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Category: Speeches

  • Lilian Greenwood – 2016 Statement on Resignation

    Below is the text of the speech made by Lilian Greenwood, the Labour MP for Nottingham South, on 14 July 2016.

    Thank you Chair and thank you all for coming to this evening’s meeting.

    I want to talk tonight about the Referendum, and what followed.

    But before I turn to the events of the last few weeks or months, I’d like to begin by looking at what we’ve achieved together.

    8 years ago I stood in front of the members of Nottingham South CLP and asked them to select me as their candidate for the next General Election.

    A number of the people here in this room tonight were there.

    Some of them weren’t sure that I was the right person for the job. They campaigned and voted for other candidates.

    But when the contest was over, they put those doubts to one side and we all got on with working together.

    Together we held Nottingham South for Labour in 2010.

    Together we won council seats from the Tories and the Lib Dems in 2011.

    Together we won by-election after by-election, even in the wards we hadn’t held since the late 1990s.

    Some of those people who didn’t vote for me are now, not just as my most valued Labour comrades, but amongst my most valued friends. We put our trust in each other and we have made a difference for our Party and our city.

    Of course some of you have just moved into Nottingham South, or joined the party more recently, and the increase in our membership has been outstanding.

    Many of you have also joined the dedicated band who spend their free time walking miles to deliver leaflets for me and our councillors

    Or give up their weekends to come out knocking on doors in all weathers.

    I know that not everyone is able to do that and that you support our Party in whatever ways you are able, but we work together because we are proud of our Labour Party, because we want the best for our movement and because we want to see a fairer, better society.

    And some of you have joined the Party in the last year, specifically because of Jeremy Corbyn: inspired by his values and principles and because he cares about fighting poverty and inequality, about offering hope for the future.

    I share those values and principles. I always have, and I hope you have always felt welcome in Labour.

    We’re here in the brand new Hopecentre. I supported Hope Church when this centre was just an idea. And I’ve seen this community turn an idea into a reality.

    If you know Clifton, you’ll know how it has been transformed over the past 8 years. The A453, the tram and the solid wall insulation. Fuel poverty in Clifton South has more than halved as a result of Labour action. Down from from 20.2% in 2010 to 9.4% last year.

    We did that by working together and campaigning together, working with the people in this community. We offered hope that things could be better and they are.

    There’s a long way to go.

    There are still huge problems and challenges to address in Clifton, in Nottingham South and across the country. But Labour in power makes a real difference to people facing inequality and poverty – and we could do so much more if we weren’t just in power locally but nationally too.

    Now let me turn specifically to recent events.

    It’s hard to imagine a more turbulent or disturbing 4 weeks in politics.

    Just 4 weeks ago, in the midst of a divisive and frankly xenophobic Referendum campaign, my friend and colleague Jo Cox was brutally murdered in the street on the way to her advice surgery. Murdered for standing up for her beliefs and speaking up for what is right.

    3 weeks ago, although Nottingham South voted to remain, people in our city, and especially in this community, voted to leave the EU. To turn their backs on our friends and neighbours in Europe.

    20 days ago, David Cameron announced that he would be stepping down as Prime Minister and we faced the prospect of a General Election, against a Party led by some of the most right wing Tories ever, and with UKIP buoyed by huge Leave votes in our Labour heartlands, including in places like Clifton.

    And 18 days ago, after 9 months serving in Jeremy’s Shadow Cabinet, I resigned.

    You all know that last summer I didn’t nominate Jeremy, and I didn’t vote for him.

    I know that Nottingham South did nominate him and that overwhelmingly members across the country did vote for him.

    So when he asked me to serve I said yes.

    I wanted to make it work and I promise you, I tried to make it work.

    In the 9 months I spent in the Shadow Cabinet I never briefed against Jeremy.

    I never tweeted what was happening in Shadow Cabinet meetings or spoke to journalists about our private discussions

    Whenever challenged, I defended our Party Leader.

    I hope you all know that I work hard for my constituents in Nottingham South

    I worked just as diligently in the Shadow Cabinet.

    Leading the Labour Transport team

    Co-Chairing Labour’sTransport Policy Commission.

    Holding the Government to account at the dispatch box.

    Going on national and local media to speak for Labour, even when it was difficult.

    Being a part of the collective decision making in Shadow Cabinet, setting a direction for the PLP in Parliament on challenging issues.

    Many of you will know that I’m passionate about transport.

    I’ve been in the Labour Transport Team for almost 5 years.

    Becoming Shadow Transport Secretary was my dream job, a huge privilege and I’m extremely proud of the work our team did.

    It was fantastic to address our Party Conference last September and be able to pledge that a Labour Government would bring the railways back into public ownership.

    That was a policy that would make a real difference to passengers, and I believe in it wholeheartedly.

    It was brilliant when we forced the Government to u-turn on their plans to cancel the electrification of the Midland Main Line

    And I was looking forward to speaking in the Bus Services Bill, in favour of re-regulating bus services and standing up for outstanding Municipal bus companies like NCT.

    So I’d like you to imagine how I felt when, even though I was trying my hardest, it became impossible for me to do my job in the Shadow Cabinet.

    Some people have asked me for examples of why that was the case, and I wanted to explain tonight what’s happened over the last nine months as fully as I can.

    Rail fares go up once a year on 2 January.

    It’s the perfect opportunity to show that this Tory Government aren’t on the side of working people.

    Commuters who’ve seen their season tickets go up by more than 26% since 2010. Some of whom are paying more for their rail fares than their mortgage. Four, five even six thousand pounds a year.

    People who live in Essex and on the Kent coast, in suburbs and small towns, in marginal seats. Many of them are not Labour voters, but they are the people we need to win over.

    It is a huge date in the political calendar every year.

    We had the opportunity not just to criticise the Government, but to show we had a real Labour alternative. Our flagship policy. One that unites our party.

    My staff spent weeks preparing briefing materials for MPs and constituency parties across the country. Trawling through mountains of rail fare information to provide examples of the season tickets that had risen the most and that cost the most. Examples for every MP and CLP.

    Like Nottingham to Derby – where the cost of an annual season ticket has risen by almost 30% since 2010.

    And over the Christmas period we were listening in to Network Rail conference calls, monitoring the engineering works. Several calls every day including Christmas Day and Boxing Day, even New Years Eve.

    On 4 January – a cold dark Monday morning – I was at Kings Cross at 7am doing Radio 5 and BBC TV.

    Standing with Jeremy and the Rail Union General Secretaries for the media photocall. It was a crucial day in the Party’s media grid.

    And all across the country local party activists were outside railway stations in the cold and the dark, leafleting commuters with the materials we’d prepared. Armed with the briefings and statistics.

    Incredibly, Jeremy launched a Shadow Cabinet reshuffle on the same day.

    This was the reshuffle that had been talked about since the Syria vote a month earlier. A vote where I supported Jeremy’s position.

    The reshuffle that meant all our staff spent Christmas not knowing whether they’d have a job by the New Year.

    By mid-afternoon the press were camped outside the Leader’s office. They were there for the next 3 days.

    It knocked all the coverage of the rail fare rise and our public ownership policy off every news channel and every front page.

    I respect completely Jeremy’s right to reshuffle his top team. But why then?

    It was unnecessary and it was incompetent.

    It let me down, it let my staff down but most of all it let down the Labour campaigners and trade union members, people like you, who had given up their time to go out campaigning for us that morning.

    Now I’d ask you to imagine how you would you feel if you agreed something with your boss but he then did something completely different.

    Something that undermined you.

    Something they hadn’t even had the courtesy to tell you about.

    HS2 has always been controversial, including in our Party, but it is something that I believe is vital for the future of our country.

    It has the support of all the rail unions. It has the support of Labour leaders in the great cities like Birmingham and Manchester and Leeds and Nottingham. It is important for jobs and skills in Derby and Doncaster and across the country and it is our official policy to support it, as agreed by the Shadow Cabinet and our National Policy Forum.

    I’ve been one of HS2’s strongest supporters so I when I took up the job in Jeremy’s Shadow Cabinet I wanted to be absolutely sure we were on the same page.

    I met his Director of Policy to talk it through. We talked about the most difficult parts of the project, the impact at Euston in London. I’d been working with Councillor Sarah Hayward and her colleagues at Camden for more than 2 years to try and help them get what they wanted for their local residents.

    It had been very difficult. I’d been to visit several times, meeting residents and businesses and dealing with some hostile media. But we secured real concessions – changes that will make a difference to local residents. It didn’t matter that it was in a nominally safe seat. It was the right thing to do.

    Despite our agreed policy, despite Jeremy’s Director of Policy and I agreeing our position, without saying anything to me, Jeremy gave a press interview in which he suggested he could drop Labour’s support for HS2 altogether. He told a journalist on a local Camden newspaper that perhaps the HS2 line shouldn’t go to Euston at all but stop at Old Oak Common in West London – but he never discussed any of this with the Shadow Cabinet, or me, beforehand.

    I felt totally undermined on a really difficult issue.

    And when 2 frontbenchers voted against the 3 line whip at 3rd Reading in March he did nothing.

    Telling one of them “well I’ve done it enough times myself”.

    Breaking the principles of collective responsibility and discipline without which effective Parliamentary opposition is not possible.

    When I raised my concerns it was simply shrugged off.

    It undermined me in front of colleagues and made me look weak.

    It made me feel like I was wasting my time.

    That my opinion didn’t matter.

    And it made me miserable.

