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9 pm

Lord Lyell: My Lords, of the subjects for today’s proceedings on the gracious Speech of Her Majesty, the last item is defence. That is what I shall try to concentrate my remarks on, after some notable speeches. I have much sympathy with the Minister, who has stood rather like a brave No. 15 at Twickenham, fielding all sorts of things. He has a little to come from me, but he need not worry too much. I believe that we have another debate on 22 November, when we will be able to expand a little more on defence. As defence was referred to by Her Majesty in the gracious Speech, it is worth following up many of the excellent speeches on defence that have already been made by some now absent friends—they are no longer in the Chamber.

It was about 30 years ago that my noble and learned friend—and, for the first time, I can say kinsman—Lord Lyell of Markyate rose up at party conference and said:

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“The prime duty of the Government is the defence of the realm”.

Unlike me tonight, he did not have to go on. Bands and banners were struck up; that was his speech made. He was of course quite right.

One reason why I want to add my short comments in support of much of what has been said today is that we have been very much concentrating on the military activities in Afghanistan. The Minister will be able to cover that tonight and, no doubt, at great length later in the year. We have been hearing that the Afghan campaign may well take many years. The noble Earl said that it would be a very long campaign, not necessarily merely military.

There is another reason why I am detaining your Lordships for a short while this evening. There is an esteemed all-party group in your Lordships’ House chaired by the noble Baroness, Lady Dean of Thornton-le-Fylde. We call ourselves the All-Party House of Lords Defence Group. Thanks to a wonderful relationship with the former Minister, the noble Lord, Lord Drayson, we have been extremely lucky. We hope that we shall be able to continue under the new Administration to polish that great relationship. I have been reprimanded at least three times for ringing the Minister’s office saying, “We are the House of Lords Defence Group. We are the warlords”. I am told to conduct myself with decorum and, above all, with restraint, which is what I shall attempt to do tonight.

There is another reason, which stings home for me personally. In our group, we go from Marshals of the Royal Air Force and Field Marshals right down to, in my case, Second Lieutenant Lyell, Lord. I had 19 months of national service. In a week’s time, I shall not be with your Lordships, because I shall be with 16 other fellow recruits in the guards’ depot at Caterham. We started our national service—two years full-time or four years part-time, that depended—under the wonderful tuition of a sergeant who may well be known to my noble friend Lord Howell of Guildford. He was called Sergeant Kiwi Clements of the Coldstream Guards. He was a perfect example of the British Army. In eight weeks, he brought 16 of us to be competent young soldiers. He taught us many things. He kept it simple. Above all, the motto that he instilled in us was the same as we have seen on television adverts:

“Be the best. Join the Army”.

Another motto, which comes from the blue sector of Liverpool—the noble Lord, Lord Alton, was here a moment ago—is:

“Only the best will do”.

That also goes for the British Army. As we see and hear day after day and night after night, the British Army lives up to those two mottos in action in appallingly difficult conditions in Afghanistan.

I had the very good luck—I do not know what he thinks—to serve with my noble friend Lord King in Northern Ireland. Even in the four years in the pressure cooker of Northern Ireland, I never heard him make such a passionate and excellent speech as he made earlier today. He made my speech for me. Indeed,

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many of my comments have already been made by the noble Lord, Lord Addington, who referred to the welfare, and above all the care and devotion, that we owe to our Armed Forces in Afghanistan and all around the world.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Drayson, and his department, and I hope that my thanks will be passed on. The House of Lords Defence Group has made two visits—we may get an opportunity to refer to this when the Minister returns later this evening or at a later stage. Usually if we are lucky enough to make visits and learn things, and if there are small points of criticism to be made and things need doing, we try our hardest to be discreet and not to echo this in your Lordships’ House, even though it is an august and excellent Chamber. On the other hand—and I have been lucky enough to serve with this group for nearly 30 years—when we find points of excellence, we may take the licence to refer to them.

Last July, the group made two visits, one of which was to the Royal Naval Air Station down at Culdrose. We found a mixture of things. Captain Thicknesse runs squadrons of Sea Kings, Merlins and Seahawks there. The way in which Captain Thicknesse and the Royal Navy look after the families is first class. We understood that the average length of service of servicemen and their families at Culdrose, which is a good way from your Lordships’ House, let alone from my home in Scotland, is eight years. Two or three of the servicemen whom we met had been with their families there for close on 20 years. RNAS Culdrose is a prime example. One week later, the group was fortunate enough to go to Royal Air Force Coningsby, where we saw the first two operational squadrons of the new Typhoon. Group Captain Atha and everyone else on that station were a superb example of the commitment, drive and real excellence in service that can be achieved. I hope that the Minister will tolerate me bringing up those two cases of excellence on a night such as this.

