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Armed Forces Bill

If the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, I would rather not be drawn into discussion of the case of Trooper Williams, which is extremely detailed. The point that I was trying to make is that we will not be drawing people away from their immediate operational effectiveness. I cannot comment on individual cases, but I suspect that one feature of the case mentioned by the hon. Member for Canterbury was the delay in resolving the matter. Service chiefs and all members of the armed forces share concern about such delays. The regime that we are introducing will ensure that matters that ought to go to the prosecuting authority move far more quickly than at present. The closer relationship between the service police and the prosecuting authority should help to improve the quality of the investigation. All those factors will contribute to reducing such delays. The hon. Gentleman suggested that the clause would prevent service police from consulting a CO." I did not suggest that the clause would prevent service police from consulting COs, but that it says that they should refer a case directly, which means that they could shove it on without consulting the CO. "