    I’d discuss it with my political adviser, a Labour Party member of staff and activist from Nottingham who has also lost his job in all this, and we’d agree to go on because the policy mattered. Because we wanted to keep holding the Government to account. Because we love the Labour Party.

    This didn’t happen once or twice.

    It happened time and time again.

    The EU 4th Rail Package is a bit complex to explain here and now, but it had the potential to make it difficult to implement our new rail policy.

    I’d been working with MEPs to ensure it was amended or blocked for the last 3 years. We felt we could live with the final draft issued in April but it was a very sensitive issue. ASLEF and the RMT were on the Leave side in the referendum because of their concerns.

    So when Jeremy talked about it in a speech, in very Euro-sceptic terms, without giving me any warning let alone discussing it with me, I was concerned and asked to meet him.

    Our frontbenchers were being challenged on the issue in the media, but there was no common position.

    I asked and asked. After my staff chasing virtually every day for a month, we got a meeting.

    We put together a briefing paper in advance.

    We drafted some lines to take in any press interviews for us to give to all Labour MPs.

    We discussed the lines with his Policy staff and made some changes in response to comments.

    We agreed a final version. We sat down together and discussed what was in the 4th Rail Package, how we were ensuring it didn’t stop our policy, how we’d been working with our MEPs and the Socialist Group and we agreed the lines to take.

    The lines were circulated to all frontbenchers, to all MPs, to ensure they knew what our policy was and how to deal with difficult questions.

    But Jeremy went on SkyNews and took a completely different, eurosceptic line.

    Not what we’d agreed.

    With the potential to make us look divided.

    It undermined me, my staff and his staff.

    I wondered why I was bothering to put in the hard work.

    You’ve all heard stories about pro-European speeches being downgraded, events, being cancelled, and Jeremy and his staff privately subscribing to Eurosceptic views.

    And I felt that I was watching my leader deliberately sabotage the campaign on an issue on which he and I had a personal agreement.

    How would you feel if your boss undermined your work and when you complained he listened and then did nothing different?

    How would you feel if you were part of a team and you knew that not only was your boss undermining you but that this was happening to other colleagues?

    You can agree or disagree about whether Jeremy was half hearted about the Labour In campaign.

    You can agree or disagree about whether it’s Ok to take 5 days holiday 3 weeks before the most important vote in my lifetime.

    But I sat at the Regional Count with Glenis Willmott the Leader of the European Parliamentary Labour Party, my friend, a fellow trade unionist from the East Midlands doing media duty for our Party.

    And as we left at 5am, defeated and in despair, we finally got sent lines to take from the Leader’s office. Acknowledging Kate Hoey and Gisela Stuart for their work in the Leave campaign. Their work in direct opposition to Labour Party policy.

    And shortly after we heard Jeremy calling for the immediate triggering of Article 50. Without any discussion with the Shadow Cabinet or the Leader of the European Parliamentary Labour Party.

    Think about that. The country had just voted to leave the EU after more than 40 years and Jeremy made a major announcement on the Party’s position without waiting to discuss it with the Shadow Cabinet, without even consulting the leader of our MEPs in Europe.

    How can that be right?

    At 6.30am I was interviewed by Radio Nottingham. I was tired and I was gutted and I tried to use the lines I’d been sent, even though they were so inadequate, but when I was asked the question “Is Jeremy the man to lead the Labour Party in these challenging times?” I found it hard to say an enthusiastic yes. Because I didn’t believe it. Because I’d worked with him and I’d tried hard but in my mind, it simply wasn’t true.

    And when I saw that Cameron had resigned, I felt like I was looking into the abyss. Towards a General Election in which dozens of my colleagues would lose their seats.

    And I already know what that is like and I was in despair.

    But at that moment I knew that I didn’t have to put up with it.

    I could leave the Shadow Cabinet and return to the backbenches and focus on Nottingham South.

    But I was tired and emotional, so I wasn’t going to do anything hasty.

    So I talked to some of my closest colleagues.

    I discussed it with my staff.

    And I told Ravi.

    And decided to raise my concerns at Shadow Cabinet on the Monday.

    I arranged to meet my agent and several CLP officers on the Sunday afternoon to explain what I had decided to do.

    But it didn’t go as planned.

    On Sunday morning Ravi woke me and passed me my phone.

    Hilary Benn, who I’d been with on the campaign bus with in Derby and Peterborough only 3 days earlier, had been sacked.

    And Heidi Alexander, one of my closest friends in the Shadow Cabinet, one of the best and most talented and loyal colleagues I know, had resigned.

    So I rang Brian, my agent, and my adviser, Laurence, to tell them. I wrote my resignation letter and I rang Jeremy to explain. And I texted asking him to call me. And I rang Katy Clark in his office and asked her to ask him to ring me.

    After an hour or so he did ring me. And we had an amicable discussion and I explained that I has lost confidence in him.

    He didn’t even ask me why.

    Or what was wrong , or how he could fix it.

    I wasn’t part of any coup.

    I didn’t plan it.

    I didn’t co-ordinate the timing of my resignation with anyone else.

    I just knew that I could not go on.

    Things were, and are, falling apart.

    Jeremy has always treated me politely, and with kindness.

    I know that he has strong principles.

    I remain proud of our policies on transport, especially rail. And Jeremy is right to set out an alternative to the economics of austerity, to focus on affordable housing, to defending a public NHS and to tackling poverty and inequality.

    But through my own personal direct experience I know that Jeremy operates in a way that means progress towards these goals is impossible. He is not a team player let alone a team leader.

    Jeremy has a new Shadow Cabinet but it’s clear to me that he doesn’t understand collective responsibility and that he can’t lead a team, so I’m afraid the same problems will eventually emerge in the new front bench. This is not about policy or ideology, it is about competence.

    I can’t describe how sad I have felt this last 4 weeks.

    I remain very proud to be your MP and to serve my Party and my city.

    I will always support Labour as best as I can in Parliament.

    I am sorry that many of you feel very angry and let down, but I know that I have done what was right, that I have behaved with integrity and that I had no option but to resign from Jeremy’s Shadow Cabinet. It’s clear that he cannot command the support of his colleagues in Parliament and under those circumstances I cannot see how he can lead our Party to the election victory people in our city so desperately need.

    8 years ago I asked Nottingham South members to put their trust in me.

    Tonight I’m asking you to do the same again.

    I don’t ask you to agree with me, but I hope you will understand and respect my decision. I have tried to be completely honest with you tonight. And I will try to answer your questions.

  • Andy Burnham – 2016 Speech on Nice Terror Attack

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    Below is the text of the speech made by Andy Burnham, the Shadow Home Secretary, in the House of Commons on 18 July 2016.

    I start by welcoming the Home Secretary to her new position and welcoming her well-judged and heartfelt words to the House today. She spoke for us all in condemning this nauseating attack, and in sending our sympathy and solidarity to the families affected and to the French people. From the very outset of the right hon. Lady’s tenure, let me assure her of my ongoing support in presenting a united front from this House to those who plan and perpetrate these brutal acts.

    It is a sad reflection of the dark times in which we live that this is the third time in the last nine months that we have gathered to discuss a major terrorist incident in mainland Europe. Each new incident brings new factors and changes perceptions on the nature of the threat posed by modern terrorism—and this one was no different. This was an act of indiscriminate and sickening brutality, made all the more abhorrent by the targeting of families and children. Ten children and babies were killed, 50 are still being treated, and many more have been orphaned and left with lasting psychological scars. Unlike other attacks, this was not planned by a cell with sophisticated tactics and weapons. A similar attack could be launched anywhere at any time, and that is what makes it so frightening and so difficult to predict and prevent.

    Let me start with the question of whether there are any immediate implications for the United Kingdom. On Friday, a spokeswoman for the Prime Minister said that UK police were “reviewing” security plans for “large public events” taking place this week. What conclusions were reached as part of that review, and were any changes made in the light of it? Will the Home Secretary be issuing any updated security advice to the organisers of the numerous large public gatherings and festivals that will take place throughout the country over the rest of the summer? We welcome the Mayor of London’s confirmation that the Metropolitan police were reviewing safety measures in the capital. Can the Home Secretary confirm that similar reviews are taking place in large cities throughout the United Kingdom?

    After the attacks in Paris, the Home Secretary’s predecessor committed herself to an urgent review of our response to firearms attacks. It has been suggested in the French media that if armed officers had been on the scene more quickly in Nice, they could have prevented the lorry from travelling as far as it did. Has the review that was commissioned been completed, and if so, what changes in firearms capability are proposed as a result? In the wake of Paris, the Home Secretary’s predecessor also promised to protect police budgets, but that has not been honoured, and there are real-terms cuts this year. Will the new Home Secretary pledge today to protect police budgets in real terms?

    The Home Secretary mentioned the Prevent programme. I have to say that I do not share her complacent view of what it is achieving. In fact, some would say that it is counter-productive, creating a climate of suspicion and mistrust and, far from tackling extremism, creating the very conditions for it to flourish. The Government’s own Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation has said that the whole programme

    “could benefit from independent review.”

    Will the Home Secretary accept Labour’s call for a cross-party review of how the statutory Prevent duty is working?

    Immediately after the attack, it was described in the media as an act of Islamic terrorism, but it is now clear that the lifestyle of the individual had absolutely nothing to do with the Islamic faith, and the French authorities have cast doubt on whether there was any link between him and Daesh. Does the Home Secretary agree that promptly labelling this attack Islamic terrorism hands a propaganda coup to the terrorists, whose whole purpose is to deepen the rift between the Muslim community and the rest of society? Does she agree that more care should be taken with how such atrocities are labelled in future?

