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Armed Forces Bill

moved Amendment No. 61: After Clause 49, insert the following new clause- ““RULES OF ENGAGEMENT (1) Where Her Majesty's forces are to be engaged in an operation the Secretary of State shall draw up a document to be known as the Rules of Engagement (““the Rules””). (2) The Secretary of State shall cause appropriate extracts from the Rules dealing with particular aspects of the Rules to be made and set out on cards (““Cards””). (3) When approved by the Defence Council the Rules and any Cards shall have the force of law under this Act. (4) The Rules and the Cards may be revised by the Defence Council at any time in the course of the operation. (5) A copy of the Rules shall be distributed to the commanding officer of every unit engaged in the operation and to the service prosecuting authorities. (6) Cards shall be distributed as appropriate by commanding officers to all members of Her Majesty's forces engaged in the operation and to any attached civilians. (7) It shall be an absolute defence to any charge alleging misconduct to show that the conduct concerned fell within the Rules. (8) The Secretary of State may direct that the Rules be classified to the degree that he considers necessary for the conduct of operations and shall be exempt from disclosure accordingly. (9) Cards shall not be classified and copies of them shall be placed in the libraries of each House of Parliament. The noble Lord said: What matters in this amendment is not the detail but the principle that lies behind it. In that sense it is probing amendment. But it is an amendment of great importance, which was heralded during the Second Reading speeches from these Benches. The principle is that the rules of engagement should become an absolute statutory defence for a soldier on operations. It must follow, therefore, that the rules of engagement define the criminal law within which the soldier operates. We believe that the rules of engagement should take statutory form. Soldiers have to know where they stand when they are on operations. They are told that if they comply with the rules of engagement they are within the law. Why are the Government prepared to say that informally but not admit it publicly in the Bill? That is the question that the Minister has to answer. He will have some difficulty in doing that if his answer is not co-ordinate with the view that we take. Article 7 of the Human Rights Act requires that the criminal law should be composed of rules that have predictable outcomes. It requires that a subject—whether a soldier or a civilian—before undertaking a certain activity should know whether that activity falls within or outside the criminal law. Precisely the same principle should apply to a soldier on operations. I entirely accept that the details of the amendment might reasonably be criticised. We have taken a view about the right approach. We would welcome other views on how it should be applied; but we are convinced that the Government have to face up to this and include in the Bill an appropriate statutory defence. I beg to move.