---

Defence Policy

I am grateful to the Minister. It is important that independent civilians on such a panel have experience of military matters because, as the hon. Member for Bournemouth, East (Mr. Ellwood) said, the military context is different. Our professional, committed, agile fighting forces do not consist just of regular forces. To provide the flexibility required by modern warfare we increasingly rely on reservists—either former regular servicemen or volunteer reserves. In Umm Qasr, I met volunteer marine reservists who were helping to co-ordinate the Gulf protection strategy. They greatly welcomed the opportunity to play a responsible role in operations, as their everyday lives were vastly different. One reservist was a lifeguard, one a credit controller and another a quality inspector in a biscuit factory—a world away from the job they were doing in Iraq. A recent report by the National Audit Office shows that the desire to serve on operations is an increasingly important reason for joining the volunteer reserves. Surveys show people who take part in an operational deployment are more likely to want to be deployed again. The marine reservists whom I met would certainly welcome another deployment. They were looking forward to serving in Afghanistan, but when I asked how their families felt, it was a different story. In theory, all reservists are subject to a compulsory call-up but, in practice, the MOD asks individuals if they wish to serve, and that informs call-up procedures. The NAO report, however, notes that reservists do not all admit to their families or employers that they have volunteered for an operation, which can cause problems. We must be much more open about such problems and involve families at a much earlier stage in a volunteer reservist’s career, so that when the call-up comes they understand what is involved and what support is available. We should ensure that the support available to the families of regular forces is available to reserve forces. We must work with employers so that they recognise the valuable work that reservists do. That is not just an altruistic point of view—the training and experience that reservists acquire on an operation is invaluable to their employers when they return. Many members of 103 Battalion of the Territorial Army, which is based in my constituency, served in Operation Telic. The battalion is a Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers unit whose job is to repair vehicles and return them to action as quickly as possible. Like all TA units, it has experienced problems with recruitment, but it was allocated additional funding last year, which enabled it to adopt new methods to reach out into the community and sign up new recruits. However, on a recent visit to 103 Battalion, I learned of a particular problem to which I should like to draw the Minister’s attention—the matter of qualifications. Young men in 103 Battalion get excellent training in vehicle maintenance, but it is not recognised by an NVQ, so when they try to get a job using those skills, they are not considered to be qualified. Surely it is possible to make that training NVQ accredited to allow those young people to get the recognition that they deserve. Such practical steps can help to build links between the local community and the armed services and to encourage more people to volunteer for the Territorial Army. I want to see greater integration between regular forces and reserve forces, because we need both in today’s modern armed services. As I have said, I want all our servicemen and women to be treated with respect, and I want the armed services to be a career of choice, not a career of last resort. I believe that our armed forces are the best in the world and our biggest asset, and an integral part of our defence policy must always be to treat them as such.