    This was, of course, the first attack in Europe since the European Union referendum. Can the Home Secretary assure the House that, in these times, she and the wider Government are making every effort to maintain strong collaboration with the French and the European authorities, and to send them the clear message that, whatever our differences, Britain will always be by their side and ready to help?

  • Lord Freud – 2016 Speech on Welfare Reform

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    Below is the text of the speech made by Lord Freud, the Minister of State for Welfare Reform, in Birmingham on 11 July 2016.

    It is a pleasure to be here in Birmingham for the annual IntoWork Convention.

    Your aim at the Learning and Work Institute is that everyone has the opportunity to realise their ambitions and potential – in learning, work and throughout life.

    Through the welfare reforms my department has been driving over the last 6 years we have sought to do exactly this.

    Whether that’s been through changing the role of jobcentres, transforming the benefits system with Universal Credit, introducing new employment programmes, or testing innovations to constantly improve – we have endeavoured to get people into sustainable work, and to give them the support to stay in and progress in work.

    What we are now seeing is an enormous cultural change – a change in the way that welfare is viewed, organised and delivered.

    And I believe these changes are behind the labour market figures we are now seeing – with unemployment at its lowest rate for a decade, and the number of workless households down by over three quarters of a million since 2010.

    Today I want to talk about the changes we have introduced – and about the innovations we are trailing to support people with complex and multiple barriers in to work.

    So that we can continue to drive down the unemployment rate, and make sure that everyone has the opportunity to enter work and realise their potential.

    Changing role of jobcentres

    One of the most enjoyable parts of my job is taking people to jobcentres who have not been there for a number of years.

    They still think of it as depicted in the Full Monty – with counters, job cards in windows, and long dole queues.

    The welfare system we inherited discouraged work. Instead of giving people the tools and encouragement to look for employment, it wrote off large numbers of people as incapable of work.

    Jobcentres were full of barriers – physical barriers with screens separating staff and claimants; technological barriers which made it difficult for people to search for up-to- date vacancies; and a routine of getting people to sign on instead of search for work.

    When I take people to jobcentres now, they are amazed by the transformation that has taken place.

    The system we have now is very different. It is more personal, it is digital, and it is more dynamic.

    We have transformed the role of jobcentre staff. They now coach people into work by tailoring support to the needs of individuals and their local circumstances.

    Through jobcentres people can get advice on finding a job, get help with retraining, and access thousands of new job vacancies every day.

    This has also been made possible by digitally updating jobcentres so that people can access wifi and computers for their job search activities. And by up-skilling our own staff to assist people with their digital capability.

    The new work coach approach means that jobcentre staff can work with claimants to create a personalised job search journey, concentrating on the person not on the benefits they receive.

    It means that claimants can build up trust in their work coach, and that work coaches can get a better understanding of the claimants’ individual circumstances – so they can more effectively help them into sustainable employment.

    I regularly visit jobcentres across the country, and when I make these visits what strikes me is the genuine enthusiasm, motivation and dedication of work coaches.

    Because of our welfare reforms they feel that the system is unified – and that they can help people to lead independent, fulfilling lives through the tools we have put in place.

    Universal Credit

    There are a number of causes driving the labour market figures we are seeing. And I believe an important factor is the change in the relationship between jobcentre staff and claimants – driven by the introduction of Universal Credit.

    We have shown that we can deliver real change by introducing Universal Credit – the biggest transformational change in the history of the welfare system.

    Universal Credit is now live in all 712 jobcentres around the country. And by the time it is fully rolled out, it will affect 7 million people’s lives.

    It is already making a real difference – with people moving into work faster and staying in work longer.

    When we compare those who are receiving Universal Credit to a similar cohort of people receiving one of its legacy benefits, Jobseeker’s Allowance, we can see that people on Universal Credit:

    – are spending around 50% more time looking for work

    – they are 8 percentage points more likely to be in work

    – and they are more actively looking to increase their earnings when they are in work

    Universal Credit better reflects the world of work, to help people make the transition into employment more easily. With personalised support work coaches, monthly payments direct to people’s bank accounts, and support in and out of work.

    It is also designed to be digital to respond to the technological changes in the way we live now.

    Instead of having to go to a jobcentre to make an application, or phone multiple agencies to report a change in circumstances, people can now manage their claims online through a single account.

    Data we have had from claimants receiving the Universal Credit full service shows that 99.6% of applicants for Universal Credit submitted a claim online. And 88% of changes of circumstances were reported online.

    Universal Credit is transforming welfare, and it is central to our vision of a society where everyone can succeed and break free of dependency.

    Work Programme

    Together with the changes to jobcentres and the benefits system, our employment programmes have also played major roles in getting people back into work.

    Key to this is the Work Programme, which we introduced in 2011 to support those at risk of long term unemployment back into work.

    I believe the Work Programme has been a significant part of the growing economy, by supporting over half a million people to move into sustained employment and helping nearly 1.3 million people spend time off benefits.

    Here in the Greater Birmingham area, nearly 35,000 people have moved into employment through the Work Programme.

    The Work Programme has succeeded in transforming the lives of those furthest from the labour market. Participants are not just finding work, they are keeping it.

    Throughout the country, in areas like Birmingham, providers are delivering innovative services to support participants back into work. Services such as budgeting advice, and support to overcome addictions and manage health conditions.

    The Work Programme was designed and built for a different labour market when unemployment was higher.

    The labour market we have now is one with a record employment rate. What remains is not cyclical unemployment but structural unemployment.

    And it is only right that we adapt the support we provide to focus on this group.

    This is what is driving our new Work and Health programme. It is being designed to tackle the remaining barriers.

    Our new programme will test different approaches, and design and commission tailored programmes across the country.

    We want to see a cross sector approach and encourage more collaboration and integrated services.

    That means bringing together the health service, the welfare system, local authorities, the third sector, employers and disabled people themselves.

    By working more closely together, we can become more effective at supporting more people back into work.

    In designing this new programme we are taking the most successful aspects of the Work Programme and Work Choice.

    We want to build on the success of everyone who went through these programmes, so that more people have the opportunity to enter work and change their lives.

    Universal Support

    To be successful in pushing employment up and unemployment down, we must become better at supporting the most vulnerable and excluded in society in to work.

    Our aim is to support the needs of anyone whose conditions are stopping them from finding and staying in work.

    It is not just the Work and Health programme which is focusing on tackling people’s barriers.

    There are a number of other areas where we are working in partnership with local authorities and other organisations to do this.

    For many people who are moving to Universal Credit, the transition will be straightforward.

    However, we know that for some people, managing their Universal Credit claim online and budgeting their award effectively may be difficult.

    That is why we have developed Universal Support to help people by improving their financial and digital capability.

    We have been trialling this through our Universal Support delivered locally initiative. This tested the most effective way to deliver budgeting support and assistance with digital services in different areas of the country.

    From the evidence we published last week we can see that there is a strong need for this service.

    It has also shown us that claimants who need this support often also have a range of barriers such as literacy issues, a fear of technology, and difficulties accessing computers and broadband.

    We aim to build on this work by looking at how Universal Support can be expanded – by encouraging joined-up services – to cover a wide range of complex barriers. The barriers that entrench worklessness and damage people’s life chances – for example, homelessness, addictions and debt problems.

    An example of this working is the Welfare Partnership Hub located in Ashford jobcentre in Kent. This hub brings together a range of partners – local authority housing officers, the homeless charity Porchlight, Turning Point, a volunteer’s centre, Citizens Advice, and other local organisations.

    Work coaches ensure that problems they identify in the claimants they see are tackled immediately by referring them directly to the relevant service in the hub.

    Through such locally designed and integrated services, we can better meet the needs of people with complex and multiple barriers. And help them into sustained employment.

    Localism and co-location

    Indeed, this fits in with the wider government localism agenda of shifting power away from Whitehall – and giving local communities the power to shape local services to meet local needs.

    As part of our Universal Support trials we modelled 4 different ways of integrating services to support people.

    In some cases jobcentre and local authority staff were fully integrated into a single team, with support services co-located.

    More commonly, all services were co-located into a single building, typically in a local authority building.

    In the third model, jobcentre staff triaged claimants and referred them to services.

    Finally, in some rural trials services were dispersed or delivered through networks of partner organisations.

    What the Universal Support trials showed was the importance of the location of support services in determining whether or not claimants chose to engage with them.

    The trials showed us that the co-location of services – where jobcentre services and local organisations are integrated within a local authority building – often led to a better service for claimants.

    Access to support was more streamlined, there was better communication, and a more effective resolution of issues.

    We currently have around 40 co-location arrangements in place and the benefits are clear – for claimants, our staff and for the tax payer.

    Examples of this include Islington’s local authority Customer Centre. This hosts all 3 digital, financial and employment services.

    Having these services in one place minimises the handover time between services and provides claimants with a “one-stop shop” for support services.

    In Islington we found that bringing work coaches into the Customer Centre significantly increased the numbers of hard to reach claimants, whom they had previously had difficulty engaging.

    The informative and helpful manner of staff and volunteers, combined with engagement in the home, was highly valued and claimants reported that it made them feel more comfortable to disclose information.

    In more rural areas, where local geography limited the scope for co-locating services, we trialled a “hub and spoke” approach – for example in South Staffordshire and in West Lincolnshire.

