michael Moore: It is welcome to see the Secretary of State in his place to respond to today's debate. The seriousness of the subject is emphasised by his presence and by the strong presence of Members from all parties representing Scottish seats and other parts of the United Kingdom. Such a good turnout is a sign of the importance of the Scottish infantry's contribution to the British Army and the other defence interests in Scotland.
There has been a great deal of uncertainty for months about the future of Scottish regiments. For several months, newspapers such as The Herald have had apparently well placed sources telling them that a major review was under way and that one—or worse, more—Scottish regiment would be at stake. I am afraid that the Secretary of State's announcement at the tail end of July, just before the parliamentary recess, enhanced that uncertainty, as he confirmed that there would be a reduction of one battalion in Scotland from six to five.
My basic grasp of arithmetic suggests that that would not work, and as yet it is not clear how it might develop. I hope that, after many weeks during which it has not been clear what is happening, the fact that the Secretary
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of State is here today will allow us to understand his thinking more clearly and that the process will lead us to a decision.
The concerns in my part of south-east Scotland about the future of the King's Own Scottish Borderers and the Royal Scots are reflected in the number of petitions that have been collected. I presented one to Parliament last night; I know that the hon. Member for Galloway and Upper Nithsdale (Mr. Duncan) presented one from the King's Own Scottish Borderers last week. Local newspapers in Fife and elsewhere have been running strong campaigns on the future of the regiments. Each focuses on key factors relating to traditions of the regiments, military honours that they have won and the importance of their contribution to the work of the British Army, whether in Iraq, Northern Ireland or the many other parts of the world where the British Army is doing sterling service. It strikes people as very strange that at a moment of such heavy requirement for deployments, we should be contemplating a reduction in the number of regiments.
The specific proposal in Scotland is that there should be one regiment for the whole country, or a highland regiment and a lowland regiment. From what we read in the press and learn elsewhere, it appears that the decision on whether there should be one or two regiments, and the related and difficult decision of how to get six regiments down to five, has been left to the colonels of the Scottish regiments. Perhaps they will play some elaborate game of musical chairs or Russian roulette to work out which of their number should leave the table. That is a difficult way for anyone to make a decision. I hope the Secretary of State clarifies how it will be made.
I understand that there is some sound operational thinking from the perspective of the planners in the Ministry of Defence. I say to the Secretary of State that, as yet, people in Scotland have not been persuaded of that. We look to him again today to set out the justification for that reform of the Army in Scotland. I do not think that any of us, regardless of our political opinions, is against reform of the Army. We appreciate that it must change and adapt to the different circumstances of the post-11 September world as well as to the way the world has changed since the end of communism. The world is very different from what we were geared up for 20, 30 or 40 years ago. The Army must adapt, and I do not think that any of us has seen any unwillingness among the people we represent to be part of that process.
However, the form of reorganisation planned by the Ministry of Defence has not been persuasive across Scotland. We await with interest what the Secretary of State tells us today and hope that his intentions become clear. Inevitably and properly, the regiments, and their huge number of supporters across Scotland, have been consulting the communities that they are drawn from, the retired elements, and families and friends to find out what they think of the proposals. There are plenty of examples of the negative responses that have come forward as a result of the consultation process. The discussions and questionnaires all articulated key aspects of the regimental system and stressed why it is important that we continue with each of the Scottish regiments that serve us with such distinction.

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One of the questionnaires that a friend passed to me emphasised some key elements of the regimental system, which bear a quick repetition. The responses start by emphasising the sense of belonging to an entity that has an existence—a past, present and future of its own. That is important to people at all stages of their military service. Continuity—the ability of individuals to keep returning to the regiment or battalion in which they began, to their benefit and that of the units in which they serve—is also important. Names and traditions are at the heart of the debate, and one of the great anxieties is over the fact that, whatever reform the Secretary of State settles on, maintaining the names and traditions, what they stand for and the power they have to motivate the people involved as well as those who support them is crucial. For Scotland to lose any of the names would be a tragedy.
Thanks to our constituency roles, each of us can emphasise and bear witness to the regional connections. I appreciate that some regiments draw their support from various parts of Scotland. The King's Own Scottish Borderers recruits from the constituency of the hon. Member for Hamilton, South (Mr. Tynan) as well as from more obvious places such as my constituency. Those regional connections are fundamental—not just to recruitment but to ensuring that the people represented by me and by others feel a sense of identification with and connection to the British Army in its broader sense. That recruitment focus is rather important.
What I understand, above all, from discussions with family members who have been in the armed forces, from friends and from constituents across south-east Scotland is that esprit de corps—the connection that people feel to their regiment or battalion—is essential to them. It would be a crying shame to give up on that.
The King's Own Scottish Borderers, the Royal Scots and the other Scottish regiments all embody the finest traditions in the British Army. We have yet to hear convincing arguments or evidence that suggests there is a case for removing one of those battalions or regiments. Whatever the final form of the recommendations, I hope that the Secretary of State will reflect on each of the points as well as the strength of feeling in the Chamber today, which represents a strong feeling throughout Scotland. I hope also that, as a result, he makes it clear that there will be no cuts in the number of regiments and battalions in Scotland.
10 am
Annabelle Ewing: As the Member of Parliament for Perth, where the Black Watch has its regimental headquarters at Balhousie castle, I am pleased to have the opportunity to contribute to this extremely important debate. I would like to take the opportunity to congratulate my Perthshire colleague, the hon. Member for North Tayside (Pete Wishart), on securing the debate. I endorse what he said in his excellent contribution. It is instructive to note that it took the Scottish National party to force a debate, as none was offered by the United Kingdom Government. That is regrettable, and it is entirely consistent with the secretive way in which the Labour Government have pursued their agenda of scrapping Scotland's entire regimental structure.
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As we have heard from other hon. Members, the official announcement came on the eve of the summer recess. There has been no opportunity for proper parliamentary scrutiny, as mentioned by other hon. Members, including the hon. Member for Dunfermline, West (Rachel Squire), and the detail of the Defence Secretary's military case for this full-frontal assault on Scotland's regiments remains a mystery. Perhaps we shall hear a bit more about that from the Secretary of State today.
Mr. David Stewart: If we had an independent Scotland, what would the disposition of your forces be? How many regiments, battalions and how many men and women would make up the Scottish army?
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman is using "your". That refers to me, and I do not have any forces.
Annabelle Ewing: I am a bit disappointed with the contribution from the hon. Member for Inverness, East, Nairn and Lochaber (Mr. Stewart). I would have thought that he should be fighting for the future of the Highland regiment. Perhaps his time would be better employed for his constituents in doing that.
There has been complete silence from Scotland's Government in the summer months. When Scotland's First Minister came to London on his whistle-stop, cocktail-party visit in early July, his spokesman said that the First Minister wanted all the facts before he made a statement. I wonder what statement the First Minister has made on the subject of the future of Scotland's regiment. As far as I can see, he has made none. What of the Scottish Secretary? Again, there has been silence. What of the Ministry of Defence? As my hon. Friend the Member for North Tayside said, we wrote to the Armed Forces Minister on 7 July and it is an absolute disgrace that we did not get a reply until 7 September.
We have experienced, to coin a phrase much liked by the Chief of the General Staff, a deafening wall of silence from Ministers, but serving soldiers, veterans, local communities and all the local authorities in the Tayside and Fife area have made their views known. The unanimous view is that the Government's proposals to scrap Scotland's regimental system are wrong in principle and are likely to be deeply damaging, particularly in light of the current overstretch of our armed forces.
A serving officer in the Black Watch, currently on its second tour of duty in Basra, wrote to me because I am his local MP. Obviously I am not in a position to give the name of this officer, not least because of the MOD's gagging order, but I would like to quote part of what he wrote to me in his bluey:
"While we wish to look after our country, our country seems less keen to look after us. The contradiction between deploying the training battalion on the one hand, and yet cutting four battalions on the other, needs to addressed. "
I have also been contacted by a number of serving soldiers currently in Basra on their second tour of duty.

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Again, I am not in a position to provide the names, but I would like to quote from a bluey from one of those soldiers:
"The recent decision to reduce the armed forces can only add to the stress and pressure put on us and our families. What with the ever-increasing commitments and deployments we are volunteered for. Some of us have been separated from our families for 400 days in the past two years. I am writing to you to fight on my behalf to reverse the decision to reduce our armed forces as I am fighting for my life out here in Iraq in support of the politicians."
I have also been contacted by the most recent colonel of the Black Watch, Brigadier Gary Barnett, who retired last year. On the subject of creating a synthetic super-regiment, Brigadier Barnett says:
"We have seen no arguments that persuade us that battalions from large regiments are more operationally efficient or exhibit any other advantage over single battalion regiments. It is clear to us that the advantages of a sense of belonging, continuity, regional connections, recruiting focus and esprit de corps far exceed the perceived disadvantages of the small regiment. If it ain't broke, don't fix it."
In my concluding remarks, I stress that the strength of feeling about the Black Watch locally—in all parts of Tayside and Fife—is very clear. The Secretary of State needs only to read the back pages of the Perthshire Advertiser and The Courier during the summer. Both papers have led excellent campaigns.
The regimental system has served Scotland well, and it has proven its worth time and time again in terms of recruitment, retention and operational efficiency. Then professionalism of Scotland's regiments is second to none. I quote again from the serving officer currently in Basra:
"The Black Watch is proud to come from Perthshire, Angus, Fife and Dundee. We hope the people of those counties will stand by us."
The people of Perthshire, Angus, Fife and Dundee have stood by the Black Watch. The question that needs to be answered is will the Secretary of State for Defence do so?
10.7 am
Mr. John MacDougall: I have an honest concern about the defence review, but I want to reflect on one or two other points other than those concerning the Black Watch.
I do not believe that the Secretary of State has the easiest job, and making a decision based on popular opinion is not the way to run defence effectively. It is unfortunate that this has already become a political dogfight rather than an honest concern about the outcome of a balanced decision. That exposure is sad at this stage. It is also sad that Opposition parties will not give an honest answer to straightforward questions. They are put to the Secretary of State for Defence, who is expected to give a straightforward and honest answer about what he believes an effective defence to be.
It is fair to say—I shall say it—that, in an independent Scotland, you would have great difficulty in maintaining existing defence.
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I have already had to tick off one Member for using "you". I have to advise the
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hon. Gentleman that by using "you", he means me, and I would have more difficulty than most, as I represent a constituency in the north-east of England.
Mr. MacDougall: My sincere apologies to you, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I shall refrain from using that word again.
I have a long-standing relationship with the Black Watch and I appreciate and value, as I am sure the Secretary of State does, the excellent service provided by those who have served in the Black Watch over many years and the work that they have carried out—the campaigns that they have been involved in and what they have been called upon to do, especially at present in Iraq.
That mixes up the argument. On the one hand, there are the high emotions. When someone loses their life—and we do not want that to happen—there are calls to bring the troops back home. On the other hand, we want to keep the regiment; we want to keep it, but we do not want to send it to war where its members' lives might be lost. We must remove ourselves from that position and honestly concern ourselves with whether we have the right balance between an effective ground force and the advanced technology of today. In my opinion, the balance is wrong, but that does not mean that I will not respect the Secretary of State's final decision, which will be intelligently based on much more information than I have and which will take into account what is needed for the future.
I am not going to say to my constituents in Central Fife that I do not value the jobs that have been developed in new defence technology. I can mention companies in Central Fife that employ hundreds of people who have benefited from the decisions that are being taken in the defence review. I welcome the fact that the more we put into modern technology and effective defence, the less chance there is of people on the ground losing their lives. That has to be valued. We must take that into account; we cannot ignore it.
As I mentioned at the outset, I also accept that we cannot keep troops simply because it is popular to do so. What kind of a silly defence would we have in this country if we simply based it on our saying, "Well, we are not going to do this because we don't like it, so let's have a show of hands and decide not to do it." No effective Government could do that.
I have concerns, but they are mixed. They are honest concerns, not political ones. I am concerned about the eventual outcome and whether the balance that is decided on will be right. My personal preference would, of course, be for the Black Watch to be retained, but I understand that the decision on that cannot be taken on the basis of personal preference; it has to be taken on the basis of intelligence, knowledge and effectiveness. If anyone wants to stand up and say, "Well, that does not matter," they should tell that to the country. Do they think that the electorate will go for that? They will not, but they will go for honesty and concern. My concern is that the balance is not right.
I appreciate that this message is not healthy for morale at present. It does not help the troops on the ground to be as effective as they should be. In fact, it could create a situation where it puts them at risk rather than aids them to do their job. The quicker we

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collectively and responsibly give out the message that that is not what we want to say to the troops, the better. This debate should not be about trying to weaken the Government's political agenda; it should genuinely be about the effectiveness of the ground force balanced against new technology. If the debate remains around that, I am convinced that it can be effective and that the hon. Member for North Tayside (Pete Wishart), who secured it, will get an honourable outcome. However, if it is about scoring points, it will not end in that way.
My sincere wish is for my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State to take on board the intelligent points that have been made this morning, and that he will send out the right message to the people who serve their country very well and have done so for many years and will continue to do so in the modern defence structure of the future—the message that their Government take on board their service but will make their final decision based on a listening policy that includes taking account of what has been said in today's discussion.
10.14 am
Mr. Alan Reid rose
Mr. Deputy Speaker: I will call the hon. Member for Argyll and Bute (Mr. Reid) if he promises to be brief.
Mr. Reid: Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I undertake to be brief. I congratulate the hon. Member for North Tayside (Pete Wishart) on securing this important debate. I am pleased that the Secretary of State is present; that shows that the Government regard this debate as important.
It is clear that the Army is already overstretched. I am concerned about the Government's plans, which appear to assume no more commitments for the Army; one of the lessons of recent years is that it is always landed with unexpected new ones. In addition to the obvious commitments in Iraq and Afghanistan, issues such as foot and mouth and the firefighters' strike have meant that the Army has had to be involved in unexpected commitments at home.
It is important that we keep our infantry strength at its current level; we should not reduce the numbers. As was said earlier, high-tech is vitally important and means that we can win wars by putting fewer soldiers' lives at risk. However, it has also emerged from the lessons of Iraq and Afghanistan that even after the war has been won and the conventional fighting is over, there is still an important job to be done in winning the peace and that requires highly skilled, committed infantry soldiers on the ground. The record of the British Army in Iraq and Afghanistan has shown once again that it is the best army in the world, and the present regimental system, which instils in our soldiers a sense of loyalty to the regiment and a sense of belonging, is a vital reason for that. I am concerned that the Government's proposals, which would effectively scrap the Scottish regimental structure, would make the Army a lot less effective.
The local regiment in my constituency is the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders, which has a long, distinguished history and only recently returned from Iraq. Recruits want to join local regiments that have long and proud traditions. If the Government go ahead
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with their plans to merge the Argylls into a new regiment, that is bound to have a negative impact on recruitment, compared with keeping the famous, longstanding name of the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders. That must have an impact on the morale of soldiers serving in the regiment. I am also concerned that the signals that the Government are sending out—that we are cutting numbers and there is no long-term future—are bound to deter people from joining the Army and put off anybody who is considering it as a career.
I conclude by reminding the Secretary of State that, 30 years ago, a previous Government tried to abolish the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders. There was a massive campaign of opposition, which succeeded and the then Government buckled under the pressure. I urge the Government not to proceed with plans to abolish the Argylls or merge them into another regiment because I suspect that, like their predecessors in office, they will buckle under the weight of the subsequent campaign.
10.19 am
John Thurso: I congratulate the hon. Member for North Tayside (Pete Wishart) on securing the debate. It is clear from the strength of feeling in the contributions made today that this timely debate touches hon. Members on both sides of the House. I am pleased to see the Secretary of State here today. I hope his presence is a sign that the Government understand that strength of feeling and may be open to some arguments of reason.
We have a proud tradition of service in Scotland, particularly in the highlands, but, as has been evidenced by contributions from hon. Members from south of the border, that tradition is not confined to Scotland but covers all the British armed forces—Army, Navy and Air Force.
There is a book relating to my area, which I have read, called "Sword of the North", which sets out the history of the Seaforth Highlanders. I recently read another book about the history of a battalion of the Seaforth Highlanders in the second world war, from which I learned just how many people whom I have known in civilian life served in the second world war. I had no idea of that, nor did I know how many medals they had won, or how much they had done. I just knew them as the Domine of the local school, a grocer or whatever it was that they did.
Throughout history, Scotland and the highlands have produced regiments that have fought bravely for this country. One has only to look at the war memorials to understand what they have given. That is an important tradition, and allied to it is the tradition of service by the Territorial Army, which has not been mentioned so far, but should be. There is a long tradition of sound service by the TA. At a time of overstretch, which has been mentioned, and when the Army is committed in many parts of the world, we should remember what Territorials are doing in many theatres of conflict.
Tradition is important as the bedrock on which our military is based and the focus for how we act as well as for morale and recruitment, but I believe that we cannot be hide-bound by tradition. We live in a fast-moving world and, as has been pointed out, there is new technology to consider. In that sense, the Government

