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Mr. Colvin: Will my hon. Friend give way?
Mr. Davies: I am afraid that I cannot. I hope that my hon. Friend will forgive me; there are time constraints.
My hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip-Northwood (Mr. Wilkinson) has had a distinguished military career as an airman, an RAF officer and, I believe, an RAF flying instructor. He deplored the lack of pre-legislative scrutiny of the Bill, as did several hon. Members of other parties. I hope that the Government will take that, at least, on board.
My hon. Friend explained that the habit of questioning a commanding officer's decisions, and the culture in which it is taken for granted that those decisions will be questioned, can easily lead to insubordination, and undermine discipline.
The hon. Member for Portsmouth, South (Mr. Hancock) tried to dismiss reservations about the 48-hour rule. He suggested that it might be difficult to bring in a military lawyer within 48 hours in serious operational circumstances but that indiscipline would be extremely rare in practice, and would probably never happen. That shows an extraordinary degree of unreality in the Liberals' approach.
As has been made clear today, this country has the finest traditions of military discipline, but under the appalling strain of military action people may break, and behave irrationally. In extreme circumstances, as we have seen recently, people may run amok, causing danger to themselves or their comrades, and it may be necessary to lock them up rapidly. In such circumstances, the commanding officer must take immediate action. He cannot release a person after 48 hours simply because he has not been able to set up a video link when, at the same time, bombs are falling and his men are exposed to danger. To suggest that would be to adopt a ridiculous approach to the management of our armed forces.
My hon. Friend the Member for Aldershot (Mr. Howarth) rightly stressed the problem of overstretch and asked, very reasonably, whether, if the French had been able to obtain a derogation from the relevant provisions of the convention, we could not do the same.
My hon. Friend the Member for New Forest, East (Dr. Lewis) rightly and movingly raised the matter of Corporal Henry. I had not heard about the case. His lucid advocacy persuaded me strongly that an act of considerable injustice had been perpetrated. The whole tragedy should make us all think carefully about the provisions that are being introduced in the framework for military discipline.
My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for North-East Bedfordshire (Sir N. Lyell) gave a characteristically brilliant and lucid legal exegesis of the problem that confronts us with the European convention on human rights. He made it clear that there is a major anomaly: article 15 provides for derogation for war or public emergency affecting the safety of the nation, but the armed conflict in which we find ourselves these days cannot legally be regarded as a war because no war has formally been declared. As the conflict takes place away from our shores, it does not qualify as affecting the safety of the nation. Clearly, that anomaly must be rectified. I hope that his argument, which was overwhelming, will be taken on board by the Government and that they will finally do something about that matter.
My hon. Friend the Member for Lichfield (Mr. Fabricant) displayed considerable erudition, which I cannot pretend to match, about video technology. I have a terrible confession to make, which may cause my summary dismissal from the spokesman role that I
occupy: I do not know the difference between a megabyte and a megabit. Perhaps I shall have to join some private seminar where he will give a teach-in on the subject.My hon. Friend the Member for Surrey Heath (Mr. Hawkins) said that the Bill, if it becomes an Act, will lead to the promotion of the barrack-room lawyer. That was a reasonable point. It was made credibly by my hon. Friend, who is a lawyer--not a barrack-room lawyer, but a professional lawyer.
Two points emerge clearly from our proceedings. One is that the Bill represents the increasing "legalisation" of our society--the extension of legalism to our armed services. There is no doubt that, throughout society, social ties that depended on tradition, loyalty, a sense of allegiance, personal understanding, or even those old-fashioned concepts of duty, and discipline in a common cause, are increasingly being replaced by a more atomised approach--contractual, legal, codified relationships. The Government want to introduce that culture to the armed forces where it is fundamentally inappropriate.
The second and blatant characteristic of the Government's approach to the Bill, which has been revealed in all its worrying horror, is that, when they look at military matters, they do not consider first what is in the interests of national defence. There has not been the slightest attempt to argue that the Bill is required in the interests of national defence. Even more amazing, there has not been the slightest attempt to argue that it is in the interests of justice for members of our armed services. No one on the Government Benches, including the Minister of State, has said that there was injustice at present because of the right of a commanding officer to arrest someone who had misbehaved, or to make a summary judgment.
We have an extraordinary situation. This country's armed services are in crisis. The Army is under strength, and training exercises are being abandoned. We hear from an admiral who writes in The Times that the Navy cannot carry out planned exercises because it cannot afford the fuel. The Army is running out of spares in Kosovo and perhaps elsewhere. Military procurement is in a mess. I understand--I have tabled a parliamentary question about the matter and am looking forward to an answer--that military suppliers are being asked not to invoice the Government until the new financial year because they are running out of money.
All that the Government can do against all that is to come forward with this particular form of bureaucratic, politically correct gibberish. That is the best response that we can get from them to the crisis that affects the armed services. That gibberish is the best that Ministers could come up with to deal with the deep concerns of the men and women in our armed services.
The shame of the Government's behaviour has been demonstrated graphically today by the fact that the great bulk of the parliamentary Labour party stayed away throughout this debate, and that only one of them could be borne upon to speak in favour of the Government's proposals.
6.45 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence (Dr. Lewis Moonie): I congratulate my hon. Friends on their good sense in not attending the debate, as they have not had to listen to the drivel to which I have been subjected for the past five and a half hours. However, I reciprocate the congratulations of the hon. Member for Grantham and Stamford (Mr. Davies), and congratulate him on his first appearance as part of the Opposition defence team. I congratulate him also on the style--of which I have had some previous experience--if, alas, not on the content of his speech.
The Ministry of Defence does not introduce much primary legislation, other than the five-yearly Armed Forces Bills, which are needed to continue the life of the single services discipline Acts. The discipline Acts provide the statutory authority, subject to annual continuance orders, for the system of discipline in the armed forces, and, by extension, for the existence of the armed forces themselves. The quinquennial Bills are used not only to achieve most of what the services require in primary legislation, but, primarily, to update the service discipline Acts--for example, to reflect changes in the civilian criminal justice system. The next review is due in the 2000-01 Session.
The Armed Forces Discipline Bill covers precisely the type of territory that might be included in a quinquennial Bill, and hon. Members are right to ask why we are considering such a Bill in the current Session. The answer, of course, springs wholly from the Human Rights Act 1998, which incorporates in United Kingdom law the majority of the articles of the European convention on human rights. The main provisions of the 1998 Act are due to be commenced in October 2000. A principle is that all legislation should, as far as possible, be interpreted in accordance with the convention--[Interruption.]
I apologise to the House for having to go into the issues in some detail, but--having listened to the speeches by Opposition Members--it is clear that they really do not understand very much of what the Armed Forces Discipline Bill is about. It might have helped if they had read it a little more carefully, although I have much sympathy for the hon. Member--I apologise; I do not remember who it was--who described the great difficulty that he had in going through the Bill. I myself had the same problem when I first received the Bill. As I said, the Ministry of Defence does not introduce much legislation, and, therefore, I had a rude shock.
Sir Nicholas Lyell: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Dr. Moonie: I shall not give way; alas there is not enough time to do so. I apologise to the right hon. and learned Gentleman.
The Department does not deal with much legislation, and I sympathise with those who have described the sheer complexity of reading three discipline Acts simultaneously. I assure them that they have in me a wholehearted supporter for reform and consolidation of the Acts as soon as is practicable.
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