    This ensured that vulnerable and isolated claimants had a greater chance of benefiting from support services.

    The trials have shown us that integrating support through co-location and joint working has greatly increased the variety of services available for claimants.

    And that using this approach we can deal with a greater range of needs and treat barriers to work holistically.

    Progression in work

    Our reforms have not just been focused on getting people into work, but also on getting people to stay in and progress in work.

    That is why – alongside the budgeting and digital support we are developing – we are trialling support looking at how people can progress in work.

    This is the first time that any country has made a significant commitment to support people through the welfare system – to try and increase their earnings and progression at work. And to become independent of the welfare state.

    We have developed a substantial programme of work to form the evidence base about what will be most effective in delivering this.

    Part of this is the in-work progression trial run by jobcentres. This large-scale randomised control trial is being rolled out nationally across jobcentres, and will test different ways of supporting people in work and conditionality.

    But it is clear that others outside of jobcentres have a key role in supporting progression. So, we are testing different approaches with a range of externally led trails.

    These include:

    – work with Goals UK, looking at motivational techniques to change individual attitudes to progression

    – work with Timewise, who are testing ways of supporting progression through the design of job roles and workplace flexibility

    – and projects my department is co-ordinating with the UK Commission for Employment and Skills (UKCES)

    The UKCES projects involve 7 trials in the retail and hospitality sectors – sectors which have some of the lowest pay rates in the country.

    Employers running these trials are testing strategies that demonstrate both clear business benefits – such as higher staff retention and productivity – and increased earnings for low paid employees.

    These are crucial in helping us to develop the business case to support progression, and are vital if we are to address the wider issue of productivity.

    These trials include a wide range of initiatives, such as:

    – innovative work to develop a smartphone app with online learning, career coaching, and support for up-skilling

    – redesigning job roles to enable progression for part time workers

    – developing pathways for progression at work across the retail sector

    – delivering tailored master-classes in the tourism sector
    and supporting employers to improve people management and productivity

    Across all the trials over 100 organisations are working in partnership to find innovative ways of designing jobs, delivering training, and ultimately raising the take home pay of workers on low wages.

    All 7 of these trials have reported that they have made progress towards the aim of improving pay and progression for low paid employees – and that there is the potential to further enhance these opportunities over the next 12 months.

    Indeed several of these projects are in discussion with other employers and stakeholders within their sectors to expand the reach of their trial beyond their funded period.

    Implications of Universal Credit

    To return to Universal Credit, it one of the biggest change programmes in government. The scale of it is driving innovation in other areas of my department’s work.

    For example, it has implications for how funding for supported housing is best delivered in the future.

    And it is a driver for innovation in the payments industry. There are a number of advantages to enhancing the payments system to enrich Universal Credit. From being able to reimburse childcare payments in real time, to minimising the opportunities for fraud and error to take place.

    In my own opinion, in order for Universal Credit to be truly successful, it cannot just focus on getting people into work.

    We have had a work first approach but we must focus, in equal measure, on ensuring that people stay in work and progress in their careers.

    To me, this is fundamentally about pulling together the skills agenda alongside this work first approach.

    Conclusion

    What we are now seeing – in the development of the new Work and Health programme, in the expansion of Universal Support, and in our trials around progression in work – is a focus on partnerships and integrated services to help people overcome multiple barriers and move into employment.

    Over the last 6 years we have introduced structural and meaningful changes in the welfare system.

    This has transformed the welfare system into one that is focused on individuals and their personal journeys into employment.

    We have achieved an enormous cultural change – and this is borne out by the strong labour market figures we are now seeing.

    Our ambition has been to transform people’s lives by giving them the tools, incentives and support they need, to move into work and out of poverty.

    I believe that this is what we are seeing now, and that the policies I have talked about today will continue to achieve this.

  • Amber Rudd – 2016 Speech on Nice Terror Attack

    amberrudd

    Below is the text of the speech made by Amber Rudd, the Home Secretary, in the House of Commons on 18 July 2016.

    With permission, Mr Speaker, I would like to make a statement about the terrorist attack in Nice and the threat we face from terrorism in the UK.

    The full horror of last Thursday night’s attack on the Promenade des Anglais in Nice defies all comprehension. At least 84 people were killed when a heavy goods lorry was driven deliberately into crowds enjoying Bastille day celebrations. Ten of the dead are believed to have been children and teenagers. More than 200 people were injured and a number are in a critical condition. Consular staff on the ground are in touch with local authorities and assisting British nationals caught up in the attack, and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office is providing support to anyone concerned about friends or loved ones.

    Over the weekend, the French police made a number of arrests, and in the coming weeks we will learn more about the circumstances behind the attack. These were innocent people enjoying national celebrations—they were families, mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, daughters, sons, friends, and many of them were children. They were attacked in the most brutal and cowardly way possible, as they simply went about their lives. Our thoughts and prayers must be with the families who have lost loved ones, the survivors fighting for their lives, the victims facing appalling injuries and all those mentally scarred by the events of that night.

    I have spoken to my counterpart, Bernard Cazeneuve, to offer him the sympathy of the British people and to make it clear that we stand ready to help in any way we can. We have offered investigative assistance to the French authorities and security support to the French diplomatic and wider community in London. This is the third terrorist attack in France in the last 18 months with a high number of deaths, and we cannot underestimate its devastating impact. We have also seen attacks in many other countries, and those killed and maimed by these murderers include people of many nationalities and faiths. Recently, we have seen attacks in Bangladesh, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Turkey and America, as well as the ongoing conflict in Syria, and last month we marked a year since 38 people—30 of them British—were murdered at a beach resort in Tunisia.

    In the UK, the threat from international terrorism, which is determined by the independent joint terrorism analysis centre, remains at “severe”, meaning that an attack is “highly likely”. The public should be vigilant but not alarmed. On Friday, following the attack in Nice, the police and security and intelligence agencies took steps to review our security measures and ensure we had robust procedures in place, and I receive regular updates. All police forces have reviewed upcoming events taking place in their regions to ensure that security measures are appropriate and proportionate.

    The UK has considerable experience in managing and policing major events. Extra security measures are used at particularly high-profile events, including—when the police assess there to be a risk of vehicle attacks—the deployment of the national barrier asset. This is made up of a range of temporary equipment, including security fences and gates, that enables the physical protection of sites. Since the terrorist attacks in Mumbai in 2008, we have also taken steps to improve the response of police firearms teams and other emergency services to a marauding gun attack. We have protected and increased counter-terrorism police funding for 2016-17 in real terms, and over the next five years, we are providing £143 million for the police to boost their firearms capability further.

    We continue to test our response to terrorist attacks, including by learning the lessons from attacks such as those in France and through national exercises involving the Government, the military, the police, the ambulance and fire and rescue services and other agencies.

    The threat from terrorism, however, is serious and growing. Our security and intelligence services are first rate, and they work tirelessly around the clock to keep the people of this country safe. Over the next five years, we will make an extra £2.5 billion available to those agencies, and that will include funding for an additional 1,900 staff at MI5, MI6 and GCHC, as well as strengthening our network of counter-terrorism experts in the middle east, north Africa, south Asia and sub-Saharan Africa.

    We have also taken steps to deal with foreign fighters and to prevent radicalisation by providing new powers through the Counter-Terrorism and Security Act 2015, and we continue to take forward the Investigatory Powers Bill, which will ensure that the police, the security and the intelligence agencies have the powers they need to keep people safe in the digital age.

    The UK has in place strong measures to respond to terrorist attacks and since coming to office in 2010, the Government have taken significant steps to bolster that response, but Daesh and other terrorist organisations seek to poison people’s minds and they peddle sickening hate and lies to encourage people to plot acts of terrorism or leave their families to join terrorists. That is not just in France or this country, but in countries all around the world. We must confront that hateful propaganda and expose it for what it is.

    In this country, that means working to expose the emptiness of extremism and safeguard vulnerable people from becoming radicalised. Our Prevent programme works in partnership with families, communities and civil society groups to challenge the poisonous ideology that supports terrorism. This includes supporting civil society groups to build their own capacity, and since January 2014, its counter-narrative products have had widespread engagement with communities. In addition, more than 1,000 people have received support since 2012 through Channel, the voluntary and confidential support programme for those at risk of radicalisation.

    This is an international problem that requires an international solution, so we are working closely with our European partners, allies in the counter-Daesh coalition and those most affected by the threat that Daesh poses to share information, build counter-terrorism capability and exchange best practice.

    As the Prime Minister has said, we must work with France and our partners around the world to stand up for our values and for our freedom. Nice was attacked on Bastille day, itself a French symbol of liberation and national unity. Those who attack seek to divide us and spread hatred, so our resounding response must be one of ever-greater unity between different nations but also between ourselves. This weekend we saw unity in action as people came together to support each other. People sent messages of condolence, and Muslims in this country and around the world have said that those who carry out such attacks do not represent the true Islam.

    I want to end by sending a message to our French friends and neighbours. What happened in Nice last Thursday was cruel and incomprehensible. The horror and devastation is something many people will live with for the rest of their lives. We know you are hurting; we know this will cause lasting pain. Let me be quite clear: we will stand with you; we will support you in this fight, and together with our partners around the world, we will defeat those who seek to attack our way of life.

  • Michael Fallon – 2016 Speech on the Iraq Inquiry Report

    michaelfallon

    Below is the text of the speech made by Michael Fallon, the Secretary of State for Defence, in the House of Commons on 14 July 2016.

