My Lords, this is a very detailed piece of work, all 73 pages of it, and I commend the efforts and industry of all those involved in preparing it for publication. But this covenant concept had its origins as far back as 2000, and even before; it was very much championed in the mid-noughties by the noble Lord, Lord Dannatt, when he was Chief of the General Staff.
In 2007, the Government recognised that all three services should be considered. They produced a Command Paper, CM 7424, dated 1 July 2008, The Nation’s Commitment: Cross-Government Support to our Armed Forces, their Families and Veterans. It opened with an enthusiastic message of intentions and promises, signed by the then Prime Minister Gordon Brown. However, in spite of the Command Paper’s promising title, his Government stopped short of legislation and sought to encourage local authorities, service charities and private businesses to participate voluntarily. It took the incoming coalition Government, while encouraging the voluntary approach, to introduce a statutory mention when updating the Armed Forces Act 2006.
As someone who has tabled or supported amendments about the covenant in the relevant 2011 Act, and in subsequent quinquennial updates of the 2006 Act, I have become somewhat involved with pushing the covenant’s progress and development through statute. But one needs a surgeon’s magnifying spectacles to discern the glacial progress, over a quarter of a century, to get even as far as today’s incomplete commitment. In 2011, all that the Government proposed was a minimalist inclusion in statute. It was to add a single-line clause requiring just an annual report to Parliament under a heading “Miscellaneous” in an identically named “Miscellaneous Part”, near the back end of that 350-page Act and immediately following Section 359.
That section pardoned World War I servicemen executed then for disciplinary offences, recognising these deceased veterans as victims.
As a result of my objections, and following negotiations with Ministers in the Summer Recess, a new Part 16A headed “Armed Forces covenant report” was created. This gave the covenant the greater visibility it deserves in legislation. However, the Government then resisted my suggestion at the time that the central heading should be “Armed Forces covenant” and not “Armed Forces covenant report”. I was quietly amused to note that the Government introduced that semantic change in their amendments last year.
I was also pleased to see reference in paragraph 14 of the Explanatory Memorandum to my specific amendment which ping-ponged last December, leading to the Government’s undertaking to complete a report on the operation of the covenant duty next year. In particular, it will consider whether central government and any of its functions could usefully be added. The noble Baroness will need no reminding of the importance that I attach to this aspect of the review.
I was also struck that in paragraphs 1.31 and 1.41 of the statutory guidance, in section 1J and headed “the Armed Forces community”, “veteran”, when applied to former members of the Armed Forces, meant that they were in scope of the duty only if they are ordinarily resident in the UK. I accept, as a consequence of those authorities listed to exercise this duty all being those which have no overseas function, that that is true. But at all costs it must not be turned on its head and misconstrued as suggesting that classification as a veteran depends on being ordinarily resident in the UK.
Looking to the future, if central government were to have this duty, as I hope, a veteran and former member of His Majesty’s Armed Forces who has chosen to live abroad must lie within central government scope. Attempts to define veterans by location are wrong and would be better avoided. Even the definition used in the guidance is unfortunate if it causes confusion or upset to veterans, wherever they live. There is a duty of care to those who have served in the Armed Forces and retired—in agreed language, veterans. They must never be geographically shut out of the approved scope of that duty, to which they become entitled by statute; I hope that the Minister agrees. However, I support the SI.