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Address in Reply to Her Majesty’s Most   Gracious Speech

My Lords, what a treat it is to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Turner. I shall follow her not just on Iraq but possibly on many other aspects of the Armed Forces. First, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Drayson, on his appointment and wish him well. Earlier today, on the Benches just over his left shoulder, he may have seen his colleague, the noble Baroness, Lady Dean, who I hope will soon be the chairman of the All-Party Defence Study Group. I am at present its secretary and hope to be able to carry on in that capacity. It is in that humble capacity that I speak from the Back Benches with enormous interest in defence matters and support for every man and woman who is serving today all over the world. As the Minister and others will be well aware, decisions taken today—this month, this year—continue for the next five or 10 years and even beyond. The noble Lord, Lord Garden, has already referred to carriers. My noble friend Lord Luke is much more alert to and specialised in that aspect than I, so I shall not go on, but those carriers require a great deal of support from arms and logistics. I am pretty sure that it will be the noble Lord, Lord Drayson, who will be at the front end, responsible for logistics support. As for the Army, there will doubtless be for this year and five or 10 years ahead the question of armour. Do tanks have a role? If so, what will they be doing? Our group visited the Household Cavalry regiment at Windsor. Quite apart from the traditional aspect of riding and equitation, we were able to see a demonstration of armoured reconnaissance, which was a great lesson to me and my colleagues. My noble friend Lord Astor of Hever will be back; he has much greater knowledge of the Life Guards, the Household Cavalry and armoured reconnaissance then I. Decisions about helicopters for the Army will also have to be taken and fine-tuned—not just attack helicopters, anti-tank helicopters, but what I might call battlefield taxis. That is why it was nice to hear the Minister refer to what I think he called the fleet, as a fleet manager transporting Armed Forces personnel and equipment all round the battlefield. That will be one aspect of his responsibilities. All that is tied up with the defence budget and finance. Defence budgets tend to get decided and spoken about in your Lordships’ House. We receive handouts; indeed, my little library in my office is stuffed full of glossy brochures with fancy names, such as Options for Change, Strategic Defence Review and other marvellous things. They tend to say the same things, but if you take a careful look, you will find that they are very much restricted by the budget. These tend to be followed by pearls of wisdom in your Lordships’ House, especially during specialised debates on defence. I return to a subject close to my heart: the men and women who serve in our Armed Forces. Over the past 32 years I have been lucky to be a member of the House of Lords All-Party Defence Study Group. Over those years I have noticed enormous changes: first, it is interesting that the senior ranks are now a little younger than me; secondly, all the ranks are immensely professional, articulate and bright. My noble friend Lord Freeman referred to national service—indeed, I was among those who participated. Forty-eight years ago I was trained, along with 16 other young men, by Sergeant Clements of the Coldstream Guards, known as Kiwi, because it was said that he gave everything, including us, a spit and polish. Within eight weeks he had turned us into soldiers. I was lucky then to go to officer cadet training, an incredible course that in   16 weeks turned young soldiers into platoon commanders. That system worked during the Second World War, it worked very well in Korea and extraordinarily well in Malaya, with 18 and 19 year-olds doing their duty for two years as professional soldiers. I spent 16 weeks at Eaton Hall in Chester, where I was guided by the father of the Second Principal Doorkeeper, Mr Blood. There is an enormous thread through your Lordships’ House that has drilled me, a civilian, a young Scot, to become a soldier. When the All-Party Defence Study Group visited the Household Cavalry at Windsor we had great difficulty restraining my noble friend Lord Renton from getting on a horse and repeating his equitation course of the 1930s, but we also saw the enormous professionalism involved in armoured reconnaissance, to which I have referred and on which my noble friend Lord Astor of Hever will be able to elaborate. In 2002, my noble friends Lord Jopling and Earl   Attlee and I had the enormous good fortune to visit the special forces at Poole, a chance given to very few members of the public, let alone parliamentarians. Those two aspects gave my colleagues and me a chance to see the vast range of disciplines in all services, including combined or joint services, of the British Army. There is one essential element in these disciplines: all the men and women are soldiers. They are not mere drivers or specialists; they must have basic military skills. The Minister referred to an ““f”” word: flexibility. He is right; you must be flexible as a soldier. I give him my old acronym: FIBUA, which means ““fighting in built-up areas””. He referred to the flexibility in the reorganisation of the infantry in December. No army can do anything without first-class infantrymen, and I pay my respects to them. My case has been made by the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Inge, who referred to the reduction in the infantry battalions. There might have been a reasonable case for that but I have my doubts. The Minister need not worry: this is not a party line; it has been argued for up to 20 years. My late noble friend Lord Vivian referred to the issue of the budget. Reducing four infantry battalions because the arms plot is to be done away with is fine, but I take the Minister back to April 1982, when overnight we had to send an expeditionary force to the Falklands. Having reduced four battalions, would we have that capacity today? We might do it, but it would be extremely difficulty. I had something to say on recruiting but thankfully the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Inge, has dealt with it. I had the enormous good luck earlier this week to see another incredibly important element of a first-class British Army, five minutes’ walk from here. I had the marvellous chance to meet the Major General Commanding London District; the Garrison Sergeant Major, a terrifying soldier; and the Commanding Officer of the First Battalion Irish Guards, all of whom were stationed five minutes’ walk from here. They were doing ceremonial duties, but in a twinkling of an eye all those men, and the women who support them, might well be in action. For all Scots Guardsmen, including me and my family, 27 April this year, during the election campaign, was a very special day. Her Majesty the Queen presented the highest award for gallantry—there are two words on the medal: ““For Valour””—to Private Beharry VC and his friends, mates or muckers—I do not know what he calls them—in the team who contributed and fought in Iraq. We owe them a huge debt. Just last year, people were doing things. The citation for Private Beharry and his team will make the case that I am putting, and which I hope the Minister can pursue over his career. I say to the Minister: do your duty, just as the noble Baroness, Lady Symons, who has sat here throughout the debate—I do not know why—did. In two instances we had quiet words with her and she took two courses of action—on HMS ““Sheffield”” and with the First Battalion King’s Own Scottish Borderers—that were enormously welcomed. She has perhaps not been mentioned in today’s debate but I add my enormous gratitude to her and the noble Lord, Lord Bach, and wish everybody in the Armed Forces well.