    This has indeed been a considered and moving debate, as befits such a serious subject. I believe that more than 50 Members have contributed over the last two days, and I join them in thanking Sir John and his colleagues, including the late Sir Martin Gilbert, for their immense efforts. They have produced a report that I think we all now agree is comprehensive, accurate, and an unvarnished record of the events, and they have been unremitting in their efforts to understand the causes and consequences of the Iraq war and its aftermath. We are all in their debt.

    I hope that members of the armed forces and their families are able to find some measure of consolation in the report’s acknowledgement of their enormous service. Our thoughts remain with them. We should bear in mind what Sir John says about the efforts of the men and women of the armed forces: that the initial war-fighting phase was a military success. They did fight to help topple a tyrant who had murdered hundreds of thousands of his own people, and the subsequent failures in the campaign, at whoever’s door they are laid, cannot and should not be laid at the door of those who did the fighting on our behalf.

    However, Sir John also makes it clear that the United Kingdom did not achieve its overall strategy objectives in Iraq. There were too many challenges in too many different areas. There was a lack of leadership across Government, and there was too much group-think in our military, security and intelligence cultures, which stopped short of challenging key decisions. That point has been made many times over the last couple of days. There was flawed intelligence, which led to assertions—particularly in relation to WMD—that could not be justified. There was a fatal lack of post-war planning, and lessons from previous conflicts and exercises had not been properly learned. We also failed, as the campaign unravelled, to adapt to the changing situation on the ground, and there were significant equipment shortfalls for our troops, listed in some detail by the hon. Member for East Renfrewshire (Kirsten Oswald). There was much in that campaign that—whatever else we do—we must try to avoid in the future.

    It will not, I think, be possible for me to refer to every single speech made over the last couple of days. The hon. Member for Norwich South (Clive Lewis) picked out some of the more memorable. We have heard speeches of anger and speeches of remorse, and we have heard thought-provoking speeches about the overall effect of the Iraq war on our process and our political culture.

    We have heard speeches from those who played significant roles at the time. The right hon. Member for Derby South (Margaret Beckett) spoke very illuminatingly of the need for humility, given that so many of those who were involved professionally were able to reach the same conclusions without properly challenging the existing culture, and my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke) spoke of the drive to converge our views with those of the United States. The right hon. Member for Leeds Central (Hilary Benn) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell) underlined the importance of planning for reconstruction in any military action. The House also had the benefit of the military experience of my hon. Friends the Members for Tonbridge and Malling (Tom Tugendhat), and for Plymouth, Moor View (Johnny Mercer). I was particularly struck by the speech made by the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton South East (Mr McFadden), who reminded the House that Islamic terrorism did not start in 2003; it was there long before that, and other countries were also engaged in trying to deal with it.

    The question the House has to ask itself is this: given that we all want to avoid this happening again in the future, have there been sufficient, significant changes for the better? I suggest to the House that there have been some changes for the better. First, we in Government are better co-ordinated. We now have the National Security Council, which ensures that decision-making is dealt with in a joined-up way across Government. The NSC includes not only Ministers from the main Departments, but the Chief of the Defence Staff, the Chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee, the heads of the intelligence services, relevant senior officials and the Attorney General.

    Dr Julian Lewis

    The Secretary of State has just listed the membership of the National Security Council. While it is revealing that all the intelligence services are individually represented, it is a fact that all the armed forces are represented only by the Chief of the Defence Staff. Will he give consideration to the Defence Committee’s suggestion that the Chiefs of Staff Committee could serve more usefully if it was constituted as the military sub-committee of the NSC?

    Michael Fallon

    I heard my right hon. Friend’s speech earlier today, in which he made that point at some length. I caution him against over-complicating the structure we have and setting up sub-committees of it. The armed forces are represented through the Chief of the Defence Staff, who attends not only the NSC, but the officials’ meeting that precedes it.

    Mr Kenneth Clarke (Rushcliffe) (Con)

    My right hon. Friend is, I am delighted to say, serving in his current role under his second Prime Minister, and I trust he will serve under several more yet. [Interruption.] If we keep having leadership crises. As he has experience of Cabinet Government and the NSC, and as he remembers serving in Government decades ago under former Prime Ministers, will he, with the new leader of the Government, consider the possibility of the Cabinet sitting for slightly longer than one and a half hours each week, particularly when pressing issues are on the agenda, and of more readily having individual briefings before issues are considered at Cabinet?

    Similarly, will my right hon. Friend consider whether the NSC might be more flexible as to the length of meetings, whether briefings might be given to members before the NSC sits, and whether matters might be returned to at subsequent meetings if there is a basis for challenging the advice given? We obviously have a difficult four years to go through; does my right hon. Friend agree that more collective government might be a good way of proceeding?

    Michael Fallon

    I am grateful to my right hon. and learned Friend, particularly for his kind words. I am now serving my fourth Conservative Prime Minister; I do not think I have quite matched my right hon. and learned Friend’s record, but I am closing in on it. I will not be drawn on the possibility of serving yet another, given that my right hon. Friend the new Prime Minister has only been in office for a day. She and I did sit together on the NSC, as well as in Cabinet, and one can always look at these things again. It is not for me to instruct the new Prime Minister on how to run her Cabinet, but I will certainly ensure that my right hon. and learned Friend’s suggestion is passed on.

    The NSC is a significant improvement on what went before it, in my right hon. and learned Friend’s time in government, and it is certainly an improvement on the kind of sofa government that the Chilcot report exposes. The NSC does not operate in a vacuum. The National Security Adviser, who attends it, is now a well-established position in Government, supported by a strong team, and the NSC and the adviser are supported by a structure of cross-government boards and sub-committees, to which the Ministry of Defence makes a full contribution. To answer the point raised by the Chairman of the Defence Committee, there is no shortage of ways in which the views of the chiefs are brought forward in that structure.

    Dr Julian Lewis

    I see a slight contradiction in the Secretary of State saying that it would over-complicate the machinery of the National Security Council if the heads of the armed services were allowed to form one of its sub-committees, given that there is evidently no shortage of other sub-committees. The fact remains that it is easier for politicians with bees in their bonnets to sweep aside the views of the Chief of the Defence Staff as a single individual, which appears to have happened in the case of Libya, than it is for them to sweep aside the views of the heads of the armed forces collectively. I wish that the Secretary of State would not be so resistant on this point.

    Michael Fallon

    As I have said, the heads of the armed forces are represented on the National Security Council by the Chief of the Defence Staff, and the Chief of the Defence Staff who has been serving up to now is certainly not likely to be disregarded by the politicians who sit on the committee. Both he and his successor—I hope that the House will welcome the arrival of the new Chief of the Defence Staff today—are well able to hold their own against the politicians.

    Clive Lewis

    Would the Secretary of State acknowledge that Baroness Neville-Jones, one of the architects of the NSC, has said that the secretariat that co-ordinates the NSC is understaffed and under-resourced? Another criticism is that there is a lack of outside expertise being brought into the NSC, and that more use could be made of such experts.

    Michael Fallon

    I read the Baroness’s speech, and I advise all Members to have a look at the debate on this matter in the other place. It had some memorable contributions, including from people who were actively involved at the time. The point that the hon. Gentleman makes about the need for external expertise has been made before. External expertise is of course available to the different Departments, and I am convinced that the new machinery is a massive improvement on what was there before.

    Mr Andrew Mitchell (Sutton Coldfield) (Con)

    I think that the Secretary of State has laid to rest the canard that the NSC operates without expertise, but I should like to reinforce that point. It is evident from the 2010 example of the strategic defence and security review that we on the NSC conducted, and from subsequent events, that expertise from the greatest experts in the country is frequently heard and always available to the NSC. Such expertise also populates the significant briefing papers that go before the NSC and informs the judgments that it makes.

    Michael Fallon

    I can confirm that that is exactly the position. There is no shortage of briefing for members of the NSC. They are able to bring that expertise to the regular meetings of the council and to question the experts who are present. The recent strategic defence and security review shows how a cross-Whitehall approach is being implemented in practice and leading to better decision making.

    Tom Brake

    On that point about cross-departmental arrangements working more effectively, does the Secretary of State feel that any of the lessons identified in Chilcot in relation to reconstruction in Iraq might already have been fed through in relation to what happened in Libya? It is not obvious that that is the case.

    Michael Fallon

    I shall talk about the lesson on the importance of planning for reconstruction in a moment. I just want to finish this important point about the machinery of government.

    The Ministry of Defence has revamped its strategy and policy making with the institution of an annual defence plan that reflects the outcomes of the strategic defence and security reviews, with senior leaders in the Ministry being individually held to account for their role in delivering it, and a defence strategy group, chaired by the permanent secretary and the Chief of the Defence Staff, to address how Defence can best contribute to delivering defence and security policy objectives.

    Mr Baron

    I am listening carefully to what my right hon. Friend is saying, but this is not just an issue of how best to encourage communication and expertise within the system; Chilcot was also saying that there was a lack of investment and proper sighting of events on the ground. That can be put right only through long-term investment to ensure that we are better sighted, so that we have a better idea of what is actually happening on the ground and the consequences of our actions. Does he agree that that is another important lesson to take from the Chilcot report?

    Michael Fallon

    Yes, I do. Defence intelligence and the gathering of information on the ground have improved and are more available to those taking the key decisions back in London.

