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Armed Forces Personnel

Let me try to answer the intervention to which I was responding before I allow another intervention; I was trying to respond to the hon. Member for North-East Milton Keynes. He has made a series of allegations about the reasons for replacing Joint Force Harrier with the Tornado GR4. There are three squadrons of Harrier; if they stay in Afghanistan, they become very Afghanistan-centred, and suffer skill fade in some of the areas in which we need them to be capable. We are rolling them around, so that they effectively have two periods in, one period out. They have been there since 2003. We have seven squadrons of Tornado. We are therefore far better able to give the Tornado people the required harmony protection, ensure a sustainable deployment, and enable the Tornado squadrons to maintain the other skills that we need them to have. That will enable the Harrier force to rejuvenate fully after such a long deployment in Afghanistan. That makes eminent sense to me. The hon. Gentleman has been given information and has latched on to the fact that there was an internal deadline. He worried himself, and others, with the idea that we would deploy Tornado before it had the required capability, so that we could relieve that situation. We will not. We have to have internal deadlines to try to make things happen, to motivate Departments and to get things done in the most timely fashion. However, despite the harmony pressures on Joint Force Harrier, Ministers and the Chief of the Air Staff do not intend, and would not allow, the Tornado to go into theatre before it is up to spec and has full capability, in terms of protecting our troops on the ground. Having given the hon. Gentleman the assurance that Tornado will not go into theatre until then, I hope that we can finally put the matter to bed, and need not continue this debate any longer.