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Armed Forces Bill

I think that new clause 7 would bring an immense improvement to current practices and I support it, but I object in principle to the recruitment of children into the military. For 13 years, I was the part-time house father of a children's home when they were run as family units and one could pursue one's own career while also operating as the father of a family group. In that time we dealt with a large number of young people from extremely disturbed backgrounds and prepared them for fostering into ordinary homes. A number of those who came to us were extremely vulnerable and I remember many of them going into military service at a very young age, almost because they were looking for the security of an institution because they had, frankly, been institutionalised as a result of their lives in care. At the time, I thought those young people were extremely vulnerable and were making the wrong decision. At the age of 16, people are too young to make that major decision to go into the armed forces and put themselves under a disciplinary regime that can result, as it has done, in a number of youngsters being put in corrective establishments. As I have said, some others have been sent to war zones. I would welcome a careful rethink from the Government about this issue and I hope that they will consider coming back with proposals to accept the measures in new clause 7 and to follow other European countries in phasing out the recruitment of children into the Army.