    Ian C. Lucas

    This is an important area, but the right hon. Gentleman has focused almost exclusively on the Executive. One of the most important lessons of Chilcot is that the most effective opposition to the decision, which many now accept to be wrong, was from the Back Benches. When the Front Benches agree, groupthink—to use his own phrase—applies. The lesson is that we need to listen to independent-minded Back Benchers who present their views to Government honestly and passionately regardless of the consequences for their careers and who make difficult decisions that Ministers need to listen to much more closely in future.

    Michael Fallon

    I accept that. I was here at the time and voted in that particular Division. It is important that the Government listen to their Back Benchers. We were not in government then, but it is important that Members are free to speak their minds independently. Indeed, they have done so in the debate that we have been having over two days—on both sides of the argument. There are those who still maintain that the action taken in Iraq, although it did not turn out as well as we wanted, was justified and right.

    Alex Salmond

    Speaking as a Back Bencher, the right hon. Gentleman’s new colleague the Brexit Secretary, the right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden (Mr Davis), said that in situations of peace and war the House must rely on the Prime Minister of the day telling

    “the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth”.—[Official Report, 13 July 2016; Vol. 613, c. 362.]

    Does the Defence Secretary agree?

    Michael Fallon

    Members and Ministers should speak the truth in this particular House, but whether the Prime Minister of the day deliberately misled the House was investigated exhaustively by Sir John Chilcot in the report and I do not want to add any more to what he said.

    I turn now to the issue raised by the right hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Tom Brake) about stabilisation. Since the Iraq war, the Government have increasingly focused first on prevention rather than intervention. We have been helping to build capability with partners and tackling the problems of fragile states at source, which has been possible only because we are now spending 0.7% of our GDP on international development. By helping fragile states to promote good governance, tackle corruption, and build capacity in defence and security forces, we can stop crises turning to the chaos that we have seen. That requires insight and understanding, often into complex situations. We have set up the cross-Government conflict stability and security fund, building on the conflict pool that had been in place for some time and supporting delivery of country or regional NSC strategies.

    All that promotes a much stronger culture of cross-Government working on strategy, policy and delivery in fragile and conflict-affected countries. An example of our success in that so far was the recent deployment to Sierra Leone to combat Ebola, where diplomats, the military and officials from the Department for International Development worked alongside each other. The stabilisation unit that we set up has continued to develop, so we now have experts on hand to deploy in post-conflict situations anywhere in the world, at short notice. I have seen for myself how civilian advisers are now routinely part of military exercises, ensuring that military and civilian staff gain experience of working together before they are deployed, so that development and humanitarian needs get the consideration and attention they need, alongside the military planning.

    We are now trying to make sure our armed forces are properly equipped and resourced. Not only are we meeting the NATO commitment to spend 2% of our GDP on defence, but our defence budget is growing for the first time in six years. That is on the back of the successful efforts we have been making since 2010 to return financial discipline to the Ministry of Defence and balance the defence budget. That is the foundation for the strong focus now on delivering an affordable 10-year equipment programme, allowing us to invest in the right equipment for our armed forces. That programme will total at least £178 billion on new military equipment over the next decade.

    Martin Docherty-Hughes

    I am glad that the Secretary of State has come to this point about members of the armed forces and their equipment. Will he expand on how this learning opportunity will support those who come back from conflict—crucially, the reservists, who take up much of that challenge and who fell off the radar after Iraq?

    Michael Fallon

    We have taken a lot of measures to involve the reserves more closely with the regulars now. After Iraq, we have been learning more rapidly the lessons from each deployment, particularly those from Afghanistan, to ensure that in future we do not have to wait for the kind of report that Sir John Chilcot has produced, and we are able to learn the lessons as we go and as units return, so that they can be applied to the next units taking up those roles.

    Strategic defence reviews take the balance of investment decisions, including where our main equipment priorities lie. Routinely, decisions on how that money will then be invested rest with the service chiefs, giving them the freedom, and the responsibility, to make decisions on how best to apply their resources, and obliging them to be very clear about where they are carrying risk in respect of potential equipment failures or shortfall. Where changing circumstances or unexpected threats lead to shortfalls, we should be ready and able, quickly and effectively, to make good any shortcomings.

    The Chilcot report recognises that the MOD and the Treasury, between them, worked hard to develop and refine the urgent operational requirements process. As the former Prime Minister told this House, that process did deliver results and new, improved equipment into theatre quickly in the Afghanistan campaign, responding immediately to the needs of our armed forces there. One of Chilcot’s most troubling observations is the lack back then of a clear focus of responsibility for identifying capability gaps during enduring operations. The new post of Deputy Chief of the Defence Staff for Military Capability that has since been established fulfils that role.

    As well as properly equipping and resourcing our people, the Government have a duty to ensure the welfare of our armed forces and their families, and then to ensure that they suffer no disadvantage when they return to civilian life. By putting the armed forces covenant into law and committing resources to it, we are making sure all those who put their lives on the line for this country get the help and support they need.

    But however much we have done, and however much things have changed and improved since the Iraq campaign, the question for this House is to judge whether or not we have done enough. My answer is: no, of course we have not yet done enough. It is evident that the Chilcot report contains many harsh lessons still for us to learn. Given its length and forensic detail, it will take us some more time to analyse and to do it full justice. What is clear to me is that we now need to take a long, hard look at our decision-making processes and our culture to satisfy ourselves that misjudgments similar to those made at the time could not recur.

    Pete Wishart

    The Secretary of State is right that we must take account of all those things, but surely the public expect somebody to be held accountable for what was the biggest foreign policy disaster, probably, since the war. What is he going to do about that? The public demand to know that somebody will be held responsible for what happened.

    Michael Fallon

    The Chilcot report itself holds to account those who were involved and took the key decisions, and it makes its judgments on them. It is for them, not for me, to respond to those judgments and to account for the actions and the way in which they took their decisions at that time.

    On the decision-making culture, the detail of the committees and the machinery of government which we discussed a few moments ago is not the stuff of headlines and speeches, but Chilcot shows us that some of these internal procedures of government are important. He sets out in pretty stark terms what happens when those structures—and the opportunities that they provide for the proper flow of information and challenge—are missing or are bypassed.

    In defence, we have transformed in recent years our approach to risk. We have a clear focus of responsibility in each key area. We have designated risk duty holders and it is their responsibility to come to me if they believe that the levels of risk in their areas are becoming excessive. I expect military chiefs and commanders now to show the same degree of rigour and transparency with respect to operational planning.

    Our organisation and culture must not prevent our people from challenging and questioning institutional assumptions, even if those assumptions are made by their superiors. That was a point eloquently made yesterday by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve), and it was made again by the hon. Member for South Antrim (Danny Kinahan) today.

    That view is fully shared by the current Chiefs of Staff—each of whom served in different roles during the Iraq campaign, including the outgoing and the incoming Chief of the Defence Staff—and it is shared by the permanent secretary. We are committed to leading defence through a period of rigorous reflection, analysis and improvement, and I am determined to make that improvement happen. I need, and the House would want me, to be absolutely sure that when our servicemen and women are deployed in future—and, inevitably, that is when, not if—nobody will be able to point to Sir John’s report and justifiably accuse us of repeating the same mistakes. I want to give the House an assurance that Sir John’s report will not be the last word.

    In conclusion, our strategic defence and security review reminds us that we are living in an ever more dangerous world. Despite the report and the Iraq campaign, we must still be ready to act, as we have shown in our participation in the international coalition campaign against Daesh in Iraq and Syria today. We must remain as committed as ever to protecting our people and standing up to any kind of terrorism or aggression that seeks to destroy our very way of life. Sir John and his team, I repeat, have done us all a great service. Their work will enable us to learn the vital lessons from those operations in Iraq and ensure that we are not condemned to make the same mistakes in future.

  • Clive Lewis – 2016 Speech on the Iraq Inquiry Report

    Below is the text of the speech made by Clive Lewis, the Shadow Secretary of State for Defence, in the House of Commons on 14 July 2016.

    My hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham North (Mr Allen) took the words right out of my mouth with regard to your presence, Mr Speaker. One can tell how good a debate has been when Members find themselves nodding vigorously, no matter from which side of the House the points are being made. I think that that has happened quite a lot over the past two days.

    I am honoured to be closing this debate on behalf of the Opposition. The Chilcot report is an extraordinary piece of work and I hope the whole House will join me in congratulating Sir John Chilcot on his efforts. He took a fair amount of flak during the lengthy writing of it, but it seems clear that it has been worth the wait. The report is in the very highest and noblest traditions of our country. It has unflinchingly shone a light both on crucial decisions made by our leaders and on how those decisions were made. It has not ducked from shining that light at the very highest levels of our Government—indeed, at the very top.

    It would be naive to suppose that complete openness is always possible in government, especially over matters as grave as going to war. None the less, openness will always ensure that our policies have a firm moral foundation. As a great American jurist once said,

    “If the broad light of day could be let in upon men’s actions, if would purify them as the sun disinfects”.

    The report has let sunlight in on much that some would prefer to remain hidden. It is the most comprehensive and devastating critique we have had of the individual, collective and systemic errors that added up to the failure in Iraq—a failure whose consequences we are still dealing with and will have to deal with for many years to come.

