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10.20 am

Mr. Winston Churchill (Davyhulme): I join in the congratulations already offered to my hon. Friend the Member for Arundel (Sir M. Marshall) on bringing this

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matter before the House and giving us the opportunity to debate it. I am particularly delighted that the Minister for the Armed Forces is here to respond, because I know of his instinctive sympathy for those who serve their country in circumstances of difficulty and danger--and who do so, as these prisoners of war did, with the highest distinction.

I fear, however, that before the debate my hon. Friend the Minister may have been to the Treasury tailors to be fitted up with a Treasury straitjacket. Still, like the hon. Member for Geneva--or, rather, the hon. Member for Rotherham (Mr. MacShane)--I hope that he may yet break free from such Treasury bondage.

I start from the premise that it is never too late to rectify an injustice--and this is clearly a case of a demonstrable injustice. One of the proudest roles and traditions of this honourable House is the redress of grievances. Despite the passage of time, it is therefore entirely right that we should deal with this matter today. I hope that the Minister, on behalf of the Government, will respond positively to the compelling case made by several hon. Members today.

We are talking about tens of thousands of men who were taken prisoner and often held in intolerable conditions for periods between a matter of months and four years. They have, in effect, been cheated by the Government whom they served with such distinction and loyalty. I agree with those who have talked of a debt of honour; it is high time the House of Commons took steps to acquit it.

10.23 am

Dr. John Reid (Motherwell, North): I need not detain the House long on this issue. Adjournment debates are generally occasions for Back Benchers, but I should like to make one or two remarks.

Some people say that the House is at its best when it is packed and exhibits the theatricality of the circus, but I often find that it is at its best during Adjournment debates when it is not packed. We certainly learn more and discuss more. I have learnt a great deal today and in recent weeks from the cases that have been raised by Members on both sides of the House. I therefore congratulate the hon. Member for Arundel (Sir M. Marshall) on his dogged pursuit of the issue and on his success in obtaining this morning's debate.

A matter of principle is at stake. There is a compact between the British Government and forces of the Crown which underlies every operation, every strategic decision and the whole relationship between the armed forces and civilian society. When we ask men and women who serve in the forces of the Crown to undertake certain risks, an obligation is placed on Governments of any political persuasion to provide them not just with the resources to complete their tasks and to minimise their risks but to take care of them should they suffer as a result of their activities.

In this case, the obligation--60 years after some of these events took place--appears never to have been discharged. I fully understand the Government's difficulty in handling the matter--the Minister will face the usual difficulties of legality and bureaucracy. Moreover, there is the additional problem that, over decades, the evidence on which to base any judgment has become fragmented. What is more, many of the pieces of evidence will have been affected by the fog of war. The hon. Member for

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Newbury (Mr. Rendel) cited a constituent who joined the partisans and who was therefore not in contact with the British Government during the relevant period--a perfect illustration of what I mean. This Minister has the reputation of occasionally swathing through the conventions of bureaucracy and firing from the substantial hip; I hope that he will apply himself on this occasion to following up the issue with gusto.

As for the charities suggestion, I make no comment except to say that this is certainly not a question of "charity", however the decision is ultimately reached. It is a question of justice and of honour. Every Member who has spoken has mentioned a debt of honour. That becomes all the more true when we realise that we live in an age of compensation and litigation. These people made tremendous sacrifices for their country and suffered all sorts of stress, often to the detriment of their health and quality of life. In an age when compensation seems to be claimed by everyone for everything, we are especially indebted to these people. It is not as if they voluntarily undertook these hardships: they were under orders to do what they did. It would therefore be a tragic irony if it were subsequently discovered that they were penalised for discharging their obligations under orders.

This is not a party political issue, as several hon. Members have pointed out. We may have our differences over how to approach veterans' affairs. As my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham said, we believe there is a case for a veterans unit under a Minister; but there is no reason why this should not be a House of Commons matter. After all, the whole country owes the debt to the people involved. I therefore urge and, knowing him, expect the Minister to give the matter the speediest and most sympathetic consideration, so that, even after half a century, not one more day is lost than need be in resolving what appears to be both a tragic omission over the past six decades and a major debt of honour in the present circumstances.