I see that the time is up for me, so I conclude, as always, by sending our very best wishes to servicemen all around the world, and to those who are serving in and preparing to go to Afghanistan. From my own perspective, I send our very best wishes to the timorous, rather shy untrained recruits—and to their instructors—who are working tonight and who in a matter of months will be serving in Afghanistan with the British Army. Their motto is “Be the best”, and they are. We salute each and every one of them tonight.

9.09 pm

Baroness Williams of Crosby: My Lords, I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor of Bolton, on becoming the new Defence Minister for appropriations. We all recognise that this is an extremely tough job to take on. Not only is the job surrounded by tremendous pressures but there has always been concern here about whether unreasonable, and indeed unfair, pressure is being used. The noble Baroness, Lady Taylor of Bolton, will rightly call on her experience as a former distinguished Leader of the House of Commons. She will need every element of that reputation to maintain a position that now needs to be kept.

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I share the view of the noble Lord, Lord Lyell, about the formidable set of questions and requests that now lie before the noble Lord, Lord Malloch-Brown; it is one that I do not in any sense envy. He will have covered the whole world and discovered that the House of Lords is full of experts and people knowingly committed to all kinds of causes. I can only say that he now has my sympathy in trying to deal with such a huge range of requests and impossibly high expectations. I am sure that, in so far as any human being can meet them, he will. On that, I wish him the very best.

I will start with just a word on Pakistan, to which the noble Lord, Lord Ahmed, referred, although I am sorry that he is not in his place. We should say right away that one of the most impressive things about Pakistan is that the huge opposition to the intent to impose martial law has come from a range of people who are essential to Pakistan’s transition to democracy. It has come from judges who have put themselves at risk in upholding the concept of the rule of law and from lawyers who have shown clearly that their concern for the public good is greater than that for their own advancement. It has come from the very heartland of the people who, one day, will build democracy in Pakistan. We need to record our recognition of their courage and determination. It is in Pakistan’s interest that, as soon as possible, their detention should cease and they should be returned to the public company of their colleagues in order to be able to advance Pakistan’s future.

One of the features of Pakistan in the past few years has been a sharp move towards growing criticism of the West and, in particular, the United States. An opinion poll conducted by Pew showed this year that only 15 per cent of Pakistanis indicated that they had faith in the United States. One of the reasons for that was touched on by the noble Lord, Lord Howell of Guildford, when he talked about the world that we are living in and referred to the extraordinary power of global communications. We must recognise that satellite television is to be found throughout the Middle East and South Asia, perhaps unexpectedly, because satellite is not always owned by the people who have television sets. Nevertheless, it extends everywhere and it has concentrated in a very dramatic fashion on the shortcomings of the West. It has concentrated on Iraq, on scenes of prisoners being abused and on occupational commitments to such things as collective punishment. It has spread throughout the Middle East and South Asia a representation of what we are doing that may not be entirely fair, but which has been terribly powerful in its ability to recruit people to the terrorist cause and to the rejection of western values and western objectives. In Pakistan, that has had the effect of rapidly moving public opinion in a direction that is not sympathetic to us. However, the noble Lord, Lord Malloch-Brown, will appreciate that nothing is so important in Pakistan at the moment as civilian support for what the Government are attempting to do.

For a long time in Pakistan, there has been a close relationship between the military and civilian support for that military—a belief and trust in the military,

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which, incidentally, as all of us know, contains the people with a key determination over how nuclear weapons might one day be used. It is therefore vital that that relationship should be reconstructed, with support by civilians of a military that they believe to be responsible. One of the lessons that we must draw from the Pakistan crisis is that we have put too many of our eggs in the basket of just one leader, General Musharraf; we have not sufficiently recognised the need to keep very close to the public in Pakistan and to support them in every way.

I wish to raise two other issues. The first follows the remarks of the noble Baroness, Lady Ramsay of Cartvale, about the Middle East. I hope that her rather optimistic view is right, but I have to say that we are now looking in Gaza at an impending crisis of the most extreme form. We know now that only one passage, Kerem Shalom, is to be permitted in that area. Sufa has been permanently closed. That one entry into Gaza can carry only one-third of the necessary supplies, not only basic food supplies but also the supplies necessary to keep the infrastructure of Gaza working. The hospitals in Gaza are closing because they have no means of keeping open. Electricity, benzene and other forms of energy have been cut off to that pathetic enclave, which is now described as a hostile enclave. As things stand, it is a matter of weeks before the population of 1.4 million people in Gaza will be virtually at the end of the road. We cannot allow that to happen.

