Armed Forces Bill

My hon. Friend makes an interesting and important point—exactly what I was driving at. Who decides whether the provisions of the clause have been achieved in years to come? That leads to me to the second part of my question. My party's manifesto went to great lengths to say how important the covenant was and how we as a party in government would put it into law. We talked about a broad spectrum of things in the run-up to the general election, but before us we have a relatively modest clause, simply saying that the Secretary of State will bring forward a report once a year. He will draft it and say what is in it, although it will be about education, housing and health care and in such other fields as the Secretary of State may determine. So, he will sit down, write a little essay about all the things that he has done to achieve the military covenant and bring it before the House. We do not know from the Bill whether there will be an oral statement, thereby allowing hon. Members to question him, a written statement or a statement to the Defence Committee, thereby enabling us to scrutinise it carefully. What form will the statement take, and what powers will the House have to hold the Secretary of State's feet to the fire? Is it possible to imagine a situation in which he comes to the House and in his report says, ““I am extremely sorry. This year we have broken the military covenant in a great many ways and done terribly the wrong thing by our armed forces””? Of course not. The Secretary of State will come along every year with his statement and say, ““Look what marvellous things we have done with regard to the covenant,”” and hope not to be too carefully cross-examined over it. Given how strongly I feel about the importance of the military covenant, and given that I feel we owe it to our soldiers, sailors and airmen, whom we ask to do such awful things that we ourselves would never consider doing, I slightly question—I do not mean to be disloyal—whether the clause achieves what the coalition Government set out to achieve. Is it actually a rather sad little clause? Could it be strengthened? When the Minister responds to the debate, I would like to know in particular how the Government see it operating. Will it be a mechanism by which this House holds the Government to account? Will it enable us to hold the Minister's feet to the fire and say, ““Secretary of State, you're not living up to the military covenant. You've broken it””? Or is it just going to be a little PR exercise, enabling successive Secretaries of State to say, ““Haven't we done well by way of the military covenant?”” If it is, it will be not worth the paper it is written on.