10.29 am

The Minister of State for the Armed Forces (Mr. Nicholas Soames): I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Arundel (Sir M. Marshall) on expertly and clearly articulating this difficult case. I thank him for raising again an issue that is of great concern, which has been well expressed by hon. Members on both sides of the House. I also thank my hon. Friend for his usual courtesy and consideration in keeping us thoroughly informed of the way in which the campaign was developing and for allowing us to come to the debate properly prepared to try to satisfy--although I fear that I shall not be able to do so--some of the points that have been made.

It is good that that concern is felt broadly throughout the House. The hon. Member for Rotherham (Mr. MacShane), whose concern for veterans is well known and who is playing an important role in the issue of Japan and reparations--on which I do not propose to touch this morning--made some important points.

The hon. Member for Newbury (Mr. Rendel) spoke extremely well of his constituent, Freddie Harris. As a young officer in the Coldstream Guards, my father was involved in trying to convey arms to the partisans in Italy and in trying to enable as many British prisoners of war who had been released by the Italians as possible to be

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guided back to our lines before the Germans could get them, so I have an added interest in the matter. I am anxious and interested to know more of Captain Harris's case, which I understand was raised in an Adjournment debate, but I have not had the privilege of reading that. I should be grateful if the hon. Gentleman would make those papers available to me.

The hon. Member for Newbury said that Captain Harris had escaped and fought with the partisans, and the hon. Gentleman raised the interesting question of what quasi-legal situation that put Captain Harris in. I have no doubt that the Army, having a rule for everything, will find that it has a definition for that, but I am anxious to find out more.

My hon. Friend the Member for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls), who has been interested in this matter for some time, made a powerful speech. I am grateful for the contributions from my hon. Friends the Members for North Thanet (Mr. Gale) and for Clwyd, North-West (Mr. Richards), and for the contribution from my hon. Friend and kinsman the Member for Davyhulme (Mr. Churchill), who spoke, as always, with such distinction and feeling for the cause and interests of people who served their country a few years ago, in the last war or before that. It is good, therefore, that this concern covers the spectrum of opinion not only in the House, but widely outside it. Some well-informed people take a close interest in this and I hope that they will follow our debate carefully.

We are concerned with people who were officer prisoners of war or protected personnel in German and Italian hands during the second world war--individuals who, under the international convention for the amelioration of the condition of the wounded and sick in armies in the field, signed in Geneva in 1929, were not to be deemed prisoners of war if they fell into enemy hands. The status of "protected person" was granted not only to those engaged exclusively in the treatment of the wounded and sick and to chaplains, but to auxiliary nurses and stretcher bearers who were carrying out their duties when captured.

Thanks in part to the assiduous way in which my hon. Friend the Member for Arundel has pursued the issue, I am aware of the profound sense of grievance felt by some ex-officer prisoners of war and protected personnel about decisions taken during the war and in the immediate aftermath and about Defence Ministers' consideration of their concern in the early 1980s.

Those service men spent, in some cases, most of the war in captivity. Only last week, I met a young private soldier who was in the Gordon Highlanders and who was captured at Dunkirk. He went into a prisoner of war camp two days after he was captured and stayed locked up until 1945. What a terrible price to be paid by a young man in the prime and flower of his youth. There were many like him, although their experiences and hardships inevitably differed. Each has a different story to tell, depending on where they were held, whether they were repatriated during the war--as some of the sick and injured and some protected personnel were--whether they made successful escapes, whether they simply had to face endless hours of tedium, waiting for liberation by allied troops, or whether they faced the great uncertainty attached to capture.

For some of those men, the last months of the war were particularly turbulent. Moved on foot ahead of the advancing allied armies by the Germans, short of food,

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sometimes badly or brutally treated and even mistakenly attacked by our own aeroplanes, some of them were liberated by Soviet forces and moved far behind enemy lines into Russia before being sent home. Although most could do little directly to affect the war's outcome, they continued to serve with dignity, to behave with courage and to face hardship and uncertainty with courage and fortitude.

Those captured early in the war had been taken while facing great odds. The protected personnel played a vital role in caring for our sick and wounded prisoners of war, and all played their part on the road to eventual victory. Therefore, as all hon. Members have said, we are concerned with not only personnel's military service, but their conduct and behaviour while prisoners of war.

