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Armed Forces Personnel

I entirely agree. Last week, with a number of hon. Members, I rattled a tin for the Royal British Legion in Westminster tube station. That is always an enjoyable occasion and it is particularly pleasurable to importune colleagues as they come through the barriers, and to fix one's gimlet eyes on precisely what goes into the tin—indeed, it restores one's faith in politicians. Perhaps I should not name names, but without exception, they were all extremely generous. Such occasions are well appreciated in the House and I recommend that all hon. Members participate in future. Like many right hon. and hon. Members, I shall pay my tribute this weekend—in my case at the war memorials in Trowbridge and Warminster. In each of the 10 years that I have been the local MP, I have noticed an increase in the number of people who wish to pay their respects. I was asked this morning on my local radio, which my hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury (John Glen) knows well, why we should wear a poppy. One point made earlier was that there is an imperative pressure to wear one. The truth is that it is an individual choice—nobody should feel obliged to wear any badge or mark of commemoration. However, purely anecdotally, it seems that more and more people are choosing to wear a poppy, and they are sometimes people whom we would not necessarily expect to do so. They do so not out of a sense of militarism, nationalism or patriotism, but out of a sense that we need to mark the sacrifice and contribution of people who have fought in conflicts. We might or might not agree with those conflicts, but nevertheless, those who fought in them have shown the best of us in their soldierly conduct. That is why people choose to wear a poppy and to be so generous to the poppy appeal and the Royal British Legion. I look forward to the armed forces covenant interim report later this year. I welcome very much the evolution of the external reference group into the covenant reference group, and particularly Ministers' insistence that it should be independent. The evolution of the Armed Forces Act 2011 was interesting—as has been said, the Royal British Legion certainly made a big contribution to it. I do not entirely share the perspective of the hon. Member for North Durham (Mr Jones), but nevertheless, the Royal British Legion's contribution was an important one. I look forward to seeing both the interim report and the covenant reference group's response—its independence is extremely important. I welcome Professor Hew Strachan's work and the report of his independent taskforce, which was published in December last year. I hope we have an opportunity to discuss progress on the points in the interim report that have been accepted by the Government when it is debated later this year.