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Armed Forces Personnel

I am grateful to you for your guidance, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Given the effect that the situation is having on British personnel, I felt it relevant to bring it into the debate, but I understand your instructions and will endeavour to stay on the right side of your guidance. Some 3,300 British troops—16 Air Assault Brigade—are based in Afghanistan, in Helmand province, and I want to analyse the thinking of those of us who were in the forces when the brigade was created. We are talking about a rapid reaction force that was put together. It packs a mighty punch, but it is designed to be lightly armoured. It now finds itself not only doing insurgency work, but guarding villages halls, protected only by sandbags. That is improper. That is not the way in which 16 Air Assault Brigade was designed to be used. We have heard a number of examples of British equipment that could be used. The Warrior tank was mentioned. The Canadians are using the Bison, which is a four-wheeled very tough armoured vehicle. It is much better than the Land Rover that we are currently using. The RG-31 is a South African vehicle designed to cater for being hit by or running over land mines. That is the sort of equipment that we need to be thinking about. I hope that, when the Secretary of State for Defence makes his announcement, he will consider the lessons that were learned in Bosnia. Once a general peace was created, we went out in Warrior tanks to do the guarding, which meant that if there were problems, we had something to protect us, rather than simply hiding behind sandbags, which, as we sadly saw at the weekend, is wholly adequate. We need to review the strength of the forces in Afghanistan. Some 3,300 troops simply with Land Rovers and 12 helicopters is not enough. I will be grateful to hear what the Secretary of State has to say on that matter. What is our mission in Afghanistan? Is it designed to deal with insurgency or to help with peacekeeping? Or is it more of a G5 task? Does it involve the building of schools and so forth? It has ended up being a mixture of all those things. There is nothing wrong with that in one sense, but our forces have to match each of those separate missions and at the moment that is not happening. That is why I believe that a review of what we have out there is so important. I will not go into what is required in relation to the provincial reconstruction teams. I simply question who is actually in control of those teams. Do they eventually answer to the Secretary of State for Defence, the Foreign Office or the Department for International Development? There is an overlap and confusion of responsibility that will prevent us from making an impact. The umbrella of security that our troops—our personnel—are trying to create there is fundamental, but we will succeed in Afghanistan only if the reconstruction operation is able to lift Afghanistan off its knees. Our troops will eventually leave. I hope that they will also eventually defeat the Taliban, but when they do, they must make sure that there is not a vacuum left behind. If they do not do that, the Afghani tribes will continue what they are doing, we will leave, and then the Taliban will come back in a few years’ time. That is not what we want. There must be an infrastructure and a local economy. Afghanistan is a country that—[Interruption.] I can see Mr. Deputy Speaker moving, so I will move on to my conclusion. I pay tribute to my local regiment, the Devon and Dorsets, which is now based in Basra, under the leadership of Colonel Chris Burtie. I am grateful to the Minister, who managed to organise a visit for me to see the regiment in Basra. Sadly—it is a sign of the times—I cannot really call the regiment the Devon and Dorsets any more. It is shortly to be merged with the Light Infantry and, before the dust has settled on that piece of paper, it is being merged with my own regiment, the Royal Green Jackets, to be called the Rifles. That is a huge transition. That has been a veneer for another slice in the size of our armed forces. It is something that we could well do without. It is odd that we are seeing cuts in the infantry, because arguably the infantry in the Army is one of the main reasons why we have the international reputation that hon. Members have mentioned a number of times this afternoon. As I said, our military does not have a union. It does not have a voice with which to shout out and say, ““I don’t like what I’m doing.”” People end up voting with their feet if conditions get bad, which is why it is important that this Chamber scrutinises what is going on. That is reflected in the fact that, out of 43 battalions in the British Army, only one is fully manned. The other 42 are short of strength. The Territorial Army’s target figure from the Government is 41,000. Currently the figures stands at 35,000. We must examine the reasons why there is such a shortfall and try to correct it. I hope that the Secretary of State has received the clear message from the debate that our armed forces are overstretched and undermanned. The success of our overseas missions will suffer unless those problems are addressed.