We are debating the money deducted from the pay accounts in Britain of officer prisoners of war and of protected personnel. I have specifically mentioned officer prisoners of war and protected personnel in German and Italian hands because those held by the Japanese were refunded with all the deductions made in respect of payments that they should have received from the Japanese. This is not at issue, although the reasons for those refunds have been questioned.

The pay deductions that concern us today were made on the basis of the terms of two conventions signed in Geneva in 1929: that covering the care of the wounded and sick, to which I referred earlier, and the international convention on the treatment of prisoners of war. Those set out the principles for the treatment of prisoners of war and captured non-combatants, which were developed into practical arrangements by various agreements made subsequently between the British Government and their German and Italian counterparts.

The deductions were made to offset payments that the officer prisoners of war and protected personnel were supposed to receive from the detaining power. Officers' payments were made because officers were not permitted to work in captivity and therefore to earn what could be used as "pocket money" to meet certain living expenses in the camps. Protected personnel received money from the detaining power because, under further agreements between the belligerent Governments, they had not been repatriated after capture, but stayed with our sick and wounded to care for them. For that work, they were to receive their pay from the detaining power at the equivalent rate for that power's own medical staff.

That was the theory. During the war, however, it became apparent from information from the camps that, although deductions were being made in Britain on the basis that the arrangements for payment by the detaining power were working, in some cases the reality was rather different. Arrangements with the detaining power were not always working as they should have been.

It was therefore decided to implement a policy of refunding some of the deductions when officer prisoners of war and protected personnel returned to Britain. The aim was to put the individual back in the position of having received, overall, his due pay, adding up what had been received or credited from the detaining power and what had been credited and paid in Britain.

A major element of the case put by those who have so cogently made representations to us--including, in lengthy submissions, Group Captain Ingle and Captain

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Bracken, RN (retd.), of Justice for Prisoners of War, and Mr. King of the National Ex-Prisoner of War Association--questions the fairness of the deductions having been made in the first place. That is the general tenor of the anxiety expressed by my hon. Friends.

The representatives also question the exchange rates used to calculate the actual amounts deducted and refunded in respect of camp payments. They consider that they did not receive the overall value of their pay, and question the implementation and efficacy of the scheme to refund deductions. These are clearly serious matters.

A further issue, which prompted much of the concern expressed in 1980, relates to the arrangements for repayment between countries. It was originally intended that certain payments made by the detaining power to individuals would be reimbursed to that power by their own country at the end of the war. After the refunds that I have described, an element of the deductions remained, but, in the circumstances that prevailed at the end of the war, the money was not transferred to Germany and Italy, but was retained by the Treasury. It is argued that it should have been repaid to the service men involved at the time, and should be repaid now.

There are further concerns about the handling of communal funds that were operated in some camps, and about money that was subsequently given to service charities in respect of those funds.

This is a tremendously complex cocktail of issues, and the situation is further complicated by the apparent lack of consensus among the different groups and individuals concerned. The Justice for Prisoners of War group has pointed out the difficulties involved in working out individual claims and making individual payments--difficulties that undoubtedly exist. It seeks the payment of a substantial sum to service charities for the benefit of former prisoners of war and their dependants. The National Ex-Prisoner of War Association representative, however, wants to see the settlement of individual claims from former protected personnel.

As I said, my Department did a huge amount of work in the early 1980s to address the points that were raised then. Moreover, recognising the criticism with which the original working group report was received, it continued to study further questions, and to discuss many additional points with representatives for the former prisoners of war. Indeed, as recent submissions to my Department acknowledge, a number of the criticisms of the original report have been accepted.

At the end of the deliberations of the early 1980s, however, the Government took the view that, although it would be possible to continue to refine points of detail, there was no case for reconsidering the original policies and decisions of previous Administrations of both parties and trying to reopen the matter. Those decisions were not reached lightly, or without profound concern for the strong views of those involved.

A number of the former officer prisoners of war and protected personnel have, however, continued to investigate the matter, and in 1995 they sought to reopen it. At the end of that year, Group Captain Ingle made a detailed submission for redress of grievance to the Air Force board. That submission was similar to one that had already been prepared by Captain Bracken, and the two were considered to see whether they raised any new

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issues, or included any details, that had not previously been considered and which, had they been considered, could have changed Ministers' previous views.