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are absolutely right to adapt and to modernise. As my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for North-East Fife (Sir Menzies Campbell) said to me earlier, it would be inappropriate for the party of Haldane to oppose the reorganisation of the Army. We have no problem with that reorganisation.
It seems to me that there are two separate points in the debate. The first is the size, scope and role of our armed forces, what we require them to do and how we introduce new technology. The second is how that is managed and organised. We are focused on the second, but I shall briefly mention the first. Our active military commitments are at one of their highest levels since the second world war. During the Iraq conflict, more than 50 per cent. of our military was committed. The then Chief of the General Staff described that as unsustainable and we are back to about 20 per cent. We are committed in a big way in Iraq, Afghanistan and the former Yugoslavia and have commitments in East Timor and Sierra Leone. We have 1,200 troops in the Falklands, which is the leftover of a previous commitment.
So, we have men and women serving us in many theatres throughout the globe. As was mentioned by one of my hon. Friends, the Army was also involved in the fire strike. There is clear evidence of overstretch and the future is uncertain. Therefore, my question is, why do we need to reduce battalions at all? Surely all the evidence indicates that we should be maintaining and, if anything, enhancing our infantry capability. This, it seems to me, is the wrong time to go for what is a modest saving. It is the time to be supporting those troops.
I turn to organisation. It is clear that we must adapt to new roles and it is absolutely right that we reorganise to meet new threats. We no longer face a cold war or need heavy armour in the way that we did. I have no quarrel with the desire to move towards light and medium-weight capability. So, much in what is being suggested by the MOD is clearly sensible and deserves support.
I am not nearly so convinced by the argument for arms plot. Of course it provides stability for families, which is important. I gather that the argument has been going on in the Army for more than 20 years as to whether we should move to arms plot and trickle posting. Many professional soldiers—past and serving—to whom I have spoken believe that this would not help at all. One put it to me this way:
"The argument on Arms Plotting or Trickle Posting has been going on … for … 20 odd years to my certain knowledge and for those of us who studied the arguments, many of us would say that it is a very dangerous thing to move to Trickle Posting, because you will lose cohesion in battalions and units will get stale in one location and be less professional."
He goes on to say that training can get to a point where people think
"we did that last year".
The movement of troops is part of our ability to focus and deliver.
Sir Robert Smith: One thing that has impressed us all is the great professionalism of the Army, which is serving us in all those places around the world that my
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hon. Friend mentioned. It has been put to me that part of that professionalism stems from the immersion in so many different experiences, so that there is versatility and adaptability, and therefore the Army can be put to whatever cause is necessary at shorter notice than would be possible were we to change the structure as suggested by the Government.
John Thurso: My hon. Friend makes an extremely valid point somewhat better than I was making it, and I thank him for that.
We must consider whether all we want to achieve in modernising our armed forces—delivering the capability, building on the tradition and all the points that hon. Members have made—has to be done by disbanding our regiments, or whether disbanding or merging regiments produces a negative effect. It has been suggested to me that there are other ways in which the desired effect could be achieved. We should consider management structures within the Army that could both preserve the regiments and provide the command and control adaptability that the MOD seeks. My message to the Secretary of State is that we should see whether we can, as we surely should, preserve the proud regiments that have done so much for us.
We have heard from all parts of the House—this is not a party issue—about the tradition of the Army and of the job it does. These are not the cries of hide-bound traditionalists; they are the earnest pleas of people who recognise both the value of tradition and the need to modernise, the strength of feeling in Scotland and the genuine and positive benefit for recruitment of serving soldiers of the link between traditional regiments and their traditional areas.
I ask the Secretary of State to think again, bearing it in mind that there has never been a military conflict that has not been won by the professionalism of the infantrymen and the Mk. I eyeball.
10.26 am
Mr. Peter Duncan: It would be remiss of me not to acknowledge that today is the 64th anniversary of battle of Britain day. It is a significant anniversary, given that that battle brought together troops from local communities across the United Kingdom.
Today's debate is on the UK armed forces. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for North Tayside (Pete Wishart) for having secured it. I am sure that many slips of paper were submitted to Mr. Speaker with this subject on them, and I am delighted that it has come up during this particular week. It gives us an important opportunity to address our concerns to the Secretary of State.
I also commend the Secretary of State, as others have done, for answering this important debate in person. That he has chosen to do so confirms the significance of the armed forces in Scotland, and underlines the seriousness of the proposals that he outlined in the House on 21 July, just as we prepared to rise for the recess.
So far, the debate has, inevitably, focused on the uncertainty that the Government have placed on the future of the Scottish regiments. Let me acknowledge at the outset the significance of the air and naval

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announcement on local communities across Scotland. The Scottish armed forces are a team that goes all the way from shipbuilding on the Clyde to the technology referred to by the hon. Member for Central Fife (Mr. MacDougall) to the regimental system and the troops on the ground. There is teamwork in Scotland, and that should be recognised.
Inevitably, uncertainty over the future of our regiments has been the focus of the debate. Hon. Members of every party have made it clear that that is the major issue striking a chord with the Scottish public. Any hon. Member who has held a surgery or attended a public function or received any volume of mail from Scotland will be aware of the strength of feeling on the issue north of the border. The campaign in opposition to the changes is both well co-ordinated and deep rooted. Hon. Members recognise the difference between bloated lobbying and campaigns that genuinely focus the concerns of a nation. The save our Scottish regiments campaign has certainly done that.
There is huge pride in what our forces have achieved over generations, genuine belief that they are currently delivering excellence on duty around the world, and a fear for their future if their link with our communities is irretrievably weakened, as would be the consequence of the proposals. My local promotion of the save our regiments campaign showed the deep bond that exists in rural communities. At agricultural shows across my constituency during the summer, I was totally unsurprised at the outpouring of affinity with the local regiment, the KOSB.
The people in my constituency, and others across Scotland, should know that, without equivocation, the Conservative party is resolutely opposed to any cut in infantry battalions. Those battalions have all served the United Kingdom with distinction. They have been immensely proud to do so and we in Scotland have been proud of their achievements. At a time of high and increasing international uncertainty across the globe, and with terrorism a continued and growing threat, we see no case for cuts in their number. For the Government to put the regiments in jeopardy when their skills, determination to serve and historic allegiance are most in demand is nothing less than crass and ill-judged.
The Scottish regiments are sustained by, and flourish with, a strong local bond in their recruiting areas. It creates that immeasurable resource of affinity, comradeship—to which the hon. Member for North Tayside alluded—and dedication to serve that will be put at risk if these changes are enforced. The Government must recognise that and think again.
In considering the proposals put to the House on 21 July, the overriding question that has been put by hon. Members from all sides of the Chamber this morning is, "Why now?" Why are these cuts to be made now to our armed forces, reducing them to a UK total of 102,000? That represents a reduction of 6,500 from the previous established strength of more than 108,000. Every forces family talks of the current reality of armed forces overstretch. What was once a warning has become reality; resources are stretched to breaking point. Indeed, there is no greater confirmation of that— as was mentioned by the hon. Gentleman and by the hon. Member for Dunfermline, West (Rachel Squire) than the Black Watch's second tour in Iraq, which started less than one year after the first. The
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Government have drawn on Scottish regimental expertise regularly. With my local regiment and that of the hon. Member for Tweeddale, Ettrick and Lauderdale (Mr. Moore), which is currently in Ulster, it is clear that the military expertise is irreplaceable. That is why it is called upon so regularly.
Regiments have served wherever and whenever they have been asked to, but the demands on their operational strength have extended far beyond combat operations. When the Home Office was in such a tangle during the fire dispute, it was our Scottish infantry regiments, among others, that provided the essential and professional back-up services that saved life and limb in our home communities. In my region, which was ravaged in 2001 by foot and mouth disease, our local regiment stepped into the breach and undertook with dignity and determination the most difficult tasks that were asked of it. It has done the dirty work when required.
Those same troops, the same forces families and the same communities are now being threatened with the loss of their local regiment. Given the diversity of the challenges that are presented, in foreign fields or in those at home, is it any wonder that overstretch is having an effect on recruitment and retention? The Select Committee on Defence report on the defence White Paper stated in paragraph 5 of its conclusions:
"What has emerged in the past six years is the extent to which the Armed Forces have been operating at the limits of what they can achieve."
Given the difficult and delicate nature of current operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, is it any wonder that there is disbelief at the timing of the Government proposals to abolish one Scottish regiment in its entirety and to subject the others to unnecessary and counterproductive reorganisation?
The Secretary of State for Defence (Mr. Geoffrey Hoon): I have listened carefully to what appears to be a thoughtful argument. However, may I ask the hon. Gentleman to address a question? He has placed great weight on the question of overstretch. If he were in my position and were told that parts of the Army were more stretched than others, would it be right to shift the burden away from the less-stretched parts in the direction of those that were more stretched?
Mr. Duncan: The Secretary of State will recall that I highlighted the reduction of 6,500 in our troop complement. That does not strike me as the actions of a Government who are taking the issue of overstretch seriously.
The demands on our armed forces cannot be indefinitely expanded to meet growing demands without impacting on those serving. That has been recognised across the Army, not least of all in the comments given by one serving senior general to The Scotsman on Monday. He said:
"The army is very busy indeed and the reduction of four battalions will not help in any way".
He is right. Most others have maintained public silence, but it is clear that serving soldiers believe either that current commitments will have to be reduced or that the proposals will have to be reversed.

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The Secretary of State has—of course—made it clear that, in the future, he sees the Scots regiments being supplemented by the technology of the future, and there is no denying that high-tech developments will come forward. However, is it not highly irresponsible to step into uncharted waters now in the hope and expectation that technology will rescue the situation at some point in the future—to say nothing of the fact that, in the end, the foot soldier is the backbone of operations and can never fully be replaced?
Far from recognising the strains caused by new commitments, it now seems clear that a secret recruitment freeze has been in place to ensure that manning levels have fallen. They have fallen significantly already. That has been delivered furtively. I was informed recently of a horrendous difficulty being experienced in securing beds for recruits in training. Therefore, although regiments have been under-strength, recruitment has stalled.
It is true that some of our regiments have had, and continue to have, recruitment problems, but the Government have to answer the central issue in links between our communities and Scots regiments. Will centralisation of the Scots regiments strengthen or weaken recruitment? I have no doubt that the loosened ties that these proposals make inevitable will create further difficulties in maintaining manning levels.
Mr. Hoyle: I have a lot of sympathy with what the hon. Gentleman says, but I think that he is rather disingenuous. I can assure him that the Black Watch and the Scots Guards have been recruiting in Lancashire and that, only six weeks ago, the Scots Guards were recruiting in my constituency. Therefore, recruitment is taking place. Will he address the following problem? One in every three 18-year-olds in Scotland will have to join the Army to bring those regiments up to strength. The question he ought to be answering is: why are people not joining?
Mr. Duncan: Absolutely. Unlike others, I have paid tribute to those who are recruited to Scots regiments from beyond the border with Scotland. However, these proposals will not help to address the central issue of recruitment difficulties.
The Government will face increasing recruitment demands, with the consequent negative effect on retention levels, unless morale can be improved. There is no doubt that those serving in Scottish infantry regiments are deeply unhappy with these proposals; my constituency mailbag confirms that. They, too, seek a change of heart from the Secretary of State. They have been presented with a consultation with only two options; a single Scottish regiment or a highland-lowland regimental format. I have no doubt of what the response would be if they were truly consulted and offered the third option of saving the existing Scottish regimental structure.
Some of the Secretary of State's announcement was to be welcomed as far as it affected Scotland's defence interests. Our forces have to become more agile. We recognise and support proposals for the scrapping of the arms plot. Its replacement may well present a positive
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opportunity for local regiments in rural areas of Scotland, in particular. However, on the substantive proposals to tear apart the traditional regimental structure in Scotland, the Government must be sent "homeward tae think again."
At this time of considerable danger from terrorism at home and abroad and major military deployments overseas including in Afghanistan and Iraq, we wholly oppose the cuts by amalgamation or disbandment of any Scottish battalion, and judge such a proposal to be a grave error.
10.39 am
The Secretary of State for Defence (Mr. Geoffrey Hoon): Let me begin by thanking the hon. Member for North Tayside (Pete Wishart) for proposing this debate on the impact of the strategic defence strategy in Scotland. Defence is rightly a reserved matter. Scotland has a vitally important relationship with the armed forces and with the Ministry of Defence more widely. I welcome this opportunity to explain again what we are doing and why we are doing it, and to address some of the concerns that have been raised.
I am of course well aware of the importance—economically, and through pride and tradition—of the Scottish regiments to Scotland. Even had I not been so, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland and his deputy have, in any event, made sure throughout our considerations that we bear that in mind. The only reason that they are unable to take part in this debate is that they both have long-standing ministerial engagements.
Before I come to some of the specific issues that have been debated, let me set our discussions in context. The United Kingdom has one defence policy, and one set of armed forces protecting and promoting all of our interests and values. Any discussion about the future of those armed forces needs to be seen in the context of the future capabilities White Paper that the Ministry of Defence published in July. As I explained then, in the 1998 strategic defence review, we set out plans to develop defence capability to match the needs of the post-cold war world. We built on that with the strategic defence review "A New Chapter", which was published after the events of 11 September 2001, and we confirmed that direction in the defence White Paper of December 2003. We have concluded that we need to modernise further to meet the challenges of the future strategic environment: the more pronounced threats and challenges of international terrorism, the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and the challenges presented by weak and failing states.
The world changes, and we need to change with it. The programme that I announced in July is about ensuring that our armed forces are prepared to meet the challenges of the 21st century. In order to meet those challenges, defence spending is increasing. The 2002 spending review provided the largest sustained growth in defence spending plans for 20 years. This year, it has been possible to make even more resources available for defence, providing the longest period of sustained growth for more than 20 years. Our spending review settlement will result in a £3.7 billion increase in the defence budget during the next three years. That is an average annual real growth of 1.4 per cent.

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We also need, however, to ensure that we are using those substantially increased resources in the most effective way. For example, our new plans will continue the shift in emphasis away from measuring capability in terms of numbers of ships, tanks and aircraft and towards the delivery of military "effects". We formally measured numbers of platforms during the cold war because we were preparing for an essentially attritional campaign that would hold back Soviet and Warsaw pact forces. Technology has moved on since then, and the nature of warfare has fundamentally changed. The capability of our armed forces is growing as intelligence is combined with target acquisition, modern communications and precision weaponry to produce new capabilities, allowing a commander in the field to deliver a range of combined effects. Military tasks can be completed in much less time, with far greater accuracy and correspondingly lower risk to our armed forces. In 2003, we were able to deploy to the Gulf in less than half the time that that had taken 12 years earlier, and our aircraft were able to hit targets with less ordnance, using better target acquisition and precision weaponry.
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Central Fife (Mr. MacDougall) on an extremely thoughtful speech in response to the challenges faced by the defence sector. It is important that Members, particularly those with experience of defence, should look carefully at the background and context in which decisions are taken. However, modernisation certainly does not mean undermining our key strengths, not least of which are the much-valued links with the communities in which our people live and work. That is certainly the case with Scotland. Scotland has one of the largest defence footprints in the United Kingdom. The Ministry of Defence has almost 50 core defence sites in Scotland and many minor units. All three services—the Navy, the Army and the Royal Air Force—are well represented.
Although we have no plans for significant changes to that footprint, we must always continue to ensure that we are delivering defence capability in the most cost-effective way. However, I have no doubt about the importance of Scottish sites within the Ministry of Defence estate. In total, there are 14,000 services personnel in Scotland and more than 7,000 civilian personnel. There are also 5,300 members of the volunteer reserve forces based in Scotland; many thousands of regular services personnel based outside Scotland train there each year.
The impact and footprint of defence extends beyond its military bases and facilities. The defence industry sustains thousands of jobs in Scotland, and has an important role in supporting research and high-tech manufacturing there. In turn, Scottish industry produces much of the cutting-edge and technologically advanced equipment on which the United Kingdom's armed forces depend. A few examples are the work on landing ships and Type 45 destroyers at Govan, Raytheon at Glenrothes, which works on the airborne stand-off radar and precision-guided bombs, and the Thales land and joint division, which produces optical products, thermal imaging devices and a host of others. This past year alone, the estimated spend on contracts placed with Scottish companies was £600 million; more than 400 new contracts were placed.
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The Ministry of Defence is deeply committed to Scotland and, I am pleased to say, the armed forces remain as deeply engaged in Scottish life as ever they have been. That tradition will continue, and it is something to be celebrated. What cannot be sensible, however, is for that relationship to be set in aspic, or used in argument as a barrier to modernisation. We need to make adjustments to our force structure across the United Kingdom to ensure that our armed forces are best placed to face the challenges of the 21st century. That brings me to the issue of Army regiments.
The hon. Member for North Tayside has given me the opportunity to pay tribute to the proud history of Scottish regiments. History documents their bravery, skill and fearsome reputation on the battlefield, and they continue to serve this country courageously and diligently. That record continues to the present day. One of the great privileges of my job is to visit our armed forces on operations and hear first-hand accounts of their actions. Several times in recent years I have been hosted in operational theatres, from the Balkans to Iraq, by several Scottish regiments, including the Black Watch, to whom the hon. Gentleman referred. I have never ceased to be impressed by their professionalism and bravery.
For reasons that I have already outlined, we require the modern Army to be flexible, structured and equipped to deploy rapidly around the world, and able to generate the right capability in a less predictable and more complex environment. The threats that we face are changing, and if the Army is to continue to be successful on operations—all hon. Members who have contributed to this debate have insisted that that is so—it must adapt to the changing strategic environment.
It might be helpful, therefore, to explain the detailed rationale behind the Army's plans for its future, part of which is a move to the "future army structure", which represents a move to more coherent brigades, properly supported by the appropriate enabling capabilities and manned robustly. It is designed to make the Army more useable, robust and relevant to the modern age. We aim to create a more balanced force structure, so that in addition to our current mix of heavy and light forces, we will have a true medium-weight capability that is able to intervene in events faster than our heavy forces, but with more combat power than our light forces. In future, we will have two heavy armoured brigades, three medium-weight brigades, and a light brigade, in addition to the Air Assault and Royal Marines Commando brigades.
Pete Wishart: Will the Secretary of State give way?
Mr. Hoon: If I can make a little progress, I will give way in due course.
At the same time, the Army is taking advantage of a reduction in commitments to take this restructuring further and, in turn, these plans further drive the requirement for a "future infantry structure", central to which is a reduction in battalion numbers that has been made possible by the progress made towards lasting peace in Northern Ireland and the ending of the arms

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plot. Following consultation between the General Officer Commanding Northern Ireland and the Police Service of Northern Ireland, it was concluded that four battalions could be removed from his command, as they were no longer required for routine support to the PSNI.
Pete Wishart: Will the Secretary of State give way on that point?
Mr. Hoon: I shall make a little more progress first, because I want to deal with the arguments that the hon. Gentleman has raised.
This situation has presented the Army with an opportunity to take forward the planned restructuring and transfer of resources released from the Northern Ireland task to strengthen other parts of the Army, thereby concentrating on those capabilities that can best deliver the effect we require.
I announced in July that the infantry would be reduced from 40 to 36 battalions, precisely reflecting the commitment that we will no longer have in Northern Ireland. Three battalions would be found from England and one from Scotland. That judgment was made after taking into account a range of factors, including manning and recruitment levels, geographical representation, and the need to ensure the appropriate balance of roles and specialist capabilities within the remaining 36 battalions.
With the reduction of four battalions, including one from the Scottish Division, around 2,500 posts will be released and redistributed across the Army. Some will be reinvested back into the infantry itself, including Scottish battalions, to develop more robust and resilient units. Others will go to strengthen high-demand trades such as logisticians, engineers, signallers and intelligence, which are crucial to a sustainable expeditionary capability and are even more heavily deployed than the infantry at present. In other words, those people will go to areas highlighted by our recent operational experience. That is precisely the point that I put to the Conservative spokesman.
It is all very well talking about overstretch, but the real overstretch, if it has existed in recent years, has been felt by the enablers and supporters of the infantry. It is not possible to deploy infantry battalions unless specialists are available to support them. What I am doing is designed to assist those people in having a more reasonable life in the Army, which is why the Army Board is strongly in favour of it. Those people are more heavily committed than our infantry battalions.
Posts will be reduced because the infantry battalion commitment to Northern Ireland will no longer be required, and that will leave us with a straightforward choice. I challenge any hon. Member here to say that, given the reduction in the commitment to Northern Ireland, we should simply put those four infantry battalions into the regular order of battle, rather than look at where the real pressures are in the Army. I cannot understand anyone making the point about overstretch not recognising that fact.
Pete Wishart: Will the Secretary of State concede that there is overstretch in our infantry regiments and, if not,
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can he explain why the Black Watch is serving its second tour of duty in Iraq and has not been home for the past four Christmases?
Mr. Hoon: I am not in any doubt that the entire Army—and indeed all our armed forces—have faced higher pressures in recent years. There have been more operations, more demands on their time and more effects on them and their families than, arguably, at any other time in recent history. No one can argue that, and I certainly shall not try. However, as we consider our commitments and our organisation, we have to make a judgment about which parts of the armed forces are to develop because they are likely to be necessary in future, and which parts, bearing in mind the overall pressures on everyone, we can maintain at roughly the present level.
Hon. Members really need to think the matter through. For the moment, we have four infantry battalions dedicated to Northern Ireland. By reducing that commitment, we are not putting greater pressure on our infantry battalions in what we do in future. What I then have to decide, and what hon. Members have to think through more carefully, if they will forgive me for saying so, is how to use those 2,500 posts. What I am suggesting seems perfectly sensible: we should look at where the pressures are in the Army today and use those surplus positions—the result of the reduction in the commitment in Northern Ireland—to ensure that we have the kind of structure, organisation and people that we need in future. If hon. Members were in the Army, that is the conclusion that they, too, would reach, because those people know what sorts of pressures are faced by logisticians, signallers, and our communications and intelligence people. I am afraid that it is a fairly straightforward exchange.
Sir Menzies Campbell: There is a great deal in the Secretary of State's analysis with which I would agree, not least because it compares favourably, if I may say so, with the sort of analysis which lay behind "Options for Change" and "Front Line First". However, if he is right that there is an opportunity because of changed circumstances in Northern Ireland, is it not sensible to take that opportunity to provide the infantry capability that, as he pointed out recently—in the past two year—has been under such considerable pressure? He may recall that the defence review of 1998 talked about defence diplomacy. If we have extra battalions now available, why do we not put some real meat on the bones of defence diplomacy?
Mr. Hoon: I do not disagree with the principle but, generally speaking, defence diplomacy does not require the deployment of a battalion. Even allowing for that—[Interruption.] It could do; I accept that. However, as the right hon. and learned Gentleman knows, and he is a thoughtful observer of such matters, sustaining battalions wherever they happen to be in the world requires all the people I described: logisticians, communicators, and intelligence. They have to ensure that the battalion can operate effectively. Therefore, as we have a number of commitments simultaneously across the world, it makes sense to ensure that we have the right numbers of those people. That is why it is necessary to look carefully at the balance of our structure.