    I wish to pay tribute to comments by hon. Members on both sides of the House. Over two days, we have heard contributions from, among others, my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe) on the opportunities the report provides to learn lessons for the future, from the right hon. Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell), who emphasised the need for war to be seen always as a measure of last resort, and from the right hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve), who ably chairs the Intelligence and Security Committee and spoke with particular insight about some of the legal questions involved in the decision to go to war and about the failures of intelligence, which were also raised by my right hon. Friend the Member for Derby South (Margaret Beckett), who has served as Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs and therefore speaks with considerable authority on these issues.

    Many Members, including the hon. Members for Argyll and Bute (Brendan O’Hara) and for South Dorset (Richard Drax), talked about problems with military equipment, as did the hon. and gallant Member for Plymouth, Moor View (Johnny Mercer) in what I thought was one of the finest speeches of the debate. The hon. Member for Salisbury (John Glen) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central (Hilary Benn) were among the many contributors yesterday who spoke about the lack of adequate planning for the post-war reconstruction phase. As the right hon. Member for Gordon (Alex Salmond) pointed out, the same mistake was repeated in Libya, where the Government spent 13 times more on the military campaign than on post-war reconstruction.

    The hon. Member for Bracknell (Dr Lee) made the case for better leadership on such matters and urged that the House and the Government learn from the Iraq report to build public trust in politics, politicians and the big decisions we inevitably must make on the public’s behalf. The knowledgeable and right hon. Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis), who chairs the Defence Committee, reminded us that it did not require hindsight to predict the many tribal and religious hatreds unleashed by the war and its aftermath. The hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) reminded us that we are elected to act in good faith, yes, but also with good judgment.

    The speech that I felt best captured my personal anxieties was that of the hon. Member for Basildon and Billericay (Mr Baron), who made more insightful comments than I have time to list. He spoke of the need for a more holistic approach to defence in both soft and hard power, and warned us that the continual budget cuts to the FCO undermine our ability not just to respond to global security threats, but to pre-empt them.

    I want to focus on two topics that stand out to me: civilian casualties and equipment failures. Sir John estimates that there were at least 150,000 Iraqi fatalities, but suggests that the number is probably much higher. He notes that a proper assessment of the likely number of civilian casualties was not made before the invasion and that there was no systematic recording of casualties after the war had started. In one of his most scathing remarks, his report concludes:

    “More time was devoted to the question of which department should have responsibility for the issue of civilian casualties than it was to efforts to determine the actual number.”

    Today, it seems that Whitehall has yet to learn from this mistake. In the air campaign against Daesh, the Government insist that not a single civilian has been lost in almost two years of UK airstrikes. This seems literally incredible. Ministers give cryptic answers to questions about how they assess the damage caused by airstrikes, how they distinguish between combatants and civilians, and what they mean when they say they will consider all credible reports of civilian loss of life. The Government’s continued lack of transparency on this issue is troubling. I urge the Secretary of State, in the light of the report, to look again at how his Department monitors and collates information on civilian casualties.

    The exposure of equipment failures is one of the gravest findings in the report. Chilcot sheds new light on this by documenting the sheer scale of the problem. Shortages of helicopters and armoured vehicles had terrible consequences. Day after day we saw Snatch Land Rovers that were designed for riot duty in Northern Ireland blown to bits by huge roadside bombs. There were also shortages of uniforms, boots and even such basic necessities as toilet paper. Some units even had to borrow rations from the Americans; one unit became known as “the Borrowers”. Some of the soldiers who died in Iraq were still teenagers, and it is a disgrace that they were sent there so woefully prepared. Although we understand that it is literally impossible to plan for every equipment need and contingency, we can never again let such catastrophic failure occur.

    I want to pay a personal tribute to the families of our troops who died for their dogged and persistent pursuit of the truth about these equipment failures. Their steadfastness to the cause was heroic. I and everyone who saw some active service in the years that followed owe them a deep debt of gratitude. We got the kit their sons and daughters did not get. I, for one, will never forget the commitment to this cause that they showed. It undoubtedly saved many lives, and I hope that that knowledge can bring them some small consolation.

    I have spoken about some of the specific failings identified in the report, but I must also speak of the much wider failings that a report of this scale and quality makes clear, such as the failure of this House sufficiently to hold the Executive to account on matters as grave as taking this country to war. Chilcot tells us that we must never allow a rush to war to blind us to facts or their absence. We must never allow a debate to be closed down with snide imputations of a lack of patriotism, or by the kind of macho posturing that suggests that those who urge caution, who demand evidence and who want proof when allegations of the gravest seriousness are made are somehow cowardly or undeserving of a voice.

    The guardianship of this country’s future and the future safety of the world are issues that require not the posturing bravado of adolescence, but mature wisdom and a readiness to accept that every voice in this Chamber is worthy of our fullest respect, because those voices have been sent here as representatives of the British people, in all their variety and complexity, and we all speak for Britain here. If we speak again of a rush to bomb the odious Government of President Assad, we should not be derided as supporters of the Assad regime. When, just two years later, we are told that we must now bomb President Assad’s enemies in Daesh and we ask the question, “How will this bombing achieve our aims?”, we must not be told that we are soft on terrorism. We are demanding evidence of a coherent long-term plan that is backed with credible evidence and sufficient resources to achieve a lasting peace, founded on justice.

    I am not a pacifist. My grandfather, of whose armed service I am deeply proud, was a paratrooper in the Normandy landings, and I have already mentioned my own service. I will always demand, however, the highest standard of proof for taking our country to war, and I will never apologise for that. These are literally matters of life and death, and the British people deserve better than political posturing.

    Ultimately, if we cannot face and accept the consequences of our actions, we cannot learn the lessons and we cannot make wiser choices in the future. I hope that when we discuss issues of the gravest possible importance next week—those relating to Britain’s nuclear capability—this House will do so in a spirit of due humility and awareness of our shortcomings. We are not infallible, and when we are making choices of such gravity, we must speak with the very best part of ourselves and not stoop to political point scoring.

    Let me conclude by quoting the words of the former Foreign Secretary and now deceased Member for Livingston, Robin Cook. In his resignation speech, he said:

    “The longer that I have served in this place, the greater the respect I have for the good sense and collective wisdom of the British people. On Iraq, I believe that the prevailing mood of the British people is sound. They do not doubt that Saddam is a brutal dictator, but they are not persuaded that he is a clear and present danger to Britain. They want inspections to be given a chance, and they suspect that they are being pushed too quickly into conflict by a US Administration with an agenda of its own. Above all, they are uneasy at Britain going out on a limb on a military adventure without a broader international coalition and against the hostility of many of our traditional allies.”—[Official Report, 17 March 2003; Vol. 401, c. 728.]
    There it is in a nutshell: we went to war without the support of international alliances, institutions or our allies, without sufficient evidence and without the support of the British people. Some Members saw that, and they are to be congratulated on their honesty and moral integrity in saying so at the time. We were railroaded into war. That was shameful, and it must not happen again.

  • Tom Brake – 2016 Speech on the Iraq Inquiry Report

    Below is the text of the speech made by Tom Brake, the Liberal Democrat MP for Carshalton and Wallington, in the House of Commons on 14 July 2016.

    I welcome the fact that the Government have allocated two days for this debate. This is an opportunity to remind the House that although all Members considered the same evidence, presented to the House by Mr Blair, some—from all parties—came to a different conclusion from others about whether military action was timely or legal.

    The hon. Member for Plymouth, Moor View (Johnny Mercer) is no longer in his place, but I thank him for the service that he has given this country, as have other Members. I reassure him that although I, along with many other Members, marched against the Iraq war, I have always been fully supportive of our troops who were dispatched by our Government to fight that war, or indeed any other war. I have no criticism of them; I might have some for their senior officers, but that is a different matter.

    Since the publication of the Chilcot report, Lord Campbell of Pittenweem has provided a helpful summary of events in a speech in the House of Lords:

    “We know that the Cabinet was not provided with the full, detailed opinions of the Attorney-General. Sir John Chilcot forcefully finds that that was not proper and should not happen again…He found that military action was not yet the last resort, that diplomatic options were still available, that there was no imminent threat, that Dr Blix and Dr ElBaradei were still able to fulfil their responsibilities, and that there were conflicting views about Resolution 1441. When you add to that Article 2 of the United Nations charter which prohibits regime change, it is a legitimate judgment that this was not a legal war.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 12 July 2016; Vol. 774, c. 135.]

    We also heard from Lord Tyler, who said that Chilcot was explicit that

    “going to war without a majority in the United Nations Security Council ‘undermined the authority of the UN’.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 12 July 2016; Vol. 774, c. 144.]

    The Liberal Democrats have always put great stead on the importance of supporting the United Nations.

    In the same debate, Lord Beith focused on some of the inadequacies in preparation, from a military perspective, by the Ministry of Defence, and asked why there was inadequate preparation for the known dangers of improvised explosive devices, and a failure to provide adequately armoured vehicles. I would therefore like to speak for a few minutes about the focus on post-conflict reconstruction—an area that has not had much of an outing today. Better planning and preparation for a post-Saddam Hussein Iraq might not necessarily have prevented the events that have unfolded in Iraq since 2003, but Chilcot identified the major issue that there was no planning to speak of at all for the post-conflict stage.

    Before I was elected, I worked in project management, and a cursory examination of paragraph 590—on page 78—onwards of the report’s executive summary highlights that if we consider the work done in Iraq as a project, it failed the most basic tests of initiation and execution for even the smallest project. For instance, is it clear who was responsible for which tasks? Paragraph 593 says no, and that

    “the UK assumed that the US would be responsible for preparing the post-conflict plan”.

