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Armed Forces Personnel

I listened carefully to what my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence had to say about the personnel Command Paper, and it put in my mind the importance of advocacy. My hon. Friend the Member for North Durham (Mr. Jones) referred to his attempt to gain some recognition for the British Armed Forces Federation, an interesting subject that provided food for thought. There is often debate around whether a union is or is not applicable, and most hon. Members on both sides of the House agree that a union in its conventional format would not apply to the armed services. Interestingly, however, the legal position with the armed services as I understand it would be that, although service personnel could join a trade union, they simply could not be represented in the conventional way, and there is no move by the trade unions to take on that role. Nevertheless, that raises the important issue of who advocates and how that advocacy is done. The personnel Command Paper and other such matters give us the opportunity in the House to comment and organisations outside to make their presence known. I have read much that the British Armed Forces Federation has sent out and I have looked at its website. It seems to have many sensible things to say, and perhaps that is the way in which it can contribute. There has been some advocacy recently, apparently on the part of service personnel, but I do not particularly agree with the style of what has been said. It has been done from the other House by former Chiefs of the Defence Staff. I have looked through the last 50 interventions and speeches made by Lords Inge, Guthrie and Boyce, but I have not seen a single reference to their own commercial interests—directorships in various companies. They are companies of particular note, for which I have considerable respect. I do not see the need to mention them again here, although I have mentioned the matter to the companies concerned. If those senior and experienced former officers want to make their interventions, the least that they can do is have the same standards that are required by this House. Sadly, we are not at liberty to make a complaint to the other place. We can write to the Lords Speaker, but we cannot instigate any kind of inquiry; it must be done there, so they are beyond reproach in that sense. However, it behoves us to put qualifying parameters around what these former senior officers say. They may technically be serving officers; I think that Lord Inge may still be a serving officer on half pay as a retired five-star officer. It is important when we hear advocacy deployed by people in this House or next door in the other place to understand what other interests they may have—particularly if they have considerable pecuniary interests, as Lord Inge and Lord Boyce especially have in the defence industry, but choose not to declare them. We have heard from the hon. Member for Billericay (Mr. Baron) how those Members of the other House choose not to court publicity, but I cannot imagine anything further from the truth. More recently, they have been making intervention after intervention in public debate, courting publicity where they can. That does not serve debate or advocacy on the part of armed services personnel particularly well. Others wish to speak, so I simply conclude by saying that there is plenty of room for advocacy. The Government have made it clear that the personnel Command Paper that is coming up is a perfect opportunity. I shall certainly be making a contribution and I urge hon. Members to help others outside this place who want to make contributions, while being wary of possible unstated vested interests.