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Even the best infantry in the world—I am sure that everyone here will agree that ours is among the very best—needs the highest quality support to be truly effective, even when peacekeeping—a point I just made to the right hon. and learned Gentleman. In the current strategic environment, Britain needs to have the most effective Army possible. That is what our changes are about: directing our resources to the capability needed most. That must be the right way forward.
Equally important are the proposals to ensure that we make the best use of our infantry. For several decades, we have moved infantry battalions from role to role and place to place every few years—the arms plot. That was needed to maintain broad experience and variety. But times change, and the Army Board has concluded that in order to meet the operational challenges of the future, the provision of infantry capability in that way is no longer sustainable.
The facts speak for themselves. The loss of capability incurred by battalions moving, "re-roleing" and retraining clearly outweighs the benefits it once provided. For example, this year 10 battalions out of 40 in the order of battle have been unavailable to us for between two and six months simply as a result of the arms plot. Recently, General Jackson made the point in an article that it cannot make sense, when Members of Parliament and commentators talk about overstretch to have, as we will in the future, 36 battalions rather than 26 or 27 that are available when we are arms plotting. This is a perfectly straightforward and sensible change.
Mr. Nicholas Soames: Does the Secretary of State not understand the real confusion that exists, which has been referred to by several hon. Gentlemen here this morning? Everyone supports the reform of the arms plot and the doing away with it. However, in order to do that and bring greater stability to the Army and greater security to military families, it is not necessary to cut four battalions of infantry. Will he deal with that problem? Furthermore, will he deal with the point, peripherally raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Galloway and Upper Nithsdale (Mr. Duncan) that to remove six ships from the Royal Navy and equip the rest with network-centric technology does not increase capability?
Mr. Hoon: I am sorry that I gave way, as I have already dealt with the point about the four battalions. The hon. Gentleman must consider carefully the consequences of dealing with the arms plot. During this debate, the point has been rightly raised by hon. Members that it is necessary to provide a breadth of experience, variety and different kinds of training to the young men and women who join our armed forces, in particular the Army. That cannot be done with single regimental battalions fixed in a particular location. That drives, necessarily and absolutely logically, the creation of these larger organisations, and there is no other way of achieving it. The hon. Gentleman is chuntering from
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the Back Benches, but he needs to think this through. He cannot say, "I believe in an end to the arms plot" without explaining the implications that that has for force structure, and I have heard no evidence of that.
Annabelle Ewing: Will the Secretary of State give way?
Mr. Hoon: I need to make a little more progress.
Battalions will be fixed by role, largely by location. We will release resources that are routinely tied up in moving location or retraining so that more battalions can be used on operations instead. That will help to relieve the operational burden across the Army. To ensure that that works—and this is crucial—individuals will need to move between battalions for career development and to increase their breadth of experience. In the interest of preserving the regimental system, and the value that it brings, that argues for a future infantry structure based on regiments of two or more battalions, as indeed half the infantry is already organised.
To accommodate the end of the arms plot, Scotland's single battalion regiments will need to reorganise among themselves to form regiments of two or more battalions. No decisions have yet been made, but logically the possibilities obviously include one regiment of five battalions, or two regiments of two and three battalions. Taking those various elements together, a period of considerable change is inevitable. But the case for those changes is undeniable and compelling. It represents the best future for the Army and for the individuals in it.
Annabelle Ewing rose—
Mr. Hoon: It is important for all those who say that they are speaking on behalf of those serving in the Army and their families to look at the implications of the arms plot for those people. Being moved every two years does not help family security or stability. Some hon. Members should think that through carefully.
Anyone involved in the decisions recognises that whatever the merits of the approach, change is bound to be difficult for those most affected, both for individuals and historic regiments. That is one of the reasons why it is vital that hon. Members, instead of going back to their constituencies and misrepresenting what the Government are proposing, look carefully at what we have advocated. There is no reason why the changes will mean a loss of identity or history. The battalions can preserve their identity within a larger structure; there is no reason why that should not happen under our proposals. If I thought that hon. Members were prepared to consider that approach, I would be much more impressed by some of the arguments that have been advanced today. Preserving the identity of historic battalions is vital, but it needs to be done in the context of the kinds of changes that we are seeing. I would appeal to all those who think carefully about these matters to consider that.

Medical Services (Service Personnel Overseas)
11 am
Mr. Desmond Swayne: May I draw the House's attention to my entry in the Register of Members' Interests, which records that I am a serving officer in the Territorial Army with recent mobilised service?
I begin by quoting a written answer from the Minister given on 19 July, which states that
"the Ministry of Defence, through the Defence Medical Services, provides comprehensive medical services, to standards at least equal to the NHS".
He continues:
"Overseas, the Ministry of Defence is committed to providing medical services for families accompanying Service personnel which are comparable to those provided by the NHS."—[Official Report, 19 July 2004; Vol. 424, c. 32W.]
That is the mission statement and the Minister's objective in respect of what is one of his core duties: to provide medical services to our armed forces, particularly those serving abroad, which is the focus of this debate.
Let me contrast that mission statement and objective with the experience of my constituent, Mrs. Deborah Crowton and her daughter Amelia, from the village of Everton. Until she was medically discharged from the services, my constituent had 17 years of military service, of which 12 were as a nurse. As a nurse, she has a volume of experience in such matters. I shall be brief in covering the details of the case because I want the Minister to have the opportunity to hear those details from my constituent at first hand. He would benefit from that, so my first request is that he meet my constituent. I caution him, however, as I found it difficult to maintain my composure when I was first appraised of the details of the case.
My constituent was posted to Cyprus to join her husband in September 1998. She was 27 weeks pregnant. She expressed reservations about being posted in that state, but the posting went ahead. On 4 October 1998, Mrs. Crowton's waters broke, leaving her without amniotic fluid. Her husband drove her to Dhekelia camp, where she was diagnosed with pre-eclampsia and was in need of an emergency caesarean section. RAF Akrotiri was unable to carry out that procedure and she was taken as an emergency admission to a civilian hospital in Nicosia.
The admission was attended by a certain amount of chaos, due to the language barrier and so on, despite Mrs. Crowton's experience as a nurse. However, after some time, she was assured that she would receive an emergency caesarean section that day. She did not, and she did not for five days. She was kept in enormous pain, and despite her requests for pain relief she did not receive it. On the fifth day, she was strapped up and required to give birth naturally in what I can describe only as horrendous circumstances from which her husband was excluded despite his request to be present.
My constituent, Mrs. Crowton, on giving birth to Amelia, immediately had to be treated for very high blood pressure. After it became possible to appraise her of what had happened, she was told that her daughter
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was suffering from septicaemic shock, pneumonia and a brain haemorrhage, and that an urgent baptism should be arranged.
In the following weeks, the insensitive and, indeed, callous treatment of my constituent continued, particularly on the issue of access to the child and visiting times. Staff told her to stop blubbing because, after all, she was young enough to have another child and she would only upset the other mothers. Little wonder, therefore, that my constituent, Mrs. Crowton, had to be discharged from her military service suffering from depression and that she has since been unable to accompany her husband on postings.
That was all some time ago. Amelia is now five and a half years old. She cannot walk, she cannot talk and she cannot use her hands. She is blind and she suffers from severe epilepsy. She requires full-time care. Those of us who are parents and who have incurred the expense of having children will find the expenses that my constituents have incurred mind-boggling: £2,000 for a pram, £3,000 for a bed, £8,000 for a bath and £65,000 to adapt and extend the house to cater for Amelia. All that has occurred without apology or acknowledgement of responsibility.
What redress is available to my constituent? I will tell the House: she may sue the medical authorities at the hospital in Cyprus, with all the attendant problems of distance, language and a statutorily set minimum compensation that is much less eligible.
So, let me contrast that with what would be available to my civilian constituents were they to be treated abroad in a foreign hospital; it is possible for our constituents to be treated by the NHS in foreign hospitals. I have guidance issued by the Department of Health in November 2002. It is entitled, "Treating more patients and extending choice: overseas treatment for NHS patients—guidance for primary care and acute trusts". I quote briefly from section 6.1, which says
"should a patient sent abroad for treatment wish to raise an issue of medical negligence, the courts may regard NHS bodies as having a duty of care that cannot be delegated, despite the fact that the treatment was being provided by a non-UK provider. Patients would therefore be able to sue the NHS in the English courts, rather than having to take a case through foreign courts."
This is the key passage:
"This approach is in line with the Government's policy preference, which states that patients travelling abroad for treatment should have the same rights and remedies as patients receiving treatment in the UK."
I take the Minister back to his written answer to me, which I quoted at the beginning of the debate, in which he said that
"Defence Medical Services, provides comprehensive medical services, to standards at least equal to the NHS".
I have not come here to find out what the law is. The courts determine what the law is; lawyers will tell us what the law is. I have come here, and brought the Minister here, to do what only a Minister and a politician can do—discuss not what the law is, but what the law ought to be and, if it ought to be different, what he proposes to do to change it.
Ought it be the case that citizens are so much advantaged over our military constituents as a consequence of their being civilians rather than in the military? Given the sacrifices that we expect and require

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of our military constituents, is it right and proper that the Secretary of State for Health should have an enduring duty of care to patients, irrespective of how he might subcontract that care, whereas once a citizen joins the armed forces, he ceases to have the benefit of that duty of care and in turn takes on a duty discharged by the Secretary of State for Defence, although that Secretary of State has no enduring duty of care corresponding to that which is discharged for civilians by the Secretary of State for Health? Can that be right? I will leap to the assumption that the Minister agrees that there should be a level playing field—military personnel should not be disadvantaged in this way. If he does agree, what is he going to do about it?
Perhaps the Minister has already begun to do something. Can he confirm that payments have been made to military personnel who were taken ill or suffered injuries during the exercise Saif Sareea and were treated in Omani medical facilities where they suffered medical negligence? Have those payments been made? If so, will he acknowledge that that touches on the same principle as cases I have mentioned, particularly those relating to designated provider hospitals in Germany and my constituent's case relating to Cyprus?
I am here today to ask the Minister whether he will review those cases. Will he consider not the positive question, "What is the law?", but the normative issue of what it ought to be, and what the Ministry of Defence might be able to do for citizens who find themselves in the position of my constituent Mrs. Deborah Crowton and her daughter Amelia?
11.12 am
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence (Mr. Ivor Caplin): I welcome the hon. Member for New Forest, West (Mr. Swayne) to the debate and thank him for raising those points. His interest in medical services for the armed forces reflects his service in the Territorial Army over the years and his call-up last year to Iraq, of which the House is aware. I have to say to him that I am unsighted on the specific case; he did not raise it with me in advance. I undertake to look in Hansard tomorrow morning at the points that he has raised in relation to his constituent, as I do for many other hon. Members. I will review the circumstances and write to let him know my views on the matter by the end of this month.
I think it would be helpful, in the context of this debate on the provision of medical services for service personnel serving overseas, to make some general points about our progress. Day in and day out, our servicemen and women have demonstrated, through their dedication and professionalism, why they are respected throughout the world. British forces are performing diverse, difficult and demanding tasks around the world. It is only right that we should provide them with the health services that they require to deliver what we expect of them. Defence Medical Services comprises doctors, nurses and other health professionals who are well trained and equipped to provide our people with the most appropriate health services for their needs.
As an employer, the Ministry of Defence has a responsibility to take care of all its people—a responsibility that we take very seriously. Wherever our service personnel are serving, we are totally committed
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to providing them with high-quality medical services that are as close as possible to those provided by the NHS.
I should also stress that, where our forces are serving on accompanied tours, our commitment extends to their families. I shall give some details about that, but how we achieve it will vary depending on local circumstances. It is neither possible nor desirable to mirror the NHS abroad. What remains consistent, however, as I indicated in the written answer to the hon. Gentleman, is our determination to fulfil our duty to take reasonable care to provide access to health care. We ensure that the standards of health care for all entitled personnel are maintained, whether through in-house providers, utilising local civilian health care, repatriation to the UK or a combination of all those provisions as necessary. I pay tribute to all those in the Defence Medical Services who provide the medical and dental care to our troops around the world.
The British forces Germany health service is responsible for the provision of health care for service personnel—mainly from the Army, but including some from the RAF—based in Germany. The entitled population in British forces Germany totals approximately 55,000, and the annual British forces Germany health service expenditure on overall health care runs at about £60 million.
As in the NHS, various organisations are responsible for different aspects of the service and, just like the NHS, the British forces Germany health service seeks to make the care that it provides seamless from the patient's perspective. It does so under a military director—currently a brigadier—by bringing together military personnel, Guy's and St. Thomas' NHS Trust and the Soldiers', Sailors' and Airmen's Families Association, known as SSAFA, in an innovative and co-operative partnership, effectively bringing together military-civilian and public-private health care provision. The relationships between those elements are complex, but firmly backed by open-book financial arrangements and close collaboration at every management level.
Primary care is provided by medical centres located in each of our five Army garrisons and run by military and civilian medical staff. Clinical staffs in each centre are a combination of uniformed members of the Defence Medical Services, UK-based civilian doctors, locally recruited civilians or locum staff recruited from the UK. SSAFA provides professional and managerial support services for medical centres, as well as care services under contract, including community midwifery, health visitors and social workers. Together, the organisations provide a fully comprehensive primary and community care service to our service personnel based in Germany.
Since 1996, secondary hospital-based care has been delivered by Guy's and St. Thomas' NHS Trust as the prime contractor to British forces Germany health service, via subcontracts let with designated German provider hospitals located in the five garrison areas.
Mr. Swayne: In one of the Minister's written answers to me in July, he said that regular attempts were made to scrutinise the standards in designated provider hospitals. Can he give me, either in correspondence or now, some guidance on what that involves? Can he tell me whether a register of complaints is kept? Can he also shed some light

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on the arrangements regarding subcontracted hospitals in Cyprus? I have correspondence showing that the obstetrics unit at the hospital that treated my constituent, Mrs. Crowton, has no knowledge of inspection or scrutiny.
Mr. Caplin: The hon. Gentleman has raised an interesting point, to which I will not respond immediately. I will get back to him, specifically on complaints, procedures and inspections, in the time scale I have set out.
In the German hospitals, Guy's and St. Thomas' liaison staff provide on-site support to patients. To overcome the inevitable language and cultural issues that present themselves, Guy's and St. Thomas' has developed a successful system of hospital liaison officers, who are bilingual personnel located in each German provider hospital. They are there to solve any problems and misunderstandings that may arise. That service has greatly assisted the delivery of the best possible care to our servicemen and women and their families. For example, British-style menus are available, as well as English language television and newspapers.
The British forces Germany health service also conducts annual satisfaction surveys, although I accept that that is not the same as inspection. The results consistently show satisfaction rates of above 87 per cent. The aim is to deliver a service that takes advantage of the benefits of the German clinical approach to care while giving our people the enhanced privacy and access to services to which they are often accustomed in the UK.
We also have large entitled populations in Cyprus, as the hon. Gentleman mentioned, and in Gibraltar, the largest of our permanent joint operating bases overseas. There we provide, and will continue to provide for as long as is needed, a comprehensive primary health care service, managed as a joint service activity, that includes community services such as ante and post-natal care and mental health services. Cyprus and Gibraltar have accredited general practitioner training practices.
To ensure NHS-comparable standards of secondary care, we also maintain, and will continue to do so for as long as is needed, military hospitals in Cyprus, namely Princess Mary's hospital at Akrotiri, and in Gibraltar, the Royal Naval hospital. I am sure the hon. Gentleman agrees that, in general, both facilities provide excellent secondary health care, covering core clinical disciplines such as general surgery, paediatrics, obstetrics and gynaecology, as well as medical cover for operational activities.
Cyprus, in its role as a forward military base, has the ability to expand capacity at short notice in the event of operations. Princess Mary's serves some 8,500 entitled personnel, and has about 185 service and civilian staff. The Royal Naval hospital in Gibraltar, which serves about 1,800 entitled personnel, also has the capacity to provide medical cover for our naval base, and has about 90 service and civilian staff.
I visited the Royal Naval hospital in Gibraltar only yesterday, and was at Princess Mary's hospital in Akrotiri in March. At both facilities, I met some of the first-rate staff and was able to see for myself how we are
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upholding our long tradition of providing first-class health care for our service personnel and their dependants.
The hon. Gentleman mentioned maternity, and asked whether, at Princess Mary's in Akrotiri, we could provide the facilities he mentioned. He may be familiar with the facility. The hospital does not have the specialist baby-care facilities that we recognise in the United Kingdom. There are circumstances in Cyprus and Gibraltar in which we are unable to provide the appropriate treatment in-house, and we have arrangements in place either to bring in specialists from the United Kingdom or to use local civilian hospitals as appropriate. If clinically appropriate, we can also medically evacuate personnel to the UK.
The hon. Gentleman also asked whether there were any payments—compensation was the term he used—in relation to Saif Sareea, the operation in Oman. I do not have an answer, but I will include one in our correspondence.
Mr. Swayne: Am I to presume that the Minister will address the two other questions I asked in correspondence? They were, first, whether he is prepared to meet my constituent, and, secondly, the normative question whether the treatment available to civilians ought to be so much better than what is available to servicemen, in terms of their recourse when things go wrong. What ought to be the case?
Mr. Caplin: On the first question, I would like to examine the case and write to the hon. Gentleman. Perhaps we could then agree a way forward. That is how I have handled the quite considerable casework in my portfolio, and I hope he accepts that, as other Members of the House have. I cannot give him a specific response on the second question. I think it would be far better for me to include all that matter in a proper letter to him detailing the issues. I have given him some indication of the time scale—a couple of weeks—in which I propose to get that response to him.
I would like to take the opportunity to congratulate the RAF on its skill and professionalism in organising medical evacuations from permanent bases and operational theatres. I know hon. Members will agree on that. It is on immediate notice—24 hours a day, 365 days a year—at RAF Lyneham to provide an emergency medical evacuation service for those who need it.
We also have smaller, permanent joint operating bases on the Falkland Islands and Ascension Island, for which we provide our own primary care; a local civilian hospital provides secondary care. If there is a requirement for more specialist services, we have arrangements in place to use facilities in neighbouring countries or to carry out a medical evacuation back to the UK.
Although we do not have a permanent military base in the United States, at any one time we have about 400 service personnel and dependants living and working there. To fulfil our duty of care to them, we have a reciprocal health care agreement with the United States that covers service personnel and their dependants. Under that agreement, health care is provided to our personnel by US medical services or through an insurance-based system. The NHS provides free medical care to US service personnel serving in the UK and their dependants.