While that work was in hand early last year--during which time a further detailed submission was received from Group Captain Ingle--the National Ex-Prisoner of War Association also raised issues relating to protected personnel, and wished to make its own detailed submissions. Those submissions were eventually received last summer. On the basis of all those approaches, it was decided that the whole subject should be re-examined in detail, and a new review was announced, to be headed by my noble Friend the Under-Secretary of State for Defence.

That review is in progress. Its aim is to re-examine the principles that underlay decisions made by successive Governments and agreements between the belligerent powers, those decisions and agreements themselves and the implementation of the various policies concerned. We wish to set all those matters in their wider context, and to see whether the policy decisions were properly made, promulgated and implemented, as far as can now be discovered. I hope that the work will be satisfactory.

I appreciate that the two groups concerned have done a great deal of detailed research, and I congratulate them on the tenacious way in which they have gone about their presentation. They have presented what they feel to be an overwhelming and clear-cut case, and I understand the strength of their feelings and their concern about the time that our review is taking. I appreciate the strictures of my hon. Friend the Member for Arundel and the concern that he has expressed. I hope that, by the end of the debate, he will have been reassured.

It is a fact that many of the arguments of the two groups have been advanced and considered before. The decisions that they wish to be overturned were considered and made by previous Administrations of both parties over a number of years, in the context of the time and with contemporary knowledge. Many of them were questioned and discussed during and after the war, and reconsidered in the 1980s. Because of lasting dissatisfaction, we have agreed to review them again, but, in doing so, we must re-examine the whole matter with great care. That is why I say to my hon. Friend the Member for Davyhulme, and to the hon. Member for Motherwell, North (Dr. Reid), that although my natural instinct would be to try to resolve the matter now, I cannot do so in the light of the decisions made by previous Administrations of all parties, the immensely detailed work that has been done and the work that remains to be done. We must conduct the re-examination with the greatest possible care, and settle the matter once and for all.

Let me reassure my hon. Friend the Member for Arundel that I believe that proper resources have been made available for the work. On this occasion, we have been anxious to use specialist staff, experienced in historical research and with knowledge of the archives and the procedures of the second world war and the period immediately after it. Let me take this opportunity to congratulate those staff on the work that they have done:

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they are extremely busy, and are taking an enormous amount of detailed care to ensure that we get this right. I hope that my hon. Friend will accept my assurance that the work is proceeding at the best possible speed. We have no interest in not concluding the matter one way or the other as soon as we can.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Arundel said, two excellent officials are leading the work on behalf of my noble Friend the Under-Secretary of State, but others are contributing in specific areas. It has been found that, for very good reasons, work of this kind should not be fragmented. My hon. Friend will appreciate that down that path lies the possibility of evidence being missed or misinterpreted, and I know that he would want the work to be as thorough and complete as possible.

I understand that Captain Ingle's submission is a detailed and thorough piece of work, which should be dignified by a proper and detailed response. We are grateful for the offers of meetings with the Justice for Prisoners of War group and the National Ex-Prisoner of War Association, which have been acknowledged and which can only help us to reach a conclusion.

My noble Friend the Under-Secretary of State has said that he hopes our work will be complete by the end of March. It follows that, as the work is not yet finished and as he has not yet reached his conclusions, it would be improper for me to comment further on the many detailed and complex issues that have been raised, but I will draw all today's contributions to my noble Friend's attention, and I will personally follow these matters extremely closely.

Finally, let me add my voice to those of hon. Members who have paid lasting tribute to all who fought and were captured by the enemy in battle. There is nothing trite about such tributes in the House. The sacrifice and the hardships of those people cannot be overstated, and the awfulness of being locked up must have been truly dreadful not only for the young men involved but for their families. I know from the time that my grandfather spent in captivity during the Boer war of the lasting impression that is made on those who are unfortunate enough to be taken prisoner of war. My grandfather was lucky to be able to escape quickly, but he recorded that the experience of capture was

"the greatest indignity of my life".

I want all those who are concerned with the outcome of our review to know that those feelings are truly understood.

I acknowledge the sense of what has been said by all who have spoken today, and the admirable way in which hon. Members on both sides of the House have expressed the feeling that this is a debt of honour that must be resolved, that the work must be finished and that there must be a satisfactory outcome. I cannot forecast the outcome of the work because it is not yet completed, but I assure my hon. Friend the Member for Arundel that our review is being conducted in the greatest possible detail and with an open mind, and that our findings will be made available to the House at the earliest opportunity.

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