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Armed Forces Personnel

Many things have been said about me since I became Secretary of State for Defence—[Interruption.] Just a moment. However, nobody can say that I am not prepared to debate these issues. I am prepared to debate them and to try to get them right. My responsibility is not just about my job and me; it is to ensure that the job that we have taken on, and that we accept that we must do, in Afghanistan in order to make the world a much safer place, is done properly. It is also my responsibility to ensure that those whom we have put in at the sharp end are made as secure as possible. There should be no suggestion that there are other motivations behind our task, because they just do not exist.