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Where our personnel are serving on operational deployments in areas of the world where the medical infrastructure is poor, damaged or overstretched, we can deploy a full range of medical support services. In a major operation such as Operation Telic, with which the hon. Gentleman is familiar, those services would include front-line medical assets integral to the units deployed, dressing stations, field hospitals and RFA Argus, our hospital ship, as well as our medical evacuation capabilities.
Notwithstanding the important individual case that the hon. Gentleman raised and the commitments that I have given this morning to get back to him on the issues that he highlighted, I hope he will agree with me: I am indeed satisfied that our servicemen and women are well served by the skills and professionalism of the Defence Medical Services.
11.28 am
Sitting suspended until Two o'clock.

International Trafficking of Women
2 pm
Ms Julia Drown: I am pleased to have the opportunity to debate the international trafficking of women, which is a serious and ongoing crime. The trafficking of human beings, whether for exploitation in work, the sex industry or for any other purpose is a tragic and complex human rights abuse. Hundreds of thousands of people are traded globally every year. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimates that 120,000 women are trafficked each year, of whom 75 per cent. are under 25. Too many lives are ruined by trafficking, and whether it affects one person or 1 million, the trade in humanity must be tackled.
Women are particularly vulnerable to that slavery-like practice, largely because of the persistent inequalities that they face in status and opportunities worldwide. Internationally, Human Rights Watch has reported consistent patterns in the trafficking of women. Coercive tactics, including deception, fraud, intimidation, isolation, the threat and use of physical force and debt bondage are used to control women. An example quoted to me was of a woman who came to Britain to raise money for her sister's cancer treatment. She worked 12 hours a day, seven days a week. Half her earnings were taken as rent for the flat that she used, and the other half to pay off the £23,000 debt that she was charged to travel to this country. She had nothing for her sister and no hope of a future.
Only last week, the London Evening Standard ran headlines about a journalist being offered two young women for £6,000 each, to do with as he wished. That proposition was made not in some seedy bazaar but a London pub, by a pimp responsible for, in some cases, luring eastern European women to Britain with promises of work, love or marriage, and in others, for kidnapping them. The implication that that is acceptable in the London community, or anywhere else for that matter simply cannot be accepted.
The recent "Sex in the city" study carried out by the Poppy Project, which supports women trying to free themselves from the sex trade, revealed that there are more than 8,000 women working in the sex trade in London, of whom 80 per cent. are from south-east Asia and eastern Europe. Many of them are prey to those complex methods of coercion and control, yet the Poppy Project has just 25 places available to help women escaping their entrapment. Women on that waiting list, who are desperate to escape a life of slavery and misery, have to be told, "Wait. We cannot afford to help you yet." I would be grateful to know whether the Government might consider better supporting such projects.
There are concerns over alleged complicity among members of the international community. There are reports of widespread trafficking in Kosovo, with the involvement of peacekeepers, which is a major concern. There are also reports alleging that in Bosnia a 15-year-old girl was
"given as a 21st birthday present to a US soldier and … raped in turn by men with American, Canadian, British, Russian and French accents".
Deceptive methods of recruitment have been reported. An orphanage in Romania received visits from a social worker offering apprenticeship programmes for

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adolescent girls, who were then taken away and forced into prostitution. Corrupt officials, who facilitate the trade, accept bribes to falsify documents and to provide protection, allow the trafficking to thrive. Of course, if there were no market for sex, much of the trafficking would not take place, so the more that we can change the culture to make it unacceptable to buy sex, the more women such as those I have mentioned will be protected.
Across the world, many Governments treat trafficked persons as illegal aliens, criminals, or both, which exposes those people to further abuse. For example, Thai trafficking victims in Japan are regularly detained as illegal aliens and deported with a five-year ban on reentering the country. By targeting the victims and ignoring the perpetrators, states allow the abuses to continue.
I congratulate the Government on taking some action on the matter, including, in the Sexual Offences Act 2003, creating several trafficking offences carrying penalties of up to 14 years in prison. I hope that we will hear from the Minister not only about the action that the Government are taking to minimise the involvement in trafficking, but that they have taken and will take to raise those issues with other countries in Europe and further afield.
All human trafficking is for exploitative work. Consider the 20 migrant workers drowned while working for a pitiful wage in ghastly conditions as cockle pickers in Morecambe, or the sex trade that, often through links to drugs, brings an early death to many. All over the world, rich people who are ill are prepared to pay huge sums of money for the chance of a normal life. Equally, desperately poor people are driven to sell a kidney or other organs as a way of feeding their families. Last year in southern India, 13 members of a gang responsible for selling more than 50 kidneys for transplants were arrested. Into this trade have stepped unscrupulous brokers, prepared to trick people into parting with an organ, often for a paltry fee.
In sub-Saharan Africa, there is a horrific trade in virgins, who are being sold because some people are told having sex with them is a cure for AIDS. The horrors do not end there. Last month in Nigeria, 30 people were arrested after the discovery of corpses and human skulls in a fetish shrine. In some parts of Africa, there is a lucrative trade in human skins, which can fetch up to $10,000. Again in Nigeria, we have had reports of the trafficking of women by an international ring using terror tactics on young people through the use of voodoo. One woman told Amnesty International:
"I always tried to open the door, but the men were always outside the door. I was scared. I always hear the voices."
Such women cannot be just immediately returned to their countries to be trafficked again. They need some support, so that they are strong enough to avoid being re-trafficked, and so that they in turn may help to prosecute the traffickers.
This is an international trade, so we need to give protection to trafficked women by working with our European and other international partners. Within Europe, there is an opportunity for binding minimum standards for the protection and support of trafficked people to be ratified this December when the Council of
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Europe's ad hoc committee on action against trafficking in human beings drafts its European convention against trafficking.
I urge the Government to address the key issues identified by Amnesty. They need to be dealt with in order properly to protect trafficked women and others. The next meeting on that is on Monday where the Home Office will be represented. In addition to pushing these issues at opportunities that the Foreign Office has, I hope that the Minister can pass on relevant concerns to the Home Office.
The first of those is the care and support of survivors. Where an adult has been identified as a victim of trafficking, their access to assistance—medical care, safe housing, counselling, information on their legal rights and so on—must not be made contingent on their willingness to testify against traffickers, particularly as doing so may put family in their country of origin in danger.
We should be willing to support people trafficked in that way because it may give them the support they need to help to prosecute the traffickers. The current draft only allows victims of trafficking "emergency medical treatment", whereas the UN protocol says that more should be done. It is surely justified to give the health support necessary for conditions arising out of the trafficking.
Secondly, we must make allowance for suitable periods of recovery and reflection. Victims of trafficking need a sufficient reflection period temporarily to regularise their immigration status and give them an opportunity to receive advice and assistance, to begin to recover from their experiences and to make an informed decision about whether they wish to co-operate with the authorities in prosecuting their traffickers. Amnesty argues for a reflection period of at least three months. Without that period, victims will face immediate deportation. That is not in the interests of the victim, who may be re-trafficked, or the police, who will lose the opportunity to gather valuable information and possible witness testimony that will help to secure prosecutions and to combat trafficking in the long term.
Reflection periods are only given to those who are considered likely to be trafficked persons, as identified by the police, appropriate non-governmental organisations, or immigration officers. They have operated successfully for several years in the Netherlands, where three months is allowed, and Belgium, where 45 days are allowed. Norway has recently introduced a reflection period of 45 days. Italy suggests a reasonable reflection period would be as long as six months, but its laws go further and offer residency permits to victims of trafficking on the basis that the traffickers pose a continued risk to them.
Sandra Gidley: The hon. Lady raises an interesting point about the reflection period, to which I hope to return. Does she agree that the provision of a reflection period has resulted in more convictions being brought in those countries? That is an important reason to provide such a period.
Ms Drown: Yes. Particularly in Italy, people are satisfied that what might seem a compassionate and long-term approach to dealing with trafficking victims

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has resulted in increased prosecutions. It is for that reason that I hope that we can agree a minimum reflection period of at least three months across Europe. That may be particularly important for women because those involved in the sex trade often face rejection by their families and communities on returning to their countries. Finding a way forward for them is a key concern.
Just last night, I received a fax from the UK representative of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and it highlighted some of these issues. One might not normally think that trafficked women had a case for refugee status in this country, but UNHCR points out that, under the 1951 convention, there are certain circumstances in which refugee status should be considered. Indeed, UNHCR hosted a seminar this February in London, at which there were representatives from the Home Office, as well as NGOs. One immigration adjudicator who presented a paper at that seminar looked at the reasons why trafficked persons should be considered as refugees. A paper is now being produced on that to try to get some general rules and guidelines. I hope that the Government will seriously consider that as a way of ensuring that trafficked people are able to qualify for refugee status, under defined conditions.
We have a duty to investigate allegations of human rights abuse and UNHCR points out the very serious human rights abuse involved in trafficking. At some point, trafficking might even qualify as a crime against humanity—it is that serious. We need to bring the perpetrators of those crimes, including state as well as non-state actors, to justice. I would like to hear from the Minister how often such issues, particularly concerning trafficked women, are raised at an international level and whether there is a willingness to take action to tackle this appalling trade at a wider level than the European level. I also want to know whether any funding or initiatives to combat the international trafficking of women are coming out of the Foreign Office's human rights, democracy and good governance programme. Trafficking is a serious and growing problem and the victims do not deserve to have their lives destroyed by it. I urge the Government to do all that they can to tackle the problem, both here and abroad.
2.12 pm
Judy Mallaber: I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for South Swindon (Ms Drown) on securing this vital debate. It is important for us to keep discussing this issue.
Last year, I attended a showing in Portcullis House by UNICEF of the film "Lilya 4-Ever". I do not know whether anyone else here saw that film. The Guardian called it an
"uncompromisingly bleak, devastating powerful study of Lilya…a poverty-stricken teenage girl abandoned in a crumbling Russian town"
who was lured into a hellish world of forced prostitution, rape and imprisonment by the promise of a better life and job in the west. She was abandoned by her mother, who was also enticed to the west by a smooth-talking man; we do not know what happened to the mother. After being left on the streets in the Russian
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town, with no help from her aunt, Lilya was sweet talked by someone into going to Sweden. It was a harrowing and graphic depiction of the stark reality for thousands of women every day. This poor young girl, who had been abandoned, was persuaded that there was a new life in the west and ended up leading, as The Guardian described it, a hellish existence.
This debate is timely. I had no sooner seen it on the Order Paper than I opened my post and got my latest Amnesty magazine, which had a leading article on the explosive international growth in trafficking. Hon. Members and, I am sure, the Minister, can expect to be lobbied by Amnesty members urging that our UK representatives support binding minimum standards in the proposed Council of Europe convention on trafficking. I fully support the proposals outlined by my hon. Friend the Member for South Swindon, to which I will return later, and urge our Government representatives to push these issues at next week's meeting.
Any hon. Member who turns on Channel 4 on 7 and 14 October is bound to be moved to action by a drama called "Sex Traffic". I understand that it shows Elena and Vara trafficked into forced prostitution from their home in Moldavia. There is a quote from that film in the Amnesty magazine. A 21-year-old Moldavian woman says that she eventually arrived in a bar in Kosovo and was
"locked inside and forced into prostitution. In the bar I was never paid, I could not go out by myself, the owner became more and more violent as the weeks went by; he was beating me and raping me and the other girls. We were his 'property' he said. By buying us he had bought the right to beat us, rape us, starve us, force us to have sex with clients."
Another woman trafficked into Kosovo told Amnesty:
"I was desperate… because we were so poor… I couldn't live any longer on my grandmother's pension, so I said that I'd better go somewhere else where I could work hard and earn some money to help my family and my brothers."
I think that anybody who watches that film will be moved into wishing to take up this issue. I ask my hon. Friend the Minister to take a look at that film and at the latest Amnesty report on the position in Kosovo and the way in which the international situation has led to the mushrooming of prostitution and trafficking into that country, because there are some very serious issues that we need to ensure that we are on top of.
What is trafficking? I will come back to the United Nations definition of that, but Secretary-General Kofi Annan said:
"Women and children are not property, but human beings. The international community should declare, loudly and more strongly than ever, that we are all members of the human family. Slavery simply has no place in a world of human rights"—
and trafficking is slavery. It is easy to think of it as something else but it is not; it is slavery—there can be no other way to describe this gross violation of human rights.
Internationally organised and highly lucrative, the crime of human trafficking has increased to the extent that it has become one of the largest sources of profit from crime along with drug trafficking and arms smuggling. In 1998, the UN estimated that this trade in human misery generated around $7 billion a year but latest studies suggest that the figure could now be as high as $12 billion.

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It is sad but interesting that there is still a need for Anti-Slavery International. Established in 1839, it is the world's oldest international human rights organisation, and it has to continue campaigning into this century against this form of slavery. The Salvation Army is another organisation that was campaigning in the 19th century. I am sure that hon. Members will recall that in 1885 it caused an outcry in Victorian Britain by buying a young girl—a 13-year-old called Eliza Armstrong—from her mother for £5 to expose the trade in child prostitutes. It is interesting, although not totally relevant to the current debate, that that was what led Parliament to raise the age of consent from 13 to 16. In 1885, child prostitutes were bought and sold on London's streets and the Salvation Army was campaigning about that. Today, women and children are still being trafficked across the world and treated as slaves.
With regard to the figures, it is hard to get exact estimates, as my hon. Friend the Member for South Swindon mentioned, but the International Organisation for Migration has reported that between 700,000 and 2 million women and children are trafficked across international borders each year. Few countries remain unaffected, either as a country of origin or as a destination for the women who become victims. Tragically, this has become yet another global phenomenon, with those trafficked forced to work in the sex trade, prostitution, pornography and child pornography and also as farm labourers, exploited labour in sweat shops, in catering and as domestics—as slaves in people's homes.
The Protection Project based at Johns Hopkins university in the United States of America estimates that, over the past 10 years, the number of women and children who have been trafficked has multiplied, so that it is now on a par with the number of Africans who were enslaved in the 16th and 17th centuries—that is an extraordinary statistic. It is a scandal that in this century we have not eliminated slavery but it just takes a different form.
Arising from the Poppy Project, which has already been referred to, Superintendent Chris Bradford of the Metropolitan police explained some of the problems in escaping their pimps that women who are exploited and arrive in the UK have. He says that it is almost impossible:
"They can't speak the language; they've had passports and travel documents taken away from them. They don't know what to do or who to see, and pimps tell them that they're paying the police, and that we will just return them if they come to us. They're not necessarily locked up, but there's the constant threat that they or their families will be 'sorted out'."
However, returning home can be equally difficult because of the stigma that the women can face, and because they have often been driven out by a lack of employment opportunities and money in the first place. Several of the women helped by the Poppy Project were re-trafficked after their return to their countries of origin. What we do when we find such people in our country or in other countries and when deciding whether they should stay or be sent back are serious issues. One woman who was re-trafficked was sold by her father for a second time just days after the police returned her home
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The women will face other threats. Many trafficked girls and women will be told that their families or children will be harmed or murdered if they try to escape or tell anyone. Others are told that their families have found out what they are doing and want nothing more to do with them. My hon. Friend mentioned the fact that a woman can become a persona non grata if she goes back home and that her family can be threatened by those who try to make her stay in the business.
There are different interpretations of what trafficking involves. The internationally recognised definition is set out in the UN protocol:
"Trafficking in person shall mean the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harbouring or receipt of persons, by means of the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability or of the giving or receiving payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person, for the purpose of exploitation. Exploitation shall include, at a minimum, the exploitation of the prostitution of others or other forms of sexual exploitation, forced labour or services, slavery or practices similar to slavery, servitude or the removal of organs."
Trafficking is not limited to sexual exploitation; it also takes other forms of labour exploitation. In their study, Dr. Liz Kelly and Linda Regan of the university of North London, as it was then called, identify the ways in which women can be recruited for trafficking abroad, and they are not always straightforward.
There can be complete coercion through abduction or kidnapping. It may be rare for women to be trafficked through those entirely illegal methods, but that does happen. Recruitment can be done by deception through promises of legitimate employment in the UK or elsewhere. There can also be deception through half-truths—telling someone that there may be employment in the entertainment industry, dancing or stripping. Some women will be made aware that they will be working in prostitution and may have put themselves at the mercy of traffickers just to get to western Europe. However, they will not have been made aware of the extent to which they will be intimidated, exploited and controlled by those who seek to traffic or to smuggle them abroad.
My hon. Friend gave the example of the woman who came to get money for her sister's cancer treatment. Everything that she made went towards repaying the sum charged to get here and her rent. Women come here with a completely false idea of what is going to happen, and the life that they were promised disappears. The final recruitment method, seen in central and eastern Europe, is to place ads in media sources that claim that there is a well paying job available through an employment agency, which may or may not exist. The person goes abroad and life is very different once they get there. They are put to work of a kind that they did not anticipate.
Trafficking is complex. There are many ways in which it happens and many issues that we need to take account of as we try to help the victims and prosecute those responsible for the crime. What should we do about it? The problem is international and requires international action. Many countries have little or no effective anti-trafficking legislation and no legislation to protect and to support the victims and families or to prosecute the perpetrators.

