Letter from the Rt Hon the Lord Crickhowell
to the Chairman
I am sure that you will have read the Official
Report of the House of Lords debate on Defence on 17 January,
with its notable contributions from five former CGS's. You will
also have seen my remarks and those of Bill Tenby. I am surprised
that I have received no response from the CGS or from the Secretary
of State, about the misleading evidence that was given to your
Committee on 12 January. The Uncorrected Transcript quotes the
CGS as saying (p 23) "We had no such requests from any other
division of infantry". When Dai Havard said (p 27) "I
am surprised that you say that there those requests have not been
made: it is my understanding that the requests have been made",
the opportunity was not taken to correct the misleading impression
that had been made. John Morris (who has written to the PM), Bill
Tenby and I feel strongly that the matter cannot be left there.
Despite what Mike Jackson said in his evidence,
I consider that the Army Board has not been conscious enough of
the importance "of heritage, history and tradition",
and its treatment of the Welsh regiments fails "to carry
forward the golden thread"; and the consequence will be damage
to both morale and recruitment. In his letter to Brian Plummer
dated 10 January the CGS quoted from Col.Comdt/DO dated 8 October
to Dinf "The majority of Colonels of Regiments agreed
this grouping which conforms to ECAB's direction" and
used the reference to justify the decision of ECAB, but failed
to refer to Col Comdt/DO dated 8 November to the Dinf which states
"whilst we would have preferred to have our existing titles
before the Regimental title, we have accepted that for consistency
and to preserve historical custom our titles shall be",
etc. In other words he was obeying orders before the decision
had been taken to ignore consistency and historical custom in
the case of the Scottish regiments.
Major General Elliott in his letter of 6 December
to the Director before the order about consistency had been given
stated that the Welsh regiments preferred to have the existing
titles placed first. Brian Plummer in his letter to Mike Jackson
of 29 November (acknowledged on 6 December) said "Both
regiments are keen to maintain their identities and traditions
within this new structure and we requested that we should be allowed
to retain our current names followed by the name of the new regiment
in brackets. . . . . .I trust that you have been notified that
this order of titles was reversed in subsequent staffing in order
to achieve neatness and consistency within the Division. But our
original proposal remains our strong preference".
That the wrong decision should have been taken
is bad enough; but it is surely equally deplorable that your Committee
should have been left with a false impression about the history
of the whole affair.
January 2005
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