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Deepcut Review

I do not intend to comment about the four individual deaths to which the hon. Member for Woodspring (Dr. Fox) referred. Enough grief has washed over the families involved already, and this has been another bad and difficult day for them. The report looks at those deaths, but goes much wider. I agree with the hon. Gentleman’s assessment of the achievements of our training environment, and I shall not elaborate on what has been said time and again about the quality produced at Deepcut and elsewhere. The hon. Member for Woodspring asked a range of questions, some of which have been answered on previous occasions. Additional resources for instructors have been made available, and we are constantly looking at the balance in this matter. I do not want to go into the history too much, but part of the problem in the past was that the training environment was stripped out to meet front-line demand. The Government inherited that problem and have been trying to address it, but strengthening the training environment means that senior and capable personnel are taken away from the front line at an exceptionally busy time. The Government must strike the right balance, and we are making significant progress. The hon. Gentleman asked about the way in which we assess the background of recruits. New procedures have been put in place to do that, so that we have the best assessment of the nature and characteristics of the young people in question. Not all of them come from vulnerable backgrounds or are damaged individuals, and I would not like it to be thought that that is the quality of the young recruits to Her Majesty’s armed forces. It is not. There are some with those characteristics, but many come from stable family homes and military families. None the less, we have to understand the breadth of the range of individuals with whom we are dealing. The hon. Gentleman raised the unquestionably important matter of phase 1 and phase 2 training. Our aim is to make sure that we do not have recruits, in effect, sitting around doing nothing while they wait for their next posting, and that has been tackled substantially. The average number of soldiers awaiting trade training for more than 14 days has decreased from more than 1,100 in 2003-04 to 456 in 2005-06, and we shall work to improve that. For Deepcut alone, the comparable figures are a decrease from 136 to 75. Sometimes it happens for a good reason, but we recognise that it is an issue none the less. The hon. Gentleman asked about coroner’s inquests and the backlog in what is done for those whose bodies are repatriated from Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere. We have announced new measures, in consultation with the Department for Constitutional Affairs. Three additional assistant deputy coroners, one of whom is a retired High Court judge, will be appointed to assist the Oxfordshire coroner in dealing with the backlog of Iraq-related inquests. As of last week, 59 inquests were outstanding on service personnel whose bodies were repatriated to RAF Brize Norton. We have at all times recognised that that is a problem, and we are now beginning to tackle it. Throughout, the interests of the grieving families must remain paramount. The hon. Gentleman asked specific questions about the role of the commissioner and he expressed a strong—indeed, prescriptive—view. I would say, let us examine the merits of the role of the commissioner. In the Armed Forces Bill, we will define in broad terms what the commissioner will do—we will have to table amendments, which will be subject to debate in the other place, where the Bill now is, and perhaps in this place when the Bill returns to the Commons. It is worth having the arguments; I simply ask the hon. Gentleman and his colleagues to have an open mind and not to be too prescriptive. Let us see what the best method and the most acceptable solution are. I believe that the framework that we have set out has great merit. An important aspect of that is that it does not undermine the chain of command, which is paramount in all that we seek to do.