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I welcome the action taken by our Government through the Sexual Offences Act 2003 and through provisions in immigration and asylum legislation to tackle this pernicious crime in the UK. However, will the Minister say what progress has been made in encouraging more countries to ratify the UN protocol, to ensure that legislation to protect women from this heinous trade is incorporated in domestic law around the world? Will he say what the latest position is on UK ratification?
Again, I urge the Minister to consider and to push the proposals for inclusion in the Council of Europe convention made by Amnesty and others. They have come out with a number of proposals, some of which have been gone into in some detail. Will the Minister respond to them? Some may be possible and some may not, but I urge him to consider them all. I am sure that he has.
The first is about ensuring that there is adequate training on how to identify trafficked persons—a great difficulty, not just in this area but in relation to many people who come here without documentation. That is clearly a difficult issue.
The second issue, of reflection periods, has been discussed at some length.
Thirdly, trafficked persons need to have access to a full range of assistance, protection and support to enable them to make informed decisions about their future. Will the Minister let us know what progress is being made on providing services in this country? I am not sure whether there is more than one safe house in this country to assist people. Will the Minister tell us what services are being provided and what possibility there is for us to do more?
Fourthly, there are issues about the legal status of people who have come into this country and whether trafficked persons will be held criminally liable for illegal entry into Council of Europe member states or involvement in unlawful activities that are the consequence of a crime being committed against them. There is also the question of risk assessments being carried out by trained officials before any trafficked person is repatriated.
The final request from Amnesty is that victims involved in legal proceedings or at risk of abuse, stigmatisation or re-trafficking if repatriated should have rights of residence or asylum. I know that that is a difficult issue but I put it on the table as one of the requests from Amnesty to be included in the Council of Europe convention. Therefore, there are a number of issues that I hope the Minister will respond on.
Finally, I extend the subject matter slightly into an area that has been one of my preoccupations in recent months in another campaign that I am involved with. Although the subject of the debate relates to the international trafficking of women, many of those women are very young and there is a huge amount of international trafficking of children. It would be remiss to allow this debate to finish without mentioning that. Many children are procured to be sold into domestic labour as domestic slaves, but the issue that I have been particularly involved with is about the international trafficking of children—and the procurement of children—to be filmed being raped and abused. The abusive images go on the internet for paedophiles to download.
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That is a massive issue. Paedophilia used to involve a few people exchanging pictures. Now, one person, who was convicted this year, had downloaded 400,000 images. Every one of those images was of children who had been procured, many of them through international trafficking, to be abused in front of a camera.
Mr. Julian Brazier: The hon. Lady is making a powerful point. Will she join me in condemning those who suggest that the "mere" downloading of child pornography should not normally result in a custodial sentence? The people who download provide the market for the vile trade that she is describing.
Judy Mallaber: I absolutely agree. I also condemn those who say that it is a matter of liberties and the freedom to do what one wants. It is not. There is no freedom to abuse a child. This country is doing well at setting up the mechanisms that we have. A taskforce chaired by the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, my hon. Friend the Member for Wythenshawe and Sale, East (Paul Goggins), brings together all the internet service providers and works with crime prevention agencies. The Internet Watch Foundation is doing well at closing down sites in this country.
However, the material is coming from overseas, largely from the United States, where there is not the same cohesion of crime prevention agencies and where some of the questions about whether to jump on the issue and to prosecute people are more difficult. The other area that material is coming from is Belarus, where the Russian mafia are involved. It is massive, international crime and there is a huge amount of money involved—as we said, $7 billion is involved in international trafficking, perhaps more. The business of child prostitution and people being seen on the internet is also a massive exercise.
Ms Drown: I am glad that my hon. Friend has raised the issue and I think that there are more links to the debate. She picked out the issue of children. Does she agree that when somebody becomes 18 or 21—depending on when one says a girl becomes a woman—the fact that the abuse still goes on is just as horrific? Would she like to see the role and the action of the Internet Watch Foundation, which is very good at tackling these problems, extended? We should have equal work going on in relation to the abuse of women, which also happens on the internet.
Judy Mallaber: It needs to be looked at seriously. It is complicated because any abuse of a child and any downloading of a pornographic image of a child is a crime. The Internet Watch Foundation is allowed to look at the sites and Visa, for example, now has a robot that trawls the net for things with its sign on it. It is easy for them to see what is clearly illegal, and to notify the crime prevention authorities. The definition of what is or is not acceptable in relation to older people and sexual exploitation is more problematic in respect of obscenity legislation.
Earlier this year, there was a debate about violent images following the appalling murder case in Brighton. I note that there is currently a debate about definitions

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and about what should or should not be banned. It is certainly a subject that needs a lot more consideration and work done on it.
One of the promising developments in relation to child porn on the internet is the work that is being done by the internet service providers—belatedly, I have to say, after a lot of pressure. BT, for example, has worked on using technical means to close child porn down. I have met some of the credit companies and PayPal to talk about how to stop the financial mechanisms that make it possible. As my hon. Friend the Member for South Swindon said, to prevent the abuse and trafficking of women and the selling of them into prostitution, we need to change the culture in which it is acceptable. Similarly, we can make it impossible to download such images, which are clearly unacceptable, by looking at technical solutions to resolve the issue.
This is an important debate, and I would be interested to hear the Minister's latest position on the United Nations protocol, the Council of Europe convention and the services that we are providing, as well as any further proposals for taking the issue forward. We have to keep on top of this massive and appalling problem, as so many women and children are facing the most nightmarish lives as a result of this evil trade.
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Sandra Gidley: I welcome the debate and congratulate the hon. Member for South Swindon (Ms Drown) on securing it. I do not know whether she was just quick off the mark with the Amnesty International campaign or had been trying to secure this debate for some time. Either way, I am pleased that we are here today. I am saddened only by the fact that there are so few of us in the Chamber. There seems to be far more interest in the livelihood of the fox than in the livelihood of the many women who are victims of this terrible crime.
I, too, was lucky enough to see the film "Lilya 4-Ever", referred to by the hon. Member for Amber Valley (Judy Mallaber), and was powerfully struck by it. I urge anybody to go and see it if they have not done so. Since then, I have read a lot about the subject, and that film seemed to describe a fairly typical route from trust in a contact to a woman or child being trafficked and often being subject to sexual abuse. In this film there was a classic progression: a friendship was built up, the young woman, Lilya, went in all innocence to Sweden, and immediately on arrival her passport was taken away and she was locked in a flat and raped. The film became quite graphic at that point, and highlighted the fact that this person was being exploited for sexual reasons. However, we are talking about a child—a very young girl was being exploited. The memory of that film will stay with me for some time.
It is difficult to get a steer on how large this problem is. Some work was done by Dr. Liz Kelly and Linda Regan of the child and women abuse studies unit—in 1999, I think. They estimated that there was anything from between 142 to 1,420 women victims in any one year. However, it is incredibly difficult to obtain the data for several reasons: the activity is underground and I am not sure that we have full knowledge of the extent of it;
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the lack of anti-trafficking legislation does not help; and there is an understandable reluctance of the victims to report such things, because many of them are not in a position to get themselves out of the situation that they are in. They are in a foreign country, they do not know who to go to or where to go. If they do, they are often sent back to where the original abuse took place. In some communities, there is a strong likelihood that the victim will be sent back to another country.
Little priority seems to be given in government to collecting and researching the data. So, if something is going on that I am not aware of, I would be interested to hear about it. Studies by the International Organisation for Migration claimed that 500,000 women were trafficked into the EU in 1995. Clearly, there is a big difference between 1,420 and 500,000. I am not sure where the IOM got its figures from either. Any clarification regarding that difference would be welcome. I hope that we have not got it so badly wrong in this country that we have totally underestimated the extent of the problem.
The problem is an international one. There is a particular problem in Albania and in many other Balkan countries, and in eastern Europe it is growing. Some African countries also have huge difficulties. I was talking to somebody who had first-hand knowledge of the problem in Nigeria and she said that when one went there, it was fairly obvious which communities were involved in trafficking, because there was a quantum leap in the standard of living.
Given that there is so little opportunity in poor countries to earn money, there is an argument for working with those communities to provide alternatives. It is no good creating righteous indignation—although it is easy and natural to do so when faced with this problem. We must tackle the issue on a global scale. That point has already been highlighted, because, as the hon. Member for Amber Valley said, the estimated profit is $7 billion a year.
Those involved in drug trafficking are becoming increasingly involved in people trafficking and we need to tap into both networks. Last year, I was very moved by "Lilya 4-Ever" and, in September, I decided to visit Italy to see what it was doing about the problem. One thing was clear to me about the difference between the Italian approach and that which the United Kingdom has adopted. Like the UK, Italy has a problem with immigration and with asylum seekers. What impressed me greatly was the fact that it seems to have managed to dissociate the problem of trafficking from that of general immigration. The Government would be well advised to examine the work that it has done, to see whether we could do something similar in this country. Italy is a very right-wing country and if it can be done there, I would like to think that we could do it here.
In Italy, there were a huge number of initiatives to tackle the problem, although they were not at all coordinated. Some of them had national Government money, but often local authorities or non-governmental organisations had decided something needed to be done on their patch. There seemed to be no attempt to regularise the activities—I am not sure that that would be a good thing anyway—and there were many different initiatives.

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One initiative in the large cities involved working with sex workers and, more specifically, their clients. As has already been graphically pointed out, the workers often cannot get out of the situation. It was realised that occasionally there was the possibility that a relationship might be built up with a client or that a client might be concerned about the treatment of a particular woman. There was a concerted effort to try to reach the users of prostitutes. I accept what the hon. Member for South Swindon said about changing the culture. I am not sure that, in our culture, it would be easy to do that overnight, but it is a worthy aspiration. Trying to nudge the conscience of people who use prostitutes may be useful, but I am not aware of any similar initiatives in this country.
It is a great pity that a cooling-off period was not included in the Sexual Offences Act 2003. Several attempts were made to introduce one, but they were very much resisted by the Government. I do not know whether there was horror at the prospect of opening the floodgates or of creating a loophole. The result in Italy of using such a cooling-off period has been a greater number of prosecutions. When I visited that country, there was concern that, with the change of Government, there would be a change of emphasis such that women would be forced to show and tell—to identify the criminals—and, if they did not, they would be deported straight away. Research seems to show that if women were given time to build up trust and realise that there was an alternative, they would willingly co-operate.
Ms Drown: One of the reasons that a minimum cooling-off or reflection period of three months is sometimes resisted is that it is seen as arbitrary, and clearly it is. A time is picked, but each woman needs a different amount of time to decide whether they might help with prosecuting the traffickers. That is not to say that if women decide straight away whether they want to co-operate, they do not need to stay for three months. However, allowing that minimum period provides a standard, at least across Europe, and some assurance to the many woman who are trafficked in Europe.
Sandra Gidley: I agree entirely. That time will often be a period of re-focusing for the woman. She can think about what she will do, and, if alternatives are available to her, she will feel more secure about identifying the criminals. If the period is shorter than three months, there is a danger that she might feel that she will have to go back to her community. She may not know anything else, and her community may be where the problem originated. Three months would give a little more time in which to come up with an alternative. The concern is that the women will want to stay in the UK, but the lesson from Italy is that most actually want to return to their home country. Some of the fears are ungrounded.
Ultimately, it is most important to catch the traffickers. In Italy, much work has been done to try to identify Mafia links, such that the lives of some of the people who produced the report were threatened. Also, in this country, some of the early examples of women being trafficked involved triad links, and there are now strong links with the Albanian community. Those networks have to be infiltrated, and we must bring the criminals to justice. I think that I am right in saying that only one has been identified so far.
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Victor Malarek, a Canadian journalist, spent four years
"in the world of pimps, traffickers, rapists and some of the most disenfranchised women and girls in the world."
He has written a book on the sex trade. He says:
"Trafficking is an easy crime to solve. If I can find the brothels and traffickers, so can the police. Just look in the tabloid personal advertisements for a start… These men are not looking for relationships… They want sex with a faceless female."
Well, we did not need to know that, but the fact is that one man—an investigative journalist—working by himself has found out an awful lot about the industry and the personalities involved. We should heed his words.
Another concern of mine has been echoed by the hon. Member for Amber Valley. When I visited Sicily, everyone wanted to know when the UK would ratify the Palermo protocol, because that would be regarded as a signal of the fact that we are serious about the problem and will do something. I would be grateful if the Minister could enlighten us on that.
My next point may be outside the Minister's area of responsibility, but it is on an important issue. A recent report by Amnesty pointed out the link between trafficking and post-war militarisation. The example given was the situation following the arrival of the international peacekeeping troops in Kosovo in July 1999. There was a vast increase in trafficking activity and organised prostitution, with KFOR troops making up most of the clients. Hon. Members may not find that surprising, because soldiers will be soldiers everywhere. I suspect that, around the world, there is a proportion who, away from home, may use local prostitutes.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. Bill Rammell): I ask the hon. Lady to reflect on what she has said, which could be taken as a massive slight to the armed forces, the vast majority of whom would never get involved in any such activity in a million years.
Sandra Gidley: I was going on to say that I suspect that the make-up of individuals in the Army is no different to that of any cross-section of British society in any walk of life. I am not talking about official activity, but out-of-hours private time activity undertaken while they are based away from home. There is a problem, but I have visited Kosovo and know that the Army does what it can to prevent it and highlight the problems and risks involved. I do not want what I say to be taken as a slur on the British Army.
Mr. Brazier: I have been several times to Kosovo with the Defence Select Committee, and I think that the hon. Lady should reflect. The Army is not just a cross-section, and it is not just doing its best to prevent prostitution. Huge numbers of our soldiers out there, both on and off duty, spend many long hours helping the local community there with everything from rebuilding primary schools to assisting the police. They do endless good works. They do a great deal better than an average cross-section of the community.
Sandra Gidley: I was talking about one aspect of their lives, but the hon. Gentleman is quite right. There is also

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a strong use of Territorial forces to provide support and back-up, so that children in Kosovo have sports opportunities and so on. I give great credit for the work that is done. I suppose I should not have said that soldiers will be soldiers; I would like to retract those remarks. I should perhaps say that some men will be men. That might be a fairer reflection of the situation.
I do not know what the nationality was of the troops involved, but certainly some of the KFOR troops have been linked with the trafficking, and that is a problem. I would be happy to receive an answer on that later, but perhaps the Minister could advise, or commit to advising me, about what work is done with British troops and what training they are given, so that they become aware of the problem. If the link is made with Italy, as I said earlier, they may be in a position to report and identify the problem. What is being done to send a strong message that this is unacceptable behaviour? I assume that most people understand that it is unacceptable behaviour, but the military forces in peacekeeping, post-conflict situations need to make an extra special effort to ensure that this issue will not come back to haunt UK troops in future. I do not think that it has so far, but people cannot really be convinced about such things.
I was going to mention the European convention on action against trafficking in human beings, which is currently being drawn up by the Council of Europe, but the hon. Member for Amber Valley went through it in detail. I ask the Minister to give some steer on whether the UK is totally behind all the recommendations that were mentioned, because some of them, such as the risk assessment before repatriation and the reflection period are not a part of UK law—and we recently missed a good opportunity to include them. I am slightly bemused as to how we are going to comply with the convention if it takes this form, when many of the measures are not in place.
2.52 pm
Mr. Julian Brazier: I, too, congratulate the hon. Member for South Swindon (Ms Drown) on securing this debate on an important subject. International trafficking in women and children for prostitution—most of them young girls—is one of the most horrifying crimes existing today. Some of the earliest signs of trafficking in the UK in the 20th century were evident in the late-1980s in the triad-controlled brothels, principally in London and other major cities. In 2001, Der Spiegel and the German secret service estimated that the revenues of international criminal gangs involved in trafficking amounted to about €5 billion a year, of which two thirds was collected by Chinese gangs.
Various international organisations are involved, including UNICEF and Anti-Slavery International. By a curious coincidence, my housemaster at school was on the world board of the latter organisation, and I remember him telling us that slavery had not disappeared. In addition, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime is involved. All the organisations have been campaigning hard over the past few years to end human trafficking, particularly in women and children. However, their work is made harder by the frightening
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lack of any comprehensive data on trafficking worldwide. The hon. Lady referred to problems, and I have seen similar figures to the ones she mentioned from the International Organisation for Migration, which suggests that around 700,000 people are involved. I have even seen a figure suggesting that 2 million women and children are trafficked in a single year.
The International Organisation for Migration observed that in most countries there are few statistics or efforts to measure trafficking, and Britain is no less culpable. As far as I know, the Home Office has no realistic, regular source of information on the number of women who are trafficked into the UK for the purposes of exploitation. An official was quoted in a recent report as saying that the illegal immigrant population was a "knowledge black hole".
In Britain, a Home Office seminar in 1999, entitled "Workers in health projects in London", estimated that 50 per cent. of those employed in London's brothels—
2.55 pm
Sitting suspended for a Division in the House.
3.7 pm
On resuming—
Mr. Brazier: An investigation by the Metropolitan police found that 76 per cent. of the Soho brothels searched were staffed by foreign prostitutes, principally from Albania and Lithuania. An estimated 80 per cent. of people trafficked from Albania are teenage girls under the age of 18. The trade has been estimated to be worth $7 billion a year.
Worldwide migrant smuggling and trafficking is worth an estimated $12 billion to $13 billion a year. The Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe believes that smuggling and trafficking has now replaced the drugs trade as the world's most profitable illegal industry. The Home Office echoed that view in the evidence that it gave to the Home Affairs Committee for its report on border controls.
At the risk of covering ground already mentioned, it is worth focusing on what we are discussing. Typically, gangs offer foreign girls passage to a fictitious legitimate job for a price to be paid off in a few months, but the bill, as the hon. Member for South Swindon described, is never paid off. There is evidence that girls, sometimes as young as 12, have gone missing from the care of social services in Britain after being released into the care of so-called relatives, who turn out to have false documentation. Organised gangs have complete power over their victims, who do not dare complain or run away for reasons that have already been discussed. Often, the induction process starts with violent, multiple rape until the girl's resistance has been completely broken.
Harriet Sergeant, the author and journalist, in more than one of her works describes areas of Albania where law and order has so completely broken down that parents are frightened to send their girls to school, because gangs hang around outside, seize girls, gang rape them and move them to a country of their choice.
3.10 pm
Sitting suspended for a Division in the House.
3.51 pm
On resuming—
Mr. Brazier: The hon. Member for Amber Valley (Judy Mallaber) referred to the internet as a further extension of this vile business and I underline everything that she said, except, oddly enough, her last comment. I was a little puzzled when she said that America was behind us on this. In fact, it seems that the FBI has been ahead of almost everyone else and has been to Parliament several times to brief groups of MPs.
Judy Mallaber: It has indeed. I was present when Ed the Fed came to a meeting, which was very interesting.
America is behind us in that our Internet Watch Foundation includes all internet service providers, payment companies and so on in this country. In America, hardly any of them are in that organisation. When our Internet Watch Foundation provides information, it is not necessarily dealt with.
In Operation Ore, we prosecuted or took action against almost all those who had downloaded material in this country, but the United States did not take action against many people, so, in some ways, it is well behind us. We are closing down sites hosted in this country, but a lot of material is coming in from the United States where action is not being taken to close sites.
Mr. Brazier: I am interested to hear that. Certainly, the United States is ahead on the investigative side, but it has a difficulty because of its federal structure. As in so many other areas, it is necessary to obtain co-operation between federal agencies and prosecuting authorities in individual states. That applies to a number of areas of organised crime there.
The truth is that the problem of people-trafficking is a symptom of the wider breakdown of immigration controls. Our failure in the west to cope with the challenges of people movements and the tens of millions of people who fly across the borders of all major western countries every year has created market opportunities for this revolting trade.
A UNHCR report in July 2000 on the trafficking and smuggling of refugees claimed that much of the existing policy making of European Governments is
"part of the problem and not the solution."
Here in Britain, successive Governments have, rightly, started to demand visas for visitors from more and more countries that are likely to be a source of illegal immigrants. However, as the changes in the paper arrangements have not always been buttressed with administrative measures to make them effective, they have all too often worked perversely simply to strengthen the position of criminal smugglers. In 2000, Migration News Sheet commented:
"Through their … short-sightedness and inclination to rush through emergency measures without reflecting on the consequences … EU states have helped to create the ingredients of a very lucrative form of international criminality which top Mafia bosses probably never even dreamed of, namely trafficking in human beings."
Besides the lack of proper monitoring I referred to earlier—the fact that we do not have a handle on the statistics we are dealing with—our borders and internal
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enforcement procedures are undermanned. As MP for Canterbury, I frequently go through immigration at Dover, and I can see how overstretched immigration officers are. On the internal side, the same kind of triad and snakehead groups that run many of the prostitution rings for women and young girls were behind the Morecambe bay disaster, which was referred to earlier in the debate.
We know that, as long ago as June the previous year, the Home Office was warned about the way in which vulnerable migrants were being exploited by gangmasters in the area. The warning was not ignored but a clear decision was taken to do nothing. In a letter to the hon. Member for Morecambe and Lunesdale (Geraldine Smith), the Home Office said that the immigration service would not intervene due to "resource issues" and the fact that
"little useful purpose would have been served by sending officers to assist."
What else were officers doing that served a greater purpose?
So, what should we do? First, we need better intelligence. The Government are putting extra resources into the intelligence services, which we have welcomed. Some of the money should be used to deal with this issue. These are the same criminals who are involved in many other areas of crime, and even, I suspect, in terrorism. The National Criminal Intelligence Service needs to place more emphasis on the matter, too. We are dealing with a market as large as that of drugs.
We need to do more to defend our frontiers by considering manning issues, and to deal with those already operating here. If we can destroy the market, the trade will dry up. We must look again at the work permit system, which is widely believed to be open to abuse. A recent parliamentary question asked the Government to list the categories of people granted work permits due to the nature of their employment. The reply revealed that 1,160 entrants in one year alone were categorised as dancers, nearly all of whom were from developing countries. I wonder, when those things were rubberstamped—there is usually no check afterwards—what sort of jobs people thought those girls were going to end up doing.
Sandra Gidley: I am a little concerned about the hon. Gentleman's focus on work permits and immigration. It is clear in my mind that this is a separate problem. I appreciate his point about opening the floodgates, but many of these trafficking victims never get anywhere near a work permit. He is confusing the issue with illegal immigration, which should be identified as such and dealt with as such.
Mr. Brazier: I can only express total astonishment at the hon. Lady's remark. It is only because of the growth of illegal immigration that the gap in the market has opened for illegal gangs. The trade of smuggling people illegally into this country was started because wealthy people were paying to come here—that is how the gangs built their power bases. If that had not been possible, the whole problem would not have come about. I am not making a political point. That has happened and grown under Governments of different political persuasions.

