Examination of Witnesses (Questions 1320
- 1339)
WEDNESDAY 15 DECEMBER 2004
RT HON
ADAM INGRAM
MP, COLONEL DAVID
ECCLES AND
MR MARTIN
FULLER
Q1320 Mr Viggers: I
believe the Armed Forces do a very fine job in turning raw material
into tough, resourceful, resilient Army, Navy and Air Force personnel
in a comparatively short period, and I am absolutely convinced
the duty of care has been given much more emphasis now than some
years ago, there is no doubt about that at all. But in emphasising
duty of care, are you actually undermining your ability to turn
out these resourceful and resilient personnel? Is there a conflict
between the two?
Colonel Eccles: I do not believe
the two are mutually exclusive at all. I was speaking earlier
about the way in which it is important to understand the people
for whom you are responsible, for whom you are the leader, and
that establishment of trust at an early stage continues throughout
the career and the trust and loyalty between the leader and the
led is critical to our business. So that needs to be established
at the same time as one is conducting tough, challenging training,
preparing soldiers to go into combat very soon after they have
left us. So we are very aware of these two factors. At first sight
they may appear to be in contradiction but actually they are not
at all.
Mr Ingram: The duty of care does
not end at the end of the training, it is a continuum. There has
to be a duty of care with all the people we have and at all the
stages of development.
Q1321 Mr Viggers: Quite
a number of the NCOs and those who have responsibility were brought
up in a different climate, how do you ensure the duty of care
priorities are communicated throughout the Chain of Command and
to those who were brought up in a different climate?
Colonel Eccles: We are doing an
awful lot of work on this at the moment. We have a programme running
at the moment called "Developing a Modern Training Culture"
and it consists of a presentation which has been passed out, it
has been given to everybody, and there was an article in the Soldier
magazine in November which you may have seen about this, and we
are advertising it as widely as we can. We are explaining to people,
as this Committee has heard already, that things have changed,
society has changed, and we need to move on not just for those
sorts of presentational reasons but for very good, practical,
operational reasons as well. This is a process which has been
evolving over a number of years but we have brought it together
formally in a formal programme of education for our instructors
in ATRA, and of course the wider Army as well.
Q1322 Mike Gapes: We
have had it suggested to us by parents from Deepcut and also in
evidence from SSAFA Forces Help that the position within the Army
is different from the other two Services, and that the problems
of bullying and unexplained deaths and other issues are less so
in the other two Services. Do you agree that is the case?
Colonel Eccles: In the terms of
the number of deaths, I would say the numbers are so small in
all three Services that empirically it is very difficult to make
those sorts of comparisons, but of course because we are much
larger there are more deaths in our organisation than the other
two. As regards the amount of bullying, that is an impossible
thing to quantify. Clearly this is a major challenge for us and
we are very alert to it, and we are very aware, not least from
the work of this Committee and other work which has been going
on, just how important it is.
Q1323 Mike Gapes: So
you would not accept there are differences between the Services?
Colonel Eccles: In what way?
Q1324 Mike Gapes: In
regard to things like bullying or general feelings of pressure
on people; peer pressure or from elsewhere?
Colonel Eccles: I think that is
an impossible one for me to answer from the Army's perspective.
Q1325 Mike Gapes: It
has been suggested, and I ask the question because it has been
suggested, to see what your response to that is.
Mr Ingram: What is the basis of
the allegation? Is it based upon evidence or is it just a feeling?
Q1326 Mike Gapes: What
I have had is information which some people say is anecdotal,
which of course is based upon feeling, and others say is based
upon looking at the total number of incidents, that there is somehow
a statistical basis to it. I have not seen the actual figures
which would show one way or the other, but I am asking you whether
you accept that is the case.
Mr Ingram: I think we are wrong
to accept something unless there is evidence, because you could
say anecdotally that may be the case or anecdotally that might
not be the case. I do not think it takes us any further forward.
Q1327 Mike Gapes: Fine.
I was interested in getting your reaction. When we look at statistical
data, which we may get from different sources, we may be able
to come up with something at the end as a Committee. Do you in
the Army, or in the Services generally, try and collect data of
that kind and make comparisons of incidents which are recorded
of bullying or self-harm?
Colonel Eccles: What we are doing
in the Army at the moment—and I think it is fair to say
that our data capture hitherto has been less than perfect and
that is acknowledged—and what we have done recently is two
things. On the bullying side, first of all, we have instigated
a recruit training survey and that is generally across all three
Services, run by MORI. They have been running it for six months
now and the half year report is due in December this year.
Q1328 Mike Gapes: It
has just started?
Colonel Eccles: It started in
June and the half year report is due at the end of December.
Q1329 Mike Gapes: So
this is an innovation in 2004?
Colonel Eccles: Correct.
Q1330 Mike Gapes: There
was no comparable or similar exercise carried out in the past?
Colonel Eccles: There have been
snapshots but this is comprehensive across all recruits across
the piece, so we can make these sorts of judgments, and build
up a statistical data base to make precisely the kind of comparisons
you are alluding to.
Q1331 Mike Gapes: In
the period 1992 onwards until now, and you talk about snapshots,
is there any data which might be used for comparative purposes?
