---

Armed Forces Bill

I should like to reinforce the point made by the hon. Member for Aldershot (Mr. Howarth). There was broad consensus among those of us who served on the Armed Forces Bill that, although we obviously welcomed the bringing together of the disciplinary procedures of the three services, it was vital in the eyes of the accused that those sitting in judgment on him or her in a court martial should predominantly be members of his or her service. It would be preferable if they were drawn exclusively from that service, however, because that would ensure that it was the defendant’s peers from his or her own service who were sitting in judgment. Will the Minister give us an assurance that those sitting in judgment in a court martial will more often than not—if not always—come from the same service as the accused?