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Of course, the vast majority of people we are talking about do not have a work permit of any kind, but there are a number of examples other than the one I cited. A suspiciously large number of people are listed as fashion models, for example, and an even larger number are just described as working in the leisure industry. The Home Office has said that domestic employment is often open to abuse, which is another large category. Introducing more checks and controls into the work permit system would not solve the problem on its own, but it would make it harder for people to be brought into the country in that way.
We also need to consider whether the new legislation on trafficking, which is obviously welcome, is delivering the sentences that perpetrators deserve. It is too early to tell whether it is, but a few really tough exemplary sentences could make a big difference to the climate. I appreciate that the issue is cross-departmental and that this question is a fast ball—the Minister may want to reply in writing—but I would be most grateful if he could let me know what the guidelines are for the Crown Prosecution Service. Busy, overworked prosecutors must face a tremendous temptation to abandon complicated cases in which the witnesses are, almost by definition, people whose English is not very good. One can see immediately the 80 per cent. chance of success rule coming up. It is in the public interest that such cases should be pursued, even if many of the witnesses are extremely frightened of and nervous about testifying. If they are willing and brave enough to do so, they should have their day in court.
It would also be interesting to know whether the Lord Chief Justice has issued any guidelines on sentencing. The maximum of 14 years applies, but what sentences are judges actually encouraged to give?
Last but certainly not least, I come to the actual handling of the unfortunate women and girls. Amnesty International and other organisations have called for medical care, counselling and other forms of aid. An area that I have been heavily involved in during the past 10 to 15 years is the handling of rape victims, particularly child rape victims. Frankly, we have transformed the criminal justice system's handling of British rape victims. One can imagine how much worse is the plight of these girls. They have been raped not just once. They have had months—in some cases, even years—of their lives blotted out in the most horrible fashion imaginable, yet they do not appear to get a fraction of the treatment that a British rape victim would get.
On granting asylum in such cases, obviously, each case must be considered on its own merits, but I strongly suspect that, if granting asylum were ever to become a pattern, it could backfire and end up partially feeding the industry. I may be wrong on that. Italy has been quoted several times. It is a matter of public record that I have been part of the Italian criminal justice system. The police and legal authorities that handled my case acted with exemplary professionalism.
The Deputy Speaker who was in the Chair a moment ago knows from the last trip that he and I made to Kosovo how much the Italian carabinieri there have done in exposing such problems, but the fact is that the Italian system as a whole has not delivered solutions.
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Italy is a country where prostitutes are more overtly on the streets than almost anywhere else I know in Europe. Ordinary Italian families talk widely about a range of problems to do with illegal immigration.
There can be no doubt that trafficking in women is a modern form of slavery and a horrible problem. It is part of a wider pattern of people smuggling, which is a lucrative industry that deserves and needs the same kind of focused treatment as is currently given to the drugs trade. People smugglers—often the same gangs—have introduced terrifying new levels of criminality into parts of Europe. The corruption and terror that they import into the UK and the destruction of the lives of innocent, vulnerable people are a blot on our society. We owe it to their victims to tackle the problem urgently.
4.4 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. Bill Rammell): I genuinely congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for South Swindon (Ms Drown) on securing this debate. When one begins to consider in detail some of the occurrences and the appalling impact on so many women throughout the world, the conclusion has to be that the matter absolutely should be a priority for the Government, who certainly are tackling it.
I share my hon. Friend's abhorrence of the trafficking of women across international borders.The trafficking of women involves crimes such as rape, torture, sexual or labour exploitation, kidnap and psychological abuse. The victims rarely have any idea what lies in store for them.
I want to draw a distinction between human smuggling and human trafficking, as the two terms are often confused. Human smuggling happens when organised crime gangs facilitate the illegal entry of migrants into another country by means of clandestine passage or the use of false documentation. A fee is usually paid by the migrant, who is a willing participant in that arrangement, one that normally finishes on arrival in the country of destination.
Human trafficking is when organised gangs coerce, abduct, threaten or deceive migrants into travelling. Those migrants are then exploited in one or more ways after they reach their destination. Traffickers control their victims through intimidation, slavery and imprisonment. They often threaten the victims' family back home. Exploitation and coercion are the key differences between the two methods of illegal entry, but what is important is that what starts as smuggling often turns into trafficking along the way.
The scale of the problem has been identified by a number of contributors to the debate. Of the two, smuggling is more common than trafficking, but the clandestine nature of the crime makes it impossible to give an accurate figure on either smuggling or trafficking. Widely cited guesstimates for trafficking range from 600,000 to 900,000 victims worldwide each year. Of those, 30 per cent.—a shocking statistic—are thought to be minors. The United Nations has estimated that criminals earn up to $20 billion a year from trafficking. That meaningfully brings home the scale of the problem that we are facing.
What are the motives of those involved? Members may wonder how women become the victims of traffickers. Frequently, they are motivated by the wish

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to escape from poverty. Inevitably many victims come from countries suffering from internal strife or where there is ineffective law and order. That makes them especially vulnerable to recruitment by traffickers. As well as those push factors there are pull factors, such as the demand for cheap and malleable labour in the developed countries and the victims' desire to find a better, more prosperous future in another country—I refer to those people who start out being smuggled and get coerced into being trafficked along the way.
In recent years, the turmoil in the Balkans has provided an unfortunate breeding ground for serious crimes such as human trafficking. That was referred to by a number of hon. Members. Many of those trafficked to the European Union originate in the Balkans. Those who come from further afield are often transported through the Balkans to their final destination. I am aware of the report by Amnesty International on the trafficking of women and young girls in Kosovo, to which my hon. Friend referred. I certainly welcome the recommendations in that report. Most of them reflect work already planned or being carried out by the UK, the European Union, the UN and NATO, which we will continue to support fully.
I now turn to what we are trying to do in this country and through this Government. We are committed to doing everything in our power to combat human trafficking. Our strategy encompasses a wide range of actions, including prevention in source and transit countries, co-operation with international partners, strengthening the law, tackling criminals through intelligence and enforcement operations, clamping down on illegal working and—this is an important point—helping the victims of trafficking.
To achieve our aims, we need good co-ordination across Departments, partnerships with businesses and NGOs and targeted international action. In 2000, Reflex, a practical, multi-agency task force, was set up to tackle all forms of people smuggling and trafficking. Led by the National Crime Squad, Reflex brings together all the key Government agencies that are involved in this work, including the immigration service, the Home Office, the National Criminal Intelligence Service, major police forces, the security intelligence agencies and the Foreign Office.
Reflex immediately set up a network of more than 20 immigration and liaison officers, mainly in Europe, to work with other Governments to disrupt and dismantle gangs. If we are to tackle the problem successfully, there must be that degree of international co-ordination. Joint operational units have also been set up at Heathrow and Gatwick, where immigration service officers work alongside police officers.
I deal now with the situation of the victims. It is particularly important that in our efforts to disrupt and dismantle the organised crime groups involved in trafficking we do not forget who the real victims of that appalling crime are. The UK Government are committed to supporting and protecting genuine victims of trafficking who are vulnerable. We have taken steps to provide support to such victims when they are identified. To help with their identification, an online toolkit aimed at law enforcement officials was developed to increase awareness and understanding of trafficking. In 2003, the so-called Poppy scheme was set up by the Home Office to provide safe accommodation and
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support for women who have been trafficked into the UK for the purposes of prostitution. Its core functions are to act as an advice and information point, to offer a range of support services through a casework approach and to facilitate the voluntary return of victims to their country of origin.
We have also enacted legislation, to which a number of Members have referred, to criminalise trafficking for the first time. The Sexual Offences Act 2003 and the Asylum and Immigration (Treatment of Claimants, etc.) Act 2004 include tough maximum penalties of 14 years for new, wide-ranging offences covering trafficking into, out of or within the United Kingdom. That measure was long overdue. The Acts include penalties for trafficking for forced labour or for the removal of organs, as well as for sexual exploitation. Overseas, we are working to build capacity in source countries.
Mr. Brazier: Will the Minister confirm that he will write to me about the cases prosecuted under the Crown Prosecution Service guidelines?
Mr. Rammell: I was going to refer to the hon. Gentleman's comments later. That is another Department's area of responsibility, but I will happily respond to him in writing.
Overseas, we are working to build capacity in source countries so that they can fight trafficking. For example, the Home Office is leading a European Union-funded twinning project with the Czech Ministry of the Interior to strengthen the capacity of the Czech Republic to combat trafficking. Anti-trafficking projects have also been funded in the western Balkans and in Poland. In Bosnia, we have a number of projects and secondments to help tackle the large-scale problem of corruption.
The Department for International Development has funded a range of projects specifically aimed at tackling prostitution and the trafficking of women and children. In south-east Asia, for example, DFID is contributing £8 million over a nine-year period to the Greater Mekong regional trafficking project—an International Labour Organisation-led project aimed at reducing trafficking and the labour exploitation of women and children in Cambodia, China, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam. Through its £15 million partnership framework agreement with the ILO, DFID is funding further anti-trafficking programmes in south-east Asia and west Africa.
I am pleased to say that the Foreign and Commonwealth Office plays a key role in tackling human trafficking. With the help of our diplomatic missions overseas, we contribute to the work of Reflex by raising awareness of the dangers of trafficking among potential victims and host-country authorities, and by reporting on local trends. We use our political and diplomatic knowledge and contacts to encourage foreign partners to increase their efforts to combat the crime. The FCO has also funded a range of projects, including an anti-trafficking witness protection and support project in Albania and a study on the role of women in the Albanian police force. We have provided equipment for the anti-human trafficking and sexual offences unit in Bosnia and funded two Serbian police officers' attendance at an Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe conference in Vienna on human trafficking.

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My hon. Friend the Member for South Swindon asked whether there were any projects in train under the auspices of the FCO global opportunities fund. There are. Last year, it funded a project to counter child trafficking in Mali, and it is currently funding a project in Bulgaria to help tackle the organised crime groups involved in the smuggling of illegal contraband. Many of those groups are also involved in human trafficking.
I now turn to multilateral assistance. The UK also works to combat human trafficking through international organisations such as the European Union, the OSCE, the Council of Europe, NATO, the International Organisation for Migration and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. Many of those organisations fund their own projects on human trafficking.
Through the European Council's 2002 framework decision on combating trafficking in human beings, the EU called on Governments across the world to take concrete measures and to intensify co-operation aimed at prevention through to victim assistance. Last December, the OSCE put in place an action plan to combat trafficking in human beings. The plan aims to address the problem comprehensively, including prevention, prosecution of criminals, international assistance and the protection of victims. A special representative, Helga Konrad, now heads a special unit within the OSCE, which is a welcome development.
For the first time in its history, NATO adopted a policy on combating trafficking in human beings at the NATO Istanbul summit in June. The policy requires specific action to be taken, such as developing training programmes for contributing countries. We strongly welcome that initiative, especially given the problems that have occurred during peacekeeping operations.
International conventions can certainly help, too. The Government have ratified the key instruments that outlaw slavery, such as the international covenant on civil and political rights, the European convention on human rights, the United Nations slavery convention and the International Labour Organisation conventions 29 and 105 on forced labour. We continue to promote their widest possible ratification and implementation, a task that we shall continue to push forward vigorously.
The United Nations convention against transnational organised crime came into force in September 2003. Two of the three protocols associated with it have also come into force. While the United Kingdom has signed the convention and its protocols, there still remains some primary legislation to be put in place before the UK can go ahead with ratification. That will be done as soon as parliamentary time allows. I have a strong message on that point: we need to focus on such matters and take them forward. I shall ensure that the business managers take that on board and, we hope, obtain parliamentary time for such action to take place.
We are also actively participating in the negotiations on the draft Council of Europe convention against trafficking in human beings. We welcome the involvement of NGOs, such as Amnesty International and Anti-Slavery International on what should be included in the convention, and have taken on board a number of their views.
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My hon. Friend asked about the care of, and support for, victims of trafficking, which is a key issue. While the Government are committed to supporting and protecting vulnerable victims of trafficking, that must be balanced with the need to make sure that support is effectively targeted and not stretched to the point where it is of little use to those who are most in need. If we are to prevent existing victims from being re-trafficked and new victims from being ensnared, it is vital that we gather intelligence on traffickers and their activities. Victims can play an important role in the defence against trafficking.
My hon. Friend suggested that a minimum period of three months should be agreed throughout Europe for the recovery of victims. Of course we accept that victims need to recover from their ordeal. Indeed, the Home Office-funded Poppy scheme to which I referred earlier supports victims of trafficking who have been forced into the vice trade while they decide whether or not they wish to assist the authorities in investigating the traffickers. We will continue to provide support, care and assistance for victims and will look at granting recovery and reflection periods on a case-by-case basis.
However, it would be difficult for us to proceed with instituting the three-month guarantee on a uniform basis. Were we to do so, there would be a danger that we would almost create a market for traffickers because a pull factor would be established. Nevertheless, we immediately give periods of four weeks, so that victims can decide what to do, and up to 16 weeks if they help the information unit. That is all judged on a case-by-case basis and we take such action because it is essential that we have co-operation from victims to obtain intelligence to capture the traffickers so that we can make a real impact on the trade.
My hon. Friend also asked how often such issues are raised at an international level. As I said earlier, they are raised at every available opportunity through the OSCE, NATO and the European Union. We are particularly active in the OSCE and NATO. Our aim is to agree a draft convention that balances the provision of care for, and the protection of, victims of trafficking with effective immigration controls and the gathering of intelligence to disrupt trafficking and to prosecute those responsible.
My hon. Friend the Member for Amber Valley (Judy Mallaber) referred to child porn on the internet. That is a key worry and we have been active in tackling such matters. We pushed the issue very strongly through the G8, which is now setting up a 24/7 network of law enforcement officials throughout the world. Through the Foreign Office, we also funded the Wilton Park conference, which took place last month and in which 31 countries participated, and a chat monitor software and training programme that involved 14 countries. Training in Bangkok for law enforcement officials from 12 south-east Asian countries is due to take to place in February 2005. That is an important initiative.
Let me also refer to some of the other points that have been raised in this debate. The hon. Member for Romsey (Sandra Gidley) referred to the difficulty involved in establishing reliable statistics. To be blunt, it is difficult to establish reliable statistics and there are a number of reasons for that. Despite the clear definitions of trafficking and smuggling in the supplementary protocol to the UN convention against transnational

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organised crime, there are still some grey areas. As I said earlier, it is common for people to begin their journeys voluntarily in order to seek a better life. They believe that the gangs assisting them are merely facilitating that journey. It is only when they arrive in the destination country that methods such as prostitution or forced labour are used to force them into jobs that the gangs want them to carry out. It is therefore very difficult to determine exactly where along the route someone becomes a trafficked person as opposed to someone who is being smuggled. Establishing the true statistics is very difficult.
The hon. Lady also said that we should look to what is happening in Italy, although the hon. Member for Canterbury (Mr. Brazier) had an alternative view. We work closely with Italy and other EU countries and regularly exchange best practice, which is important.
The hon. Lady also raised the issue of what we are doing to ensure that UK peacekeepers do not engage in activities associated with human trafficking. Let me be clear: all members of the UK armed forces are bound by codes of conduct that set out the standard of behaviour expected of them. They are made fully aware of those codes prior to being deployed on operations. They also receive regular diversity training, which includes training in gender awareness. As part of their pre-deployment training, personnel posted abroad receive instruction on the customs and culture of the host country, including, where relevant, the cultural status of women. This is an issue that we are rightly concerned about, although, as I said earlier, I would not want to create the wrong impression: the vast majority of our armed forces are people who do an extraordinarily difficult job very well and would never in a million years have anything to do with crimes such as these.
Sandra Gidley: Will the Minister give way?
Mr. Rammell: How long is there until we must finish?
Mr. Derek Conway (in the Chair): There is one minute left.
Mr. Rammell: Then I apologise to the hon. Member for Romsey, but I cannot give way.
The hon. Member for Canterbury raised the issue of work permits. I am not convinced about the arguments that he made. Most important, people have to apply for the work permit, so I am not sure that the case he was making is valid. However, if he has evidence, we would certainly consider it.
We will continue to do everything in our power to tackle trafficking in women. To achieve that, we need a multi-agency—
Mr. Derek Conway (in the Chair): Order. I am sorry to interrupt the Minister. It has been a difficult afternoon thanks to the Divisions, but I am afraid that his time is up.