I fully understand the anger of Israelis at the rockets that have reached them, to which the noble Baroness, Lady Ramsay, referred. However, we cannot find a way out of the terrible dilemmas of the Middle East by allowing one part of what is one day supposed to be the independent second base of a new Palestinian state to collapse in ruins all around us. It is simply impossible. What can be done to sustain Gaza and the West Bank in a situation where a viable second state—a Palestinian state—is becoming day by day, because of what are sometimes cynically called “facts on the ground”, almost impossible to sustain? Have the British Government raised the issue of the misuse of funds intended to support the authorities in the West Bank, but used to buy arms, the so-called Elliott Abrams policy, which in turn will lead to a massive civil war?

I am deeply concerned also about missile defences being built in eastern and central Europe, in Poland and the Czech Republic. On 28 February 2007, we were promised by the Prime Minister a major debate in Parliament and outside Parliament on the decision to be made about whether we should partake in the missile defences now extending to Poland and the Czech Republic. There has been no debate or discussion with Parliament. There has been only a decision, made in a Written Ministerial Statement on the last day of the last term of Parliament, that we will go ahead with supporting this ballistic missile defence and being involved in Menwith Hill.

Russia has understandably become extraordinarily troubled about this. One moment’s thought on how we would feel if missile defences were being placed by Russia in, say, the Republic of Ireland will tell us

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something about the way the Russians feel. The outcome of this is an increasing lack of co-operation by Russia at a time when the world’s global structures are coming under the most extreme pressure and we are moving in some parts of the world towards chaos.

The Russian Government have now decided to walk out of the conventional treaty on arms in Europe. They have decided to resume their global flights of surveillance all around the world and have announced that they will target European cities in retaliation. All this was unnecessary. I hope that it can be dealt with by co-operation between the United States, Russia and the European Union, but at present it is very hard to see how this can contribute in any way to peace. Were the British Government consulted before the United States decided to embark on placing missile defences in Poland and the Czech Republic? Did they object in any way? Were they aware that, for one reason or another, it was decided not to put this issue to Parliament, despite the very clear commitment in the Queen’s Speech to restore the influence, the power and the sovereignty of Parliament?

9.20 pm

Lord Rogan: My Lords, compared with the majority of our European neighbours and many overseas contemporaries, the role of our Armed Forces in the life of this nation has been more than prominent. The retreat from Empire and colonial entanglements may seem a lifetime away, but in the expanse of our kingdom’s history they are relatively recent events, necessitating military commitments uncommon to nations of a similar size. Britain’s participation in the Cold War kept our Armed Forces to the fore through the 1970s and 1980s, and in the 1990s our foreign policy began to fashion a new role for the military as peacekeepers in conflicts such as Kosovo and the Balkans, building on the skills and expertise which our soldiers honed combating terrorism on the streets of my native Northern Ireland.

I do not decry the role of the military in our national life. Rather, our Armed Forces have been and continue to be a source of national pride, a physical manifestation of values which often reflect the best of what it is to be British in the modern world. In a world where respect, discipline and sacrifice are oft neglected, our Armed Forces remind us, and society in general, of the enduring importance of character and duty. We owe much to and indeed expect much from the men and women who voluntarily endanger life and limb for the nation’s benefit. Much has been said today about how the Government fail to reciprocate the faith which servicemen place in them, sentiments with which I wholeheartedly agree. It is to our eternal shame that we fail properly to equip, train and support our Armed Forces. Further, as my noble and gallant friend Lord Craig of Radley, the noble Lord, Lord Addington, and others have elucidated, for the Government to break the military covenant reflects poorly on our Ministers.

It is a problem as old as the military itself. Every age has its cause célèbre. The issues of the day may change, but the underlying tensions remain. For

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example, in his excellent book, Redcoat, Professor Richard Holmes paints a bleak picture of the soldier’s lot in the years after the Crimean War. Conditions, particularly in barracks, were shockingly poor. Soldiers, mostly sleeping on the floor, were crammed into spaces half the size of those enjoyed by convicts of the time. While we have mostly left behind such gross physical squalor, there have been more than a few disturbing instances of troops serving in Iraq and Afghanistan being denied the means by which to fulfil their duties effectively. If that was not sufficient dereliction of duty on the Government’s behalf, it has also emerged that not only do troops feel obliged to take out private insurance to top up the meagre compensation offered by the Ministry of Defence in the event of injury or death—or even to cover the loss of kit, an affront in itself—but those insurance premiums are now expected to increase by some 160 per cent. Such fast and loose treatment of those who put themselves forward in the line of fire for our country should burn the conscience of Ministers.

