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Armed Forces Bill

My Amendment No. 62 would add to the rules of engagement amendment, if they were to be put on a statutory basis. It is a question of what happens when servicemen find themselves operating under the rules of engagement of another nation. Members of the Committee may not be aware that this is happening as we speak. On 19 June, I received an Answer to a Written Question about the arrangements for Royal Air Force personnel embedded with US personnel on Predator drones perhaps thousands of miles away from the operations, but who can release weapons and are subject to somebody's rules of engagement. The Minister very helpfully told me: "““UK embedded personnel act within US rules of engagement, may use US collateral damage methodology and work to US delegated authorities””.—[Official Report, 19/06/06; col. WA 54.]" So on certain occasions, people who are subject to our service law are subject to another nation's rules of engagement. That perhaps gives us an extra dimension of problem on how we put rules of engagement on a statutory basis. Turning to the broader aspect of rules of engagement, I should be interested to hear the Minister's reaction. I am not sure whether it is a good idea. My first reaction was that when they are put on a statutory basis, there will perhaps be a tendency for them to be less flexible, which may make life more difficult. I am also slightly concerned that a subsection (7) of the new clause makes observance of the rules of engagement an absolute defence. Of course, you are still required to be proportionate in your response at any stage of warfare. It may be that you can operate under quite robust rules of engagement, but the particular circumstances do not mean that you need to go to their outer edges; you could do something less damaging. We still need to be able to look at the proportionality argument. If we were to put rules of engagement on a statutory basis, we must consider how we handle being under those of other nations. I have yet to be convinced that this is the place to put them, however, and will wait to hear what the Minister has to say. I beg to move.