Colonel Eccles: Not really. There
are bits and pieces of data one has heard of, surveys conducted
at particular locations or something like that, but there is nothing
comprehensive, and that is why we have recognised the need and
instigated this training survey, properly conducted by MORI.
Mr Fuller: Colonel Eccles speaks
for the Army of course but all three Services collect similar
statistics on bullying and harassment and we do look at all of
them.
Q1332 Mike Gapes: Were
all three starting in the last few months or do the RAF and Navy
have data going back earlier?
Colonel Eccles: I do not know
about the Navy and the Air Force going back but I do know we are
all on this programme now.
Mr Fuller: We certainly have figures
going back several years for all three Services.
Q1333 Mike Gapes: Sorry,
I am unclear. I have just been told this is a new approach in
2004 but you have just said "figures going back several years".
I would be grateful for an explanation as to what your figures
going back several years are and how they relate to what we have
just been told by Colonel Eccles?
Mr Fuller: Colonel Eccles is speaking
about a particular Army initiative. We have also been collecting
figures relating to allegations of bullying and harassment going
back several years for all three Services, but that is separate
from Colonel Eccles' initiative.
Mr Ingram: If we have data, you
should have it.
Q1334 Chairman: I
hope we will be given the information.
Mr Ingram: It is a useful question
and if there is anything there which is helpful to you, we will
give it to you. Colonel Eccles is saying that some things have
to be treated with a measure of caution because the analysis may
not be very good.
Q1335 Mike Gapes: Of
course, I understand that completely, and statistics can mislead
as much as give answers if they are not accurate and comprehensive,
and all Government Ministers know that. Nevertheless, if we have
some statistics it is better than having none.
Mr Ingram: I do not necessarily
agree with that! It is the usefulness of that information, you
have to analyse the quality of that information, and if it does
not add up to a row of beans you will not use it.
Q1336 Mike Gapes: We
have the Government health warning attached.
Mr Ingram: I think you have to
use your own abilities to say this does not stack up.
Q1337 Chairman: MORI
are an incredibly reputable polling agency and they will be aware
of any scam by any organisation, so what I would really like,
Minister, please, is the earlier, not-so-sophisticated-perhaps
polling which was done, and then perhaps the background to the
current arrangements, what the process is and how you are going
about it, and then put us on your mailing list.
Mr Ingram: I just ask that if
it is heavily caveated or caveated at all, you will wait in the
same way we would seek to wait.
Chairman: Sure.
Q1338 Mr Cran: As
you are aware and the Chairman has made clear, we have visited
a wide range of training establishments. You have given us carte
blanche to go anywhere and we have spoken and seen everybody,
so no impediments have been put in front of us, but what has struck
us about the duty of care regime is not only are there differences
between the various wings of the Services—perhaps that is
understandable and explainable—but what does require explanation
is why the duty of care regime is so various, so different, as
between units in the same Service. There is a lack of uniformity,
if you like, and that is a worry or could be a worry.
Mr Ingram: It could be a worry
but diversity of itself could be encouraging because then people
are looking at better and different ways of doing things all the
time. If you take the lowest common denominator it may not be
the best standard. I do not think there is necessarily anything
wrong with people bringing a particular view on some of these
things and saying, "Let's have a look at this and see if
there is another way of doing this." What happens I guess
is that these things have grown up organically but now all that
is being examined to see what are the best practices, what is
the best way forward, what would be the common core running through,
the instructor training process, because if they have to apply
standards we have to match those. I would also say that we await
with keen interest the work of the Adult Learning Inspectorate
and I am sure they will alight on this and bring their expert
knowledge and their educational knowledge into that domain and
analyse it, and so we will get that benefit. That is not that
far away and is the same sort of timescale as your own publication.
I would then probably instinctively say, rather than start doing
a lot of things now, let us wait for that report because that
will point us in the right direction, but if things need to be
done they should be done and we should not stop developmental
work necessarily, but we may find ourselves going off on a different
course because of the recommendations which are coming down the
line in a few months' time. That is the sort of territory we are
in. We know it is out there, we know it is being done, there will
be variations, I have no doubt about that, I am aware it is increasingly
getting better, instinctively I feel that because of the spotlight
on it and I think it will be better in the future because it will
be a matter of greater provenance.
Q1339 Mr Cran: Just
so I understand your answer, I am not going to try and put into
your mouth the fact you are concerned about the wide variation
of the structure of duty of care, but what one could perhaps say
and what you have said is that it is a striking issue and therefore
it is something which is going to be highlighted and is going
to come through in the various studies and so on you are doing
at the minute?
Mr Ingram: We are doing the studies
which are being done on this, but also there will be work getting
done to make sure we have a common core activity within those
training establishments which train the instructors. You are right
not to put the words you said into my mouth because that is not
what I said. I am saying, all the time we have to examine what
we are doing, are we doing it properly, can we do it better, and
incrementally that will always be the case. We will never stop
and say, "That is now the perfect solution" because
it seems to me you always have to be looking for better ways of
doing things. If you examine the DOC report, of course, they did
highlight the various methods so we are already on to that as
a result of those internal inquiries we asked for, but what I
am saying is that the ALI as well will come into that because
of their particular knowledge and experience, and the provenance
of it has to be there, it must be a component part.
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