In an era when the Armed Forces face intense competition in recruitment, it is peculiar indeed that the Government should lose sight of the importance of ensuring that the armed services are seen to offer good conditions and terms in order to attract potential recruits. However, lest I be accused of having nothing positive to contribute, I would like to suggest a partial solution to today’s recruitment difficulties. Despite their problems, the Armed Forces still offer tremendous career opportunities to both United Kingdom and Commonwealth citizens. Pre-1969 and the outbreak of the Troubles in Ulster, the armed services of Britain were also a highly popular career choice for thousands of citizens from the Republic of Ireland. That should come as no surprise as historically the Irish have made a disproportionately large contribution to the United Kingdom’s military, boasting a lineage that stretches back to the 17th century. The Irish formed the backbone of Wellington’s army with regiments such as the Connaught Rangers and the 87th Irish Fusiliers, earning the admiration of all who fought with them. In 1830, 42.2 per cent of the British Army was Irish, and as late as 1870 the proportion was still high, at 28 per cent. Even during World War II the numbers serving from the Irish Republic stood at over 160,000.

Apart from sheer quantity, Ireland also produced quality. Macaulay called Ireland,

“an inexhaustible nursery of the finest soldiers”.

These, of course, included one Dublin-born Arthur Wellesley.

With stability returning to Northern Ireland, I can see no reason why our Armed Forces should not proactively reactivate that rich vein of recruitment from the Irish Republic. Not only would this help to address manpower issues, it would also help to strengthen personal ties between the United Kingdom and Ireland and set the tone for further improvements in relations between our two countries.

At a time when our military resources are stretched and when uncertainty abounds in various theatres, it is beholden upon the Government to ensure that the Armed Forces have the manpower to undertake all that they lay at their door. This requires practical

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measures to underpin the service personnel’s confidence that the nation will protect their interests and, I suggest, a more creative approach to recruitment which would tap into the ambitions of those Irish men and women from the whole of the island who wish to follow a military career with a global touch.

9.26 pm

Lord Selsdon: My Lords, I feel a little nervous tonight because I think I am going to say some things that I might regret later. I started and thought the most moving words of all were those in Prayers today and I could not remember the number of the Psalm. It set the scene.

The Lord Bishop of Winchester: Psalm 46.

Lord Selsdon: My Lords, Psalm 46. My noble friends could not remember either.

Then I thought that some of the weakest words I had ever heard in this House were in the Queen’s Speech on foreign affairs. Before, as your Lordships will know well, foreign affairs and defence came first. The first two days were for defence and foreign affairs and we filled the House with usually 90 or more speakers. You look at the thinness of my Benches on this side and the Labour Benches opposite, and the great strength of the independent Benches and the Liberals, who normally come out in mutual admiration, and you ask why.

Then I thought, “What were the words that moved me yesterday?”. We had two great speeches on the Adjournment and then the Leader of the House said there were a couple of TomToms on the Front Bench. There is another Tom on my left here. I thought, “What is a TomTom?”. I should know, of course, because I am secretary of the Parliamentary Space Committee. One of the things that I am good at, as many people will know, is that I have a sense of direction. You often have a sense of direction if you have spent a long time on your mother’s milk and can divine water. Many people have no sense of direction. Many of Islamic faith have an extremely good sense of direction and always know where Mecca is. In my car, which is a German car—I always said I would never have a German car—I have a form of TomTom. It does not really work—I call it Hilda—and it says every 10 minutes “You must make a U-turn”. That is what I would like to say to Members on the Benches opposite.

I was told that I should always say “I” because their Lordships like to know that you are “I”. You do not say “they” or “one” or the report that many people read out from third parties; you say “I”.

I am not very much but I have spent most of my life in trade, usually being put by the Foreign Office below the salt at important meetings. I was brought up to believe that trade was the lifeblood of anything—it created added value—and that if you wanted your trade right you needed to create added value at home and then added value abroad. For 10 years I chaired the Government’s Middle East Trade Committee. I was on that committee long before I was

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under Lord Jellicoe on the British Overseas Trade Board and under Lord Shackleton on the East European Trade Council. I went round with great men and good and I found that you could go places where no angels could tread.

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