School Sport
4.23 pm
Mr. Andy Reed: I appreciate that this has been a difficult afternoon in terms of the timing and I am grateful for the opportunity to raise this important subject. Why have the debate today? Over the past couple of years, I have wanted to raise the profile of sport and of physical education and activity, as well as the role that they can play not just in schools but right across society in tackling many problems, such as increasing obesity and social exclusion, and in respect of the health agenda. All those things are important.
I hope that this afternoon, a couple of years into the Government's programme to increase participation in school sports, we will hear from the Minister how it is going and what more we can do to encourage even more participation, and that we can talk about some issues that hold us back in this country.
I have to admit that when one or two hon. Members saw my name on the Order Paper again this week and knew that there would be another debate on sport, a few groans went up. It is important to recognise that a number of our colleagues in this place do not enjoy sport and particularly did not enjoy school sport. Looking around the Chamber, I can see that there are no Members present who had that experience.
We must recognise that sometimes we tend to talk among ourselves. Those who are passionate about sport feel that it has great benefit, but there are many who have had poor experiences. Perhaps they were the last ones to be picked underneath the rugby posts or the goalposts at school, or they were forced to do cross-country on a miserable, wet Wednesday afternoon. I have to admit that, as a sprinter, I never really appreciated the need to do cross-country, but it is part of school sport.
I want to ensure that this debate on school sport links in with others that I have secured, as well as those that I hope to secure, so that we have a co-ordinated approach to the delivery of sport. I would like to encourage mass participation through the school system to drive this agenda forward. We need to ensure that the school sports co-ordinators link in ably with the local clubs through the national governing bodies such as UK Sport, Sport England and Sports Coach UK. All those organisations can ensure that there is talent identification, and the elite performance directors can ensure that across the country individuals who have potential fulfil it.
I am lucky in my Loughborough constituency to have one of the regional hubs of the English Institute of Sport. We were very glad to have 43 constituents at the Olympics. Unfortunately, only two came back with medals. My heart still goes out to Paula Radcliffe, who put so much effort into her performance. She had come through the school system, benefited from lottery funding and reached the elite level. Her story demonstrates how difficult it is to achieve at that level.
It is important that if individuals and Members such as me have a passion for this issue, we keep it high on our radar, but also on that of the Government. We must not let it slip. There was some welcome news over the

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summer in response to what was happening in Athens. Some myths had been going around that Governments have not been in favour of competitive school sport, so it was good to see Ministers outlining the situation clearly. I was pleased to see an answer from the Minister only this week:
"The Government are firmly in favour of competitive school sport."—[Official Report, 13 September 2004; Vol. 424, c. 1445W.]
"Hear, hear!" say I, along with the many others who want to see our country and the nation as a whole doing well at school sport. That can be translated into a lifelong love of sport, and then to people participating at an elite level.
We must remind ourselves how badly we were doing as a country just a decade ago in terms of school sport. Looking around the Chamber, I see a generation of people who experienced the teachers' strikes in the early 1980s, at which point the emphasis changed. Teachers' relationship with school sport turned everything on its head so that there has been a 20-year gap. I know from my experience at the rugby club where I play every weekend—I am still one of the younger players, although I shall be 40 this Friday—that there has been a generational gap among those coming through the school system. It is now dependent on the clubs to reinvest, which clearly demonstrates the need for the school-club link in the future.
I am pleased that the Government have committed substantial sums of money to school sport, including the £459 million going into the school sport partnership programme. Nearly £700 million is going into facilities. I want to talk separately about those two, which are both important in their own right as they highlight the issues that we need to tackle.
I referred earlier to some of my colleagues not having a love of sport, which unfortunately translates across to school level. That was demonstrated only too clearly in the slightly outdated report "Sport Uncovered", produced by Adidas in 1999-2000. Nike has also conducted research on women's and girls' participation in sport. One of the problems is that it still seems really uncool, and some comments from youngsters illustrated the problems that we have. Many teachers who have stuck at teaching some form of physical education in school deserve credit for what they have done because their work has been carried out almost on a volunteer basis. We depend on those people. If it was not for them—I have been looking at comments over the past year or so from youngsters who have drifted away from sport—we would be in even greater difficulty.
However, because we are investing money in the school sports co-ordinators, the partnerships and the other little programmes, the balance is starting to shift. I was pleased to see in the Ofsted report earlier this year that the quality of the teaching of physical education and sport in schools is improving. However, there is still a long way to go. The Government's target that 75 per cent. of children should have two hours a week of high-quality physical education in school by 2006 still means that by then one in four children will not be getting what I consider the absolute minimum requirement.
The big debate has been over the two hours—whether it should be within or without the curriculum. I can live with it being outside the curriculum, but I would prefer
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it if the two hours were a definite that were tied into it, in the same way that we have the literacy and numeracy hours. Physical education and physical activity from five to 16 are that important.
I was delighted to see that 50 per cent. of schools are now into the,school partnerships. Having an elite university in my constituency, with a sports specialist college—Burleigh—right next door, including its partnership and the group of schools around it, I can see how it all works. Sports co-ordinators are making a difference bit by bit. For example, we were pleased that two or three years ago, two children from Burleigh won the national tennis competition. For the first time, a non-private school won it. Strangely enough, a number of private schools then tried to recruit those two individuals. That shows that—given the right coaching, facilities, backing and opportunities—anybody can achieve a great deal.
Mr. Paul Truswell: I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this latest in a series of debates on sport. I come to the debate not only as an MP but as an avid sports lover and a parent of two boys who both play cricket at county level for Yorkshire, one of whom is also an international badminton player. Given that that is a personal and exhausting perspective, does my hon. Friend accept my contention that young people—irrespective of their age, ability or gender—need to be brought into contact with dynamic and enthusiastic coaches across the widest possible range of sports? They are the ones who can enthuse young people, point them towards clubs and facilities, and, importantly, help to engage the parents. Does he agree that schools are the best way of doing that?
Mr. Reed: I am grateful for that intervention, because it ties into what I have been trying to say. There is a twin-track approach to this matter. It is important to get the facilities right, so that the best ones are available across the range of sports. However, even before Loughborough university got the new 50m pool, swimmers were coming from around the world to be based there because of the quality of the coaches and because of their enthusiasm. We had a horrible 1950s swimming pool, but those people still came.
I learned to play volleyball simply because of the enthusiasm of a teacher who had played it at international level and gave lessons after school on a Thursday to those who were keen to take part. The enthusiasm of that individual brought me into a sport that otherwise was not available. Every now and then I still manage to get out there and do a bit of setting; it would be good to play a little more. I will try to get a parliamentary side together, as that is one of the few teams that we do not have in this House. I am pleased to say that the English Volleyball Association is now based in my constituency and we are trying to get the national governing bodies in as well.
It is crucial that we get the two things that I mentioned right. That comes through in the report. It is quite clear that if teachers, or coaches who are brought in from the national governing bodies through the school-club links, demonstrate that level of enthusiasm to individuals, they will participate. The facilities are also necessary. Part of the problem is that our experience is

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of dirty, dingy areas. If we want children to stay after school hours, particularly when it is dark, we need well-lit areas.
What people want to do in terms of school sport is another issue. In most places, during the winter, boys do football or rugby and girls probably do hockey. During the summer there is a choice of cricket, athletics or netball, and a bit of rounders. The research shows that the reality these days is that lots of boys and girls want a much wider range of activities, and the media expose them—especially the girls—to many more sports. Football is the fastest-growing girls' sport, yet only 22 per cent. of them get exposed to girls' football at school. They also want to do basketball. That seems to be a growing area in which people, particularly girls, want to do a bit more.
There is much work to do in broadening the experience. It would be impossible in an average-sized primary or secondary school to obtain such a wide range of experience in the teaching staff, which is why that club-school link is vital. A co-ordinated approach means not only local clubs in sports such as basketball but local professional clubs. In Leicestershire, Leicester Tigers, Leicester City football club, Leicester Riders basketball team and the county cricket side do an excellent job to ensure that their talented players, including some academy members and some superstars, go into schools.
One of the greatest things after the Olympics was seeing Kelly Holmes returning to her school, taking a lesson and seeing the enthusiasm on the children's faces for having a go at athletics. That is vital, and it is why we must have enthusiastic teachers and coaches as well as club links in place. We must also ensure, particularly for girls, that children have sporting heroes to look up to and emulate. There are very few role models—people they would look up to and want to be like—for girls.
Research among girl footballers showed that they wanted to be like David Beckham. Would it not be great if they were able to name the captain of the women's football team? There is a great opportunity for enthusiasm to grow when we host the women's European championship next year. That is important, because sport is a good thing and we now have the obesity time bomb. For the first time in a generation, our life expectancy could be reducing instead of increasing. Some 20 per cent. of children are obese, and we must tackle that through physical education, nutritional and dietary requirements at school, and encouraging people to eat and live sensibly. We have them captured at school.
I know from my son's experience that a bit of tennis and physical activity—footie does not tire him out quite enough, but we can work on that—gives him an opportunity to do a variety of sports with his classmates, yet all the figures show that unfortunately we are still at the bottom of all international tables. We are still at the bottom when it comes to people participating in intensive, regular, competitive or organised sport at school. The UK is top of one league table, as 29 per cent. of us are involved in intensive, irregular competitive or organised sports.
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The way we can achieve our targets is to try to involve not only the Department for Education and Skills. I am pleased to see the Minister in the Chamber and I would like to hear what further measures there are to ensure a co-ordinated approach.
Indeed, sport is not the only winner. As the report produced by, among others, the Rugby Football Union, the Lawn Tennis Association, UK Athletics and the Central Council for Physical Recreation and entitled "Everybody Wins: Social Inclusion and Sport" makes clear, with crime reduction and health improvements, every Department wins from sport. The individuals who have benefited from their involvement in school sport go on, not necessarily to win gold medals but to participate throughout their life perhaps to veteran level. We must ensure that children have positive role models to look up to. There is lots of scope for them to get involved, and we must assist teachers and volunteers from clubs when they are trying their hardest.
When I became chair of East Midlands Sport, I was bamboozled by the number of initiatives in sport, not necessarily from the Department, but from Sport England and all those other organisations. I wonder whether we can work through that. If we consider athletics, for example, it is difficult to see who is running what and who is responsible for what. In schools, we have the Youth Sport Trust, the National Council for School Sport, school sports co-ordinators supported by Sport England and the new talented athlete scholarship scheme. I wonder whether it is possible to co-ordinate them to ensure that the basics of school sport are put higher up the agenda.
I am pleased to see a number of professional sports doing their bit. Even for older sportspeople such as ourselves in this place, if there is an international attending an event we are willing to get involved. We played a game of rugby at Twickenham two weeks ago. I find it difficult sometimes to get Members of Parliament to play in our rugby games, but give us the opportunity to run out on to the turf at Twickenham, which was hosting the Saracens and Wasps game, in front of 51,000 people and we do it. At school level, bringing in professional footballers, local cricket and rugby heroes, hockey players or others who are known locally makes an enormous difference; it comes back to the idea of having positive role models for individuals to look up to.
On the gender issue, people used to say to girls, "You don't have to worry about exercise if you are not overweight; you'll end up looking like Arnold Schwarzenegger." We will not go into that, but many such comments show that people are fearful, not just slightly ambivalent, about getting involved in sport. There is a lot of work to be done.
A 13-year-old boy from Birmingham—not my five-year-old son from Loughborough—said:
"Sport gets you going for a good life, or else you could be fat like my dad."
That sums it up. Sport gets people going for life and gives them the opportunity to take it forward. They may want to join a local club and run at local level for the rest of their lives and go no further. Nevertheless, school sport is the foundation for all other sport in this country. If we are to succeed with the 2012 Olympics, we must start ensuring that 100 per cent. of our children get at least two hours a week of it now, not later.
4.41 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education and Skills (Mr. Stephen Twigg): First, I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Loughborough (Mr. Reed) on securing this important debate. I feel the need to place it on the record, in the light of his opening remarks, that I was one of those who was among the last to be chosen at school sport. I still bear the scars. However, even after that experience, I acknowledge the great importance of physical education and sport. My hon. Friend has powerfully placed on the record the case for those things and their importance. I congratulate him—on behalf of everyone in the Chamber, I am sure—on his birthday this Friday.
There is a real determination, which is shared throughout the House, to increase participation in school sport and ensure that opportunities are provided. The two hours a week is a minimum, but we want to see schools achieving it sooner rather than later. The national strategy on school sport is about turning that ambition, on which my hon. Friend spoke so eloquently, into a reality in schools and communities across the country. It is worth recognising that this strategy follows years of decline and underfunding as well as a lack of focus on physical education and sport in our schools, including, as he rightly reminded the House, the central role of competitive sports. I am pleased to have the opportunity to place clearly on the parliamentary record what was said over the summer, to which he referred.
We have an ambitious public service agreement target to increase the proportion of five to 16-year-olds who spend at least two hours a week on PE and school sport to 75 per cent. by 2006 and 85 per cent. by 2008. We want all children to be given the opportunity to take up that entitlement. Physical education and sport have a crucial part to play in so many different respects, very much for the reasons that my hon. Friend set out and not least in helping to secure and promote the health of our nation. Last week, we published the healthy living blueprint, which brings together our Department and the Department of Health to address a range of issues, including food in schools, what is taught in the curriculum and, importantly, physical education, sport and physical activity. The more we can break down barriers between the different elements in schools, as well as between different Departments, the more likely we are to be successful.
My hon. Friend spoke about the impact of the strategy. We have the school sport partnerships, to which he referred. Around half the schools in England are already part of the network of 313 partnerships, and pupils are benefiting from them. Alongside those schemes we are creating a network of sports specialist colleges—an important part of the specialist schools movement—which provide enhanced quality facilities, as well as learning and teaching in schools, and, importantly, act as a hub for other schools, including primary and special schools in the local community.
That is very much about sharing best practice, organising activities—including competitions—and building and strengthening subject leadership. That is particularly true in the primary sector, because the earlier we get it right, the more likely it is that we will get
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all the benefits, including an enthusiasm for sport and the health and broader educational benefits to which my hon. Friend referred.
An important component is to achieve professional development for all schools to access, and I am pleased to say that Leicestershire helped us to pilot the programme last year. Thousands of teachers are already benefiting from the programme. It is in part about strengthening the links between schools and clubs, and offering—through, for example, the step into sport programme—leadership and volunteering opportunities for young people. The national sport strategy is investing over £8 million and working with the 22 national governing bodies of sport to enhance club links and bring more coaches into schools.
We are starting to see the benefits of the programme, and my hon. Friend referred to some of them. The latest evidence is that, in schools taking part in the partnership programmes, 62 per cent. of pupils are spending at least two hours in a typical week on high-quality physical education and school sport. We are on course to deliver the 2006 target, but I recognise his point that we need to aspire to go beyond it. We need to achieve the target, but if we can go beyond it, so much the better.
That is remarkable progress, if we compare the position with what was happening in those schools in partnership just three years ago. On average, 68 per cent. of pupils do two hours of sport each week in the schools that have been part of a partnership for three years, compared with only half—52 per cent.—in schools that joined the partnerships in September 2003. That is a remarkable 16 percentage point difference. We want to build on that.
The survey also showed that 96 per cent. of schools hold a sports day, so there is an important element of competitive sports. Just over one in five pupils take part in intra-school sports competitions, and one in three took part in such competitions within their own schools—that is, in inter-school sports competitions—during the last academic year.
We also found that almost one in 10 pupils in years 10 to 13—the upper years of secondary school—from the partnership schools are actively involved in sports, leadership and volunteering—for example, participating in work in primary schools and sports clubs. One in five in years 2 to 11 are participating in clubs linked to schools. That is progress, but clearly we need to build on it if we are to ensure that the programme makes a sustained difference in the long term. There is no room for complacency; we need to consolidate what has been achieved, press on and do more. In particular, as my hon. Friend said, we must do more to widen participation among all parts of the community. For example, we need to encourage our youngest children in schools and we have to get more girls, pupils from ethnic minorities and those with special needs to take up their entitlement to physical education and sport.
On facilities, the national schools sport strategy is investing in the people and tools needed to transform physical education and increase participation. In the five-year strategy for children and learners set out by the Secretary of State in July, we said that one of our key secondary reforms was a commitment to refurbish or

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rebuild every secondary school to a modern standard over the next 10 to 15 years through the building schools for the future programme.
Mr. Reed: I am delighted that we have some fantastic facilities—when I look around the school where I regularly play rugby, I see that it has what is required—but they are not used for much of the time. There seems to be general agreement that not enough school facilities are used 24/7, although there appears to be no further progress. Will the Minister take that on board and ensure that we start to use all those facilities 24/7?
Mr. Twigg: That is absolutely right. My hon. Friend asks an important question that has relevance for sports facilities for young people, as well as sport and other facilities for the whole community. The sense of the school being the hub of the community is an important component of the policy, both as part of the building schools for the future programme and, more broadly, as part of the idea of opening up and extending school facilities. That has relevance in rural as well as urban areas, and we can pursue it further in debates here and in the main Chamber of the House.
We are supporting capital investment for school buildings at around £4.5 billion this year. That is a very considerable increase compared with the position we inherited in 1997—a sevenfold increase in the schools capital budget. It will rise to £5 billion next year.
My hon. Friend referred to the money that is going to particular programmes—for example, space for sport and the arts and the new opportunities for PE and sport lottery programme—to bring about a step improvement in school sports facilities across the country. More than 3,000 schools will benefit directly, and as the new facilities need to be opened up and shared with other
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schools and the wider community, I am confident that many more schools will benefit from this. As part of that, Leicestershire has funding of about £3.5 million and nine projects have already been awarded grants and given the green light to start work.
My hon. Friend referred to the success of Burleigh school in winning the tennis competition. I join him in congratulating it on that and, more broadly, in welcoming the work that is going on through the Burleigh school sport partnership in Loughborough. I want to put on the record thanks to Adele Hickling, the partnership development manager, for the excellent work that is going on. Already, 57 per cent.of pupils in that partnership are able to take up their two-hour entitlement, and I know that it is working very hard to build on and improve that.
An above-average number of pupils are involved in competitive school sport there, and all the schools hold a sports day with a massive 19 per cent.—one in five—of year 11 pupils across the partnership taking part in leadership and volunteering. Some really good work is going on, in particular to include children with special needs and disabilities. In response to my hon. Friend, I say that that example is exactly the kind of best practice that we want to share.
I welcome the opportunity that a debate such as this, however short, gives for some of these things to be put on the record. What is critical now is that we—as a Government, in Parliament and more broadly—learn the lessons from those examples of good practice so that they become typical rather than exceptional beacons to which we can refer in debate. We want them to become the good practice of all our schools so that it can be shared and so that all children and young people get the entitlement to physical and sports education that I think everyone in the House agrees they deserve.

