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Mr. Viggers: As the hon. Gentleman is an historian, can he remind me what happened in South Africa at the beginning of this century?
Mr. George: South Africa was a dishonourable draw: it was not a military defeat.
When our endeavours began, the Ministry of Defence got off to a bad start. It was forced on to the back foot within about three minutes of the beginning of our deliberations on the issue of consolidation of legislation. The previous Committee had strongly recommended that single-service legislation needed to be examined more closely and tidied up.
To our embarrassment, and even more to the embarrassment of the Ministry of Defence, the witnesses, who were not responsible for the policy failure, had to explain to the Committee why, despite starting with the MOD and trying to follow up the recommendations of the previous Select Committee, their movement and enthusiasm came to a dramatic halt. They had to appear before the previous Select Committee to explain why they had done nothing to follow and take up the recommendations of the Committee before it. I hope that, when the Committee is re-formed four and a half years from now, there will be substantial adherence to our recommendations.
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Motherwell, North (Dr. Reid) on a courageous speech shortly before the final Division. It is not easy, in such circumstances, to make such a speech from the Opposition Benches. It was not easy to support the new clause in the Lobby. We who gave our support may suffer the consequences for our position and our honesty. I voted willingly on the issue, as I did in the Select Committee.
I am sure that the Minister will not agree with me when I say that everything that has been done in this place has provided a stay of execution for present policy. Having read the advice of the Ministry's legal adviser on the likely consequences of the European Court of Human Rights when considering the MOD's policy, I believe that it is almost inevitable that the line that the majority of the House has taken, and the line taken by the MOD, will become increasingly difficult to sustain.
The report commissioned by the MOD contained a proposal, although it is not presented as such, that might be seen as a fall-back position if all else fails. It was not a version of the United States policy, but one in that general direction. I am sure that the Minister will not tell the House that the Government are even considering a fall-back position. He and his fellow Ministers will sustain the MOD's line vigorously in the European Court of Human Rights or in any legal or media forums in which anyone may be obliged to speak or appear.
If there is any furtiveness, I hope that serious consideration will be given, as it was in the United States, to commissioning a study similar to that pursued by the Rand Corporation in Santa Monica on what could be done within the military to prepare a way for an eventual change in policy. That may seem unpalatable now, but I feel that serious consideration must be given to such an approach.
On reflection, I am delighted, despite my initial reservations, to have participated in the Committee
proceedings. As our Chairman said, the staff of the Select Committee were excellent. We had good relationships and there were some amusing contretemps with the witnesses. We were all seeking a common objective--a legal framework within which men and women may serve within the armed forces. I do not patronise them when I say that they are probably the best service men and women in the world.
Those service men and women may be criticised. Lee Clegg was referred to by some of my hon. Friends, who implied that, somehow, he was a murderer. That is insulting nonsense. It was also implied that the men in Cyprus who besmirched the reputation of Britain's armed forces were in some way not an aberration. They were an aberration.
I was angered by that debate, because I have seen British soldiers in the most appalling conditions throughout the world--in the Falklands, in some barracks in Britain and certainly in Northern Ireland. They are men and women who offer their services to the country in a way that few hon. Members can comprehend. There are few people who understand what young and not so young men and women sacrifice in order to earn not a miserable but an unsatisfactory salary.
I am not making a political point. Those men and women are experiencing the traumas of a reorientation of our armed forces following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989. We should see as typical those people, not the men who did such damage to the reputation of the armed forces, the Ministry of Defence and the British in Cyprus and throughout the world. We can be justly proud of the men and women who are serving us.
I hope that I shall be in a position to serve on the Select Committee that considers the next Bill five years from now. I hope that even more members of the Defence Committee will serve on that Committee, which showed that it is possible to develop a common approach to serious issues.
I hope that the magnanimity that I showed in not pressing amendment No. 81 to a Division, when I would clearly have won, so allowing the Minister to avoid experiencing defeat within three hours of the beginning of the debate, will be reciprocated by the Minister's coming before the Defence Committee with an open mind and listening seriously to our arguments.
Mr. Michael Stephen (Shoreham):
This House of Commons has this evening made a momentous decision in refusing to overturn the British armed forces' long-standing policy that homosexuality is incompatible with military service. That is a delicate matter upon which many hon. Members have held and expressed genuine and passionate views on both sides.
We decided that question after careful deliberation. It was one of the best debates that I have ever heard in the House. All points of view were considered. We drew upon
our own experiences and we listened to the experiences of other hon. Members, often eloquently expressed. I was particularly impressed by the contribution to the debate of the hon. Member for Motherwell, North (Dr. Reid).
One of the most important points in the debate was that the question had to be decided according to United Kingdom conditions. We were referred to the experiences of other countries. It is clear that other countries, including other European countries, have their own cultures and their armed forces have their own traditions, and that what succeeds or fails in their countries and in their armed forces may not necessarily be a good guide to what we should do here.
But having made the decision on the basis of United Kingdom conditions, and after careful deliberation in this sovereign Parliament, I have one important concern, and that is that the whole exercise may have been completely academic. The European Court of Human Rights, we are told, is going to overrule the decision.
During the debate, reference was made not only to that court but to the European Court of Justice. The two institutions are very different, and there is in particular an important difference between them in respect of the question that we have just decided. Defence matters are specifically excluded from the competence of the European Union, and the European Court of Justice would therefore have no right to decide whether homosexuality should be allowed in Britain's armed forces.
I think that it would be outrageous if the European Court of Justice used equal opportunities legislation to seek to intervene in defence matters, which are specifically excluded from its competence. I find it extraordinary that the British Government conceded the point in relation to pregnant service women, and I hope that they will never again concede that the European Court of Justice has any jurisdiction in respect of defence.
We are bound by the jurisdiction of the European Court of Human Rights because we are signatories to the European convention on human rights. Defence matters are not exempted from that court's jurisdiction, as they are from the competence of the European Union. It is therefore open to the court, when the case comes before it--as it undoubtedly will--to overrule the decision that we have made, after careful deliberation, in this United Kingdom House of Commons. If it did so, that would be an extremely important constitutional matter.
Mr. Soames:
I warmly endorse the words of my hon. Friend the Member for Gosport (Mr. Viggers), and thank him for being such an admirable Chairman. I join him in
I also join my hon. Friend the Member for Gosport in warmly thanking the Ministry of Defence Bill team, the parliamentary branch of the MOD, my heroic parliamentary private secretary--my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool, South (Mr. Hawkins)--and all who contributed to the superb job that the Committee has done.
The Bill both preserves and improves the system of discipline in the armed forces, and I warmly commend it to the House. We have settled many important matters. I heard what my hon. Friend the Member for Shoreham (Mr. Stephen) said; no one could gainsay the important points he made. The hon. Member for Walsall, South also made important points.
Let me reassure the hon. Member for Leyton(Mr. Cohen) that we take the question of the Commission for Racial Equality very seriously. Some of what he said was very wide of the mark. It is not in our interests not to encourage all the recruits that we can get, wherever they come from; we need more, not fewer recruits from ethnic minorities in the armed forces, and they are very welcome. If the hon. Gentleman can offer me helpful suggestions as to how we can better achieve that, we shall pay considerable attention to them.
We thank all who took part in the Bill's passage, and to our armed forces, wherever they may be--in Bosnia, Saudi Arabia or Turkey--we send our warmest wishes, and our thanks for all that they do for this country.
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