Education Provision (Southend)
4.53 pm
Mr. David Amess: Mr. Conway, this may be a sad day for democracy and security, but the fact that we are discussing education, and education in Southend, is timely. However strongly we feel about issues, the attempt today to halt proceedings was a very sad action indeed.
I am very grateful that the Minister for School Standards is responding to this debate as it was not so long ago that I was part of a delegation to meet him. This is not an opportunity to criticise or berate the Government for what they have done in terms of education. All parents in Southend are very grateful for any assistance that the Labour Government give to our schools and that the Conservative council in Southend also gives to our children.
Southend used to be a very popular seaside resort, but times have changed and many people now travel abroad. The local authority has desperately looked for a new outlet in activities in Southend and, sensibly, it has been decided to try to make Southend a centre of learning. That is not easy to achieve, but I congratulate all those who have worked in partnership to make it happen.
South East Essex college of arts and technology is working with the university of Essex to enable young people to benefit from higher education. They have signed a joint venture agreement and have embarked on a unique partnership. The vision is for the joint development of an integrated further and higher education campus offering progression opportunities for young people and adults.
The college has recently relocated to its splendid new building in Luker road in the heart of Southend. The building forms the first phase of the campus and houses most of the college's further education and all its higher education provision. I hope that the appropriate Minister can visit our new campus. Everyone in the town is excited about it and the opportunities it affords. There will be a strong vocational focus in an exciting and innovative flagship building. The college, in partnership with the university, is helping to raise aspirations and skill levels in an area that, traditionally and unfortunately, has low rates both of staying on post-16 and of participation in higher education. The project fits in extremely well with all the aspirations of the Thames gateway.
The Minister has probably heard many Members of Parliament praise local examination results, and I intend to follow that example. I give the credit entirely to the children who have achieved those results, to their teachers and to their parents. Also, I want to touch briefly on the relationship between grammar schools and comprehensive schools in Southend and the impact it has on the results. As the Minister will know, we have four grammar schools in Southend. We are very proud of them. We know that the Labour party has pledged not to abolish them so we will be working with the secondary schools that we have in Southend at present.
Westcliff high school for boys was ranked among the top 50 schools in England and Wales, based on this summer's A-level results. We also saw excellent A-level
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results from Westcliff high school for girls, Southend high school for boys, Southend high school for girls and St. Thomas More high school for boys. I am pleased to tell the Minister that the percentage of pupils attending schools in Southend who achieve five or more A* to C passes at GCSE is above the national average. The percentage has risen from nearly 57 per cent. last year to nearly 60 per cent. this year. The national average is about 53 per cent.
Westcliff high school for girls, which one of my daughters attends, had a pass rate of 100 per cent. Southend high school for girls, which another of my daughters attends, had a pass rate of 99 per cent. Westcliff high school for boys had a pass rate of 98 per cent and Southend high school for boys had a pass rate of 96 per cent. As a Catholic, I was pleased to see the two Catholic schools—St. Bernard's, which is wonderfully led by Miss Vicky Squirrell, and St. Thomas More, wonderfully led by Frank Keenan—do so well. The Eastwood school also did splendidly. I congratulate all those involved.
Much as I praise all those schools, Prittlewell school and Belfairs school in my constituency are equally important. I do not want to use the short time that is available to go into the detail of what has happened at Prittlewell school. I simply put on record the fact that it has been a splendid school, given all the challenges it has faced. I am sorry that as a result of the Ofsted report it is now under special measures, something that I never thought would happen while I was the local MP. I was totally unaware that this was happening. We have support from the Minister's Department, but once a school is labelled as having difficulties it often takes a generation to turn it around. I will not shut up about Prittlewell school: I want to ensure that normal education provision is returned as soon as possible because I cannot believe that in just a year something has somehow gone terribly wrong there.
The final school, Belfairs, is magnificently led by John Duprey. I have had the privilege of attending many events at that school. The headmaster is very proud of all that has happened there, but he is concerned about the impact that the activities of other schools are having on his school. Obviously the grammar schools take a number of children who are not from Southend. However, the number of children from disadvantaged backgrounds is significantly higher at a school like his and the number of asylum cases and those from economic migrant families is higher at his school, and that type of population is, by character, fairly mobile. The Government have said that such pupils must be included in schools and they feel very strongly about that. However, such a change has absolutely no impact on the grammar schools, as the youngsters who are to be included are invariably not sufficiently able to go to grammar schools.
I would never support the abolition of grammar schools in Southend. We must live with the way things are at the moment. I feel very strongly that Belfairs' magnificent achievements should be recognised in a different way, not merely in terms of the tables as printed. As the Minister knows, Belfairs has a wonderful drama facility and other areas of excellence, but in its academic achievements it is seen not to be doing as well as the grammar schools. I will support Belfairs school to

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the end; it has a magnificent staff, and it is a bit tough on them when the results are printed and Belfairs appears not to be doing as well as the other schools.
I have decided not to name the heads of secondary schools who have given me various pointers that I shall use in this debate. However, the head of one secondary school in Southend feels that channelling money to disadvantaged schools is unlikely to produce the effects that the Government want. He believes that the reverse will happen because learning is difficult; it comes from sustained and deliberate application over time and it is the product of patience and resolution. Learning is not amenable to a quick fix; neither can it be equated with having access to a computer. I have strong views on computers: I agree with the headmaster that information and communications technology by itself cannot usher in an age of higher standards. The head feels that the problem is
"a poverty in home life and in conversation, in reading, which many cannot do, in understanding the cultural and historic roots of our society, in seeing the significance of the principle of personal responsibility and in recognizing that the puritan ethic ought be a source of continuing vitality in our affairs."
The head also believes that the Government have not understood the distinction between education and training, which he feels will eventually have an adverse effect on the work force. The Government have always talked about "education, education, education", but that headmaster believes that there has been too much bureaucracy, bureaucracy, bureaucracy.
Several heads have complained about the cost of examinations, especially of modular A-levels, vocational examinations and so on. I hope that the Minister will say how funds will be given to the schools to sustain the cost of examinations.
My party feels strongly about parental choice. When the Government introduced the School Standards and Framework Act 1998, infant school class sizes were restricted to 30. In the tiny urban area that I represent, there is no space in the playground to build extra classes, and restricting class sizes to 30 has had an adverse impact on parents' choice of school. Once upon a time, you could go along to a teacher—they were all paid the same amount—and say, "Do you mind taking an extra one or two?" Schools cannot do that now, so primary schools such as West Leigh, Leigh North Street and Chalkwell have been turning parents away, literally in droves. Will the Minister comment on that?
The meeting that we had with the Minister was about budgets. I have to tell him that schools in Southend have muddled through with their budgets, but there are staffing restrictions, even with transitional grants. I am advised that the money is simply not enough, and next year the grant goes down by 50 per cent. I fear that schools will be in trouble again, although I hope that the Minister will be able to reassure me on that point.
A number of head teachers have raised concerns with me about funding generally, and work force reform in particular, which is an issue for both primary and secondary schools. Schools in Southend are very worried about how they will pay for those activities that were formerly performed by teaching staff, but that will now have to be performed by non-teaching staff. As I understand it so far, the Government have not yet, indicated how funding will be passed on to the schools.
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Although it is laudable that the Government insist on non-teaching staff doing things formerly done by teachers, will that work force reform be fully funded?
Another head teacher wanted to share with me her concerns about pay, recruitment and the retention of staff generally. It is an issue in Southend. I do not know whether it is because we are at the end of the line, but we are currently finding it rather difficult to attract head teachers in particular, which is very surprising and disappointing. When vacancies are advertised, there is a small selection of replies. Head teachers feel concerned about funding for the upper pay scales. There appears to be a huge constraint on budgets for schools with established and experienced staff—I am sure that that is not the first time the Minister has heard that.
The transition from a local education department to a directorate of children's services, which is currently happening in Southend, has financial implications. The time scale and process seem unclear, and coupled with the loss of staff in the local education authority it has removed support from schools. During the same period, the local education authority is being further stretched by the secondary school that I mentioned—Prittlewell—going into special measures. There is additional concern that a second school on special measures—not in the area that I represent, but at the other end of town—will further distort the admissions into secondary schools.
The Minister will know that we also had a meeting with the Minister for Children earlier this year, at which the deputation was concerned about the financial impact of looked-after children, relative to Southend's size, and at which we gave the Minister all sorts of examples of how we thought we were not being treated fairly.
One primary school teacher—together with Michael Frampton, the excellent head master of Southend high school for boys—stressed to me very strongly that there does not seem to be any equality of funding whatever. She certainly feels strongly that the primary schools are not being treated fairly, and that there are no incentives for schools to reduce their budget deficits. I have to tell the Minister that she rather longs for the days of grant-maintained schools.
Recruitment and retention is an issue in Southend. In May 2003, there were nine primary, 19 secondary and two special school vacancies. That is quite high. At present, there are four primary and 16 secondary vacancies, and fortunately, we have solved the vacancy problem in our special schools. Will the Minister comment briefly on that?
I end with a comment about our special schools. I have five special schools in the area that I represent, and they are absolutely splendid. I am deeply moved every time I visit the schools and see their wonderful achievements. The Minister will understand that when it was first mooted that children with all sorts of special educational needs be absorbed into mainstream schools, there was resistance from many parents who felt that their children would be at a real disadvantage in some schools.
However, following the local authority's decision to reorganise special education in Southend, the five special schools—Kingsdown, Lancaster, Priory, St. Nicholas and St. Christopher's—have been preserved, although they are going through a period of

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prolonged change. The strategy adopted means that more people will be able to be educated locally in Southend, which I applaud, and there will be greater choice for parents with enhanced facilities in some of our mainstream schools, which I am particularly delighted about.
I am very pleased that in Lancaster school, 19 to 25-year-olds, for whom there has always been a gap in provision, will not be forgotten once they leave school. I praise Southend-on-Sea borough council for that development., which is one of just a few in the country. Eastwood secondary school, led by David Penketh, has a drama facility and music centre, and is a wonderful school. I am now into my eighth year as MP for Southend, West, and I am seeing all sorts of changes that the education authority is doing its best to cope with.
Finally, will the Minister look carefully at Southend council's position as a unitary authority outside Essex county council? I know that the change was not his decision but that of the local residents, but the fact that it is a unitary authority means that there are special circumstances in terms of educational opportunities. I look forward to working with the LEA and the Department for Education and Skills in raising standards for all our children in Southend and rejoicing with the Minister and others concerned as Southend marches on to become a centre of educational excellence.
5.13 pm
The Minister for School Standards (Mr. David Miliband): I can only guess at the excitement that you, Mr. Conway, and the millions of others who are watching us on television feel at joining what is becoming an extended conversation between the hon. Member for Southend, West (Mr. Amess) and me about education in Southend. Until today, the discussion has been sadly restricted to private meetings, but we can now be assured that it will be seen by a wider range of people who can gauge the passion, common sense and innovation that are part of it.
I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on the beginning and end of his speech, and I associate myself wholeheartedly with his congratulations to the teachers, pupils and parents of all the schools in Southend on their achievements this summer. I am pleased that he has not joined the brigade of so-called well-informed commentators who, every time that test and exam results come out, are the first to say that the results are the product not of hard work and good sense but of the exams getting easier. Like him, I believe that young people and their teachers are working more smartly and better, and that they deserve the results they achieve.
The hon. Gentleman was also honest enough to recognise that not every young person is fulfilling their potential at school or college and that we have to fight any sense of complacency that we feel about existing provision while celebrating the good work done by pupils and teachers in Southend.
Looking at the statistics for this year, I was struck by the fact that the number of 15 and 16-year-olds getting five or more GCSE passes—when the hon. Gentleman
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referred to passes, they were for grades A to C—rose by 2.9 per cent. in Southend, which is encouraging. That is above the national average and an increase from 48 per cent. when the authority went unitary in 1998, to pick up on a later point that he made. Also, the percentage of students receiving no passes fell—it nearly halved—this year. I am sure he agrees that that is significant.
I am glad that the hon. Gentleman talked about the work of the South East Essex college of arts and technology at advanced level. The A-level average points score in Southend rose to 48.4 per cent. this year, which is significant. Looking at the description of the new £52 million South East Essex college—I gather it is opening on Southend high street within a matter of days, and I am sure that the bunting will be put out—it was striking to see that nearly two thirds of enrolments at the college are in business, information and communications technology and visual and performing arts. Those are three areas in which there are growing employment opportunities and it is good to see that that often technical type of education, which has sometimes been neglected in this country, is being supplied by the college. I applaud the work that it is doing.
The hon. Gentleman concentrated his remarks on the secondary sector, but I am sure that he will join me in welcoming the renewed progress at primary level. Secondary schools cannot prosper unless the primary stage—the foundation of education—is properly undertaken. The improvements in that area are really striking.
Let me run through some points that the hon. Gentleman raised, because I want to ensure that they are covered. He mentioned Prittlewell school and said that he was worried that it might take a generation to repair and restore its fortunes. I do not just hope that that need not be the case; I believe it. The record of schools being placed in special measures shows that they can make fast progress. The average time schools spend in special measures is about 13 months—just over an academic year. It is a challenging process, but I am sure that he would agree that when Ofsted, the independent inspectorate, finds serious weaknesses or significant problems, it is right not to avert our eyes but to get in there and sort the difficulties out.
I can reassure the hon. Gentleman that overall the number of schools in special measures has fallen significantly over the past seven or eight years—it has more than halved. The number of schools with less than 20 per cent. of pupils getting five A to C grades at GCSE is down from 361 in September 1997 to an estimated 59 this year. This need not be a counsel of despair. I am sure that it is disappointing for the people at the school involved, but they can be sure that they will get support—not just from the local authority but from central Government—to get them out of special measures as soon as possible. It is not just that we want to avoid a spiral of decline; we believe that we can avoid it and have a virtuous circle of improvement. I am sure that any help or positive support that the hon. Gentleman can give will be welcome.
I will not dwell on the hon. Gentleman's worries about computers. Suffice it to say that the use of

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information technology seems to me quite compatible with learning how to read and write well—in fact, they can support each other.
The hon. Gentleman had a specific question about exam costs, which is an issue. I think that he was probably thinking of exam registration fees. Rightly in my view, the exams are run by independent charitable bodies, not by central Government, and they fix their fees under the watchful eye of the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority. He referred to the costs involved for schools and colleges. Perhaps he did not have this in mind, but it is also important to think about the assessment burden in terms of coursework, which can take time away from teaching. We must look at both aspects. The Tomlinson review of 14 to 19 provision is looking directly at those issues and the cost implications; it will be published in about three or four weeks. I hope that we can address some legitimate points that were made by the hon. Gentleman's constituents in that context.
The hon. Gentleman talked about funding in Southend, but he has been misinformed that there was a 50 per cent. cut in its grant. Perhaps that was a slip. The funding for Southend continues to increase. This year, every school in his constituency is guaranteed at least a 4 per cent. increase per pupil in funding. Next year—2005–06—it will be at least 5 per cent. for primary schools and at least 4 per cent. for secondary. I will explain the difference later; it relates to work force reform, which he also mentioned. Those are the minimum increases. It is also important to recognise that Southend's overall increase per pupil was 6.3 per cent. this year, so significant extra funds are going to Southend.
I think the hon. Gentleman was talking about the transitional grant, which was given specifically to help to overcome some problems in 2003–04. He is right in saying that that is going down from £1.4 million to £0.7 million and to zero eventually, because it was a two-year grant to help to smooth out some of those difficulties. It is right that we do not go straight from £1.4 million to zero, which is the cliff edge that Southend might have faced. I hope he agrees that the overall increase in the base—6.3 per cent.—provides a significant safety net as the transitional grant is withdrawn and that the commitments for schools are inviolate.
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I am glad that the hon. Gentleman referred to work force reform as well as the three-year programme to ensure that teachers focus on teaching and that the administration and whatever bureaucracy is necessary is taken care of by administrative support staff. That has been carefully modelled, most recently in 72 primary schools during the summer term of the 2003–04 academic year.
Furthermore, I am delighted that the National Association of Head Teachers, the Secondary Heads Association, significant teaching representatives and the Local Government Association have worked with us to develop the funding formula for 2005–06—the last year of the work force reform initiative—to deliver funding that will provide the stability, predictability and cover that primary and secondary schools need.
We have upped the minimum increase for primary schools because they face a particular challenge in the third year of the agreement as teachers are entitled to 10 per cent. of their teaching time being reserved for the preparation and planning of lessons, which are obviously critical as demands on the curriculum rise. However, we believe that the measures we have taken, with the support of those partners I mentioned, will cover that.
The hon. Gentleman also talked about children's services, and I heard and read about his meeting with my right hon. Friend the Minister for Children. There are big opportunities for schools and social services to work together in ways that they previously have not.
I shall wind up on a note of common agreement. Special schools have a critical role to play in our education system. For some pupils, they will always be right, but not necessarily for the whole of their school career. I do not want a battle between special schools and the mainstream sector; I want more co-operation between them so that the special skills in special schools and among the teaching staff are spread across the system.
I am glad to hear that the hon. Gentleman supports that and that he is as inspired as I am by what goes on in our special schools. They have a lot to offer—not just to their pupils, but to the wider system—and I look forward to making the most of them.
Question put and agreed to.
Adjourned accordingly at twenty-two minutes past Five o'clock.