    Were there any contingency plans? Paragraph 601 says that none were made for the possibility of the UK being drawn into a huge commitment of UK resources. Is there clarity about who had the power to take decisions? Paragraph 603 stated that no one had sufficient authority

    “to establish a unified planning process across…the FCO, the MOD, DFID and the Treasury.”

    Was it clear who was in overall control? Paragraph 609 states that no single person was in charge of

    “overseeing all aspects of planning and preparation”.

    Were sufficiently trained and experienced people available? Paragraph 610 states:

    “The FCO…was not equipped by past experience…to prepare for nation-building of the scale required in Iraq,”.

    Were the assumptions challenged? Paragraph 618 states that assumptions were not systematically challenged, and that in fact, they were very seldom challenged. Any project manager—even the most junior one—in IT, construction, or any other field, who designed a project that was as poorly planned, initiated, resourced and executed as this one, would have been sacked. Yet in 2002-03, our Government planned to invade a country, support regime change, introduce democracy, and rebuild the Iraqi infrastructure without so much as a plan written on the back of a fag packet. This lack of planning for the post-conflict period was one of the most shocking aspects of the Iraq war.

    In conclusion, the Iraq war and its legacy—internecine religious war, some 180 UK troops killed, many casualties, car bombs, suicide bombers, hundreds of thousands of dead Iraqi citizens, millions displaced and instability—reverberates around the region to this day. We can argue about whether this was all linked directly to our intervention in 2003, but I do not think anyone could claim that our intervention in 2003 helped to stabilise Iraq—on the contrary. What we need from the Minister today is reassurances that the UK Government will never, ever again launch into such a reckless adventure on such a flimsy premise, with so little preparation. I wonder whether the Minister will be able to give us that guarantee.

  • Johnny Mercer – 2016 Speech on the Iraq Inquiry Report

    Below is the text of the speech made by Johnny Mercer,  the Conservative MP for Plymouth Moor View, in the House of Commons on 14 July 2016.

    Thank you, Mr Speaker, for this opportunity to speak in the debate. The Chilcot report, published last week, made sobering reading. Many things have been said already on the issue—I shall not repeat them—and the chief protagonists at the time have received, in my view, fair criticism. I am in the fortunate position of both having been in the Army at the time of the Iraq war and now being a Member of this place. I did not serve in combat in Iraq; my theatre was another unpopular war, in Afghanistan.

    At the time of the Iraq invasion, the Army was a strange place to be, particularly if you were just beginning your career. It is difficult to be positive about a mission when over 1 million people march against your deployment just before you go. But it is testament to the character and professionalism of the UK armed forces that the initial operation was the success that it was, despite cruel losses—including from my own regiment on 23 March 2003, when Ian Seymour, Les Hehir and Welly Evans of 29 Commando were killed during the insertion into southern Iraq.

    However, what happened following the initial operation in that country and for the following seven years—indeed, perhaps right up to today—has been a tragedy for Iraq. I visited the country last autumn and met the President. It remains a place of extreme violence, heavy corruption and deep division. It was a challenge to return from a visit to Baghdad with much of a sense of optimism, although recent changes in the Iraqi security forces, and the international coalition’s mammoth efforts in the fight against Daesh, give real cause for hope, and I want to pay tribute to all UK forces engaged in that fight today.

    How did we get to this point? I absolutely understand the public rage. The actions of some of those at the top of Government at the time—and yes, at the top of the military—were negligent. I am concerned, however, that the public’s fixation on Tony Blair could make us miss some of the learning points that must be taken from Sir John’s comprehensive work. Those learning points are the whole point of this process. It was encouraging to hear the Prime Minister who left office yesterday say that it would be impossible for these events to happen again today because of the structures he and his team had put in place, and I commend him and the Secretary of State for Defence for that.

    However, there is a deeper issue here—one of basic moral courage—that I have found most distressing. In the military, that moral courage can be a rarer and therefore more treasured commodity in an organisation configured to imbue and nurture physical courage in the face of the enemy. That ability to stand up for your men in the face of a seemingly unstoppable sequence of events, and to speak truth to power, is an integral part of the military’s duty to this nation. We drill it into our subordinates and we preach it to anyone who will listen. So where was that courage in the build-up to this disastrous war?

    It is inconceivable to me to allow a political Administration in this country to hamper preparations for war because they did not politically want to be seen to be making those preparations. It is inconceivable to me to allow soldiers out of patrol bases and into contact with the enemy without body armour, not as a tactical decision or a result of enemy action against a supply route, but simply because of bad planning. It is inconceivable to me continually to allow patrolling in Snatch Land Rovers when they were known to provide no protection whatever to our men and women against a well known and obvious threat from improvised explosive devices. But those things happened, and they directly cost UK military lives. These lessons must not be missed amid the almost visceral fixation of hatred on Tony Blair, lest we do a further disservice to our men and women who serve.

    The Prime Minster does not make tactical decisions. She does not plan logistics; she is advised by those who do. I cannot in all honesty conceive of a time when I, as a very junior and insignificant commander in another unpopular war in Afghanistan, would ever have sanctioned an operation knowing that it lacked the equipment required to protect my men from a threat that I clearly knew about, because I was not prepared to say no. I find it hard, as do many of my cohort, to understand why that was sanctioned, yet it was.

    We as a military betrayed the individuals who lost their life in this conflict as a direct result of equipment shortages. That is the point that really sticks in the craw. The political arguments and the strategic comings and goings will be debated ad infinitum, as they must be, to ensure that we do not make the same mistakes again, but the military and tactical lessons must also be learned. What happened in Iraq had a profound effect on my whole generation of junior commanders in the military. We grew up with a deep sense of distrust in our superiors as a result of their actions, or lack thereof, during the Iraq war. That affected many of us at a formative stage in our career.

    Finally, I want to speak strongly against the idea that the lives of British servicemen and women were somehow wasted in this war, or that they died for nothing. I simply cannot reconcile it with my not insignificant personal experience of commanding men in combat that lives lost in the pursuit of protecting the freedoms and privileges that we enjoy in this country were lost in vain. For the families, many of whom I know intimately, nothing—no mission, no cause—can be worth losing a loved one. As a soldier, however, I feel that I must represent the intimate conversations we shared, and the deep motivations that we fell back on to get through yet another day in the sweat, heat, blood and dust of these recent wars. We soldiers are drawn from all backgrounds, races, religions, colours and creeds. We all have different views—usually much more informed than anyone gives us credit for, and no doubt crafted by our own personal experiences—but we wear one uniform, with one Union Jack on our sleeve. We sign up to the same core value of protecting this nation, in exactly the same tradition of immense sacrifices as our forefathers, who wore the same cap badges and were under the same flag.

    The truth is that, when a soldier leaves his patrol base in the morning, he is not thinking about how his particular contribution that day will help to advance the cause of Iraq’s future prosperity or Afghanistan’s place in the world. He is not thinking about whether we should have believed the dossier about weapons of mass destruction or whether he is going to stumble upon Osama’s house in downtown Sangin. He is thinking of calling his wife later, of covering his arcs and of trying not to blink in case he misses something. He is making sure he has some spare batteries for his radio. He is more frightened of letting his mates down than he is of the enemy. He is more focused on doing his section, his platoon, or his battalion proud than whether he should be there in the first place. In those endeavours he is showing that courage, that fortitude, that resilience, that commitment, that discipline and that humanity that we all aspire to on the most revealing stage of all: warfare, where norms do not exist and brutality and raw human emotion are everywhere.

    We aspire to those things because they are good, because they are noble, because they are to be desired, and young men and women made sacrifices demonstrating such qualities, which those of us who witnessed it and were lucky enough to return refuse to remember as futile. They did make a difference. They saved comrades’ lives through their bravery. They shielded civilians from a brutal enemy intent on showing the very worst of humanity. They improved individual communities and made them safer and better—perhaps not on an overall strategic level, but it was not all a waste. That courage, that resilience, that discipline, that commitment, they are what we must remember from these conflicts. They cannot and must never be forgotten, for that would be an even greater betrayal than the ones laid out in the report. The lives were not wasted; they were engaged in noble pursuits in the generational struggle of our lifetime.

    In conclusion, let us learn these painful lessons. Let us not fixate on Tony Blair—he is yesterday’s man. Let us not commit to things that we cannot fulfil and pass the buck to the lower end of the command chains.

    Mrs Madeleine Moon (Bridgend) (Lab)

    I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving way and for his powerful speech. One thing that has always worried me about the Iraq war debate is the idea of the military as victims who were forced to go to fight when they in fact were trained and wanted to do so. What they did not want, however, was bad equipment, and they do not want bad equipment today. Does it not behove this House and its Members to be much more interested on a daily basis in what we are providing service personnel with, rather than just focusing on past decisions?

    Johnny Mercer

    Absolutely. I thank the hon. Lady for her intervention. We have come an extraordinarily long way. The processes at the time were simply unacceptable. Under this Government and this and previous Defence Secretaries, we have made real progress, but she is right that we do not want sympathy. We want a little more empathy and understanding of what we are doing. There is sometimes too much sympathy. We sign up and are proud to do so, but we do not expect to be ill- equipped or to be part of a mission that is ultimately badly planned and resourced.

    Let us never lose the courage to speak truth to power—no matter our rank or position in life. Let us remember with humility the courage and sacrifice of our servicemen and women in Iraq. Let us make sure that we learn the lessons for the hundreds of thousands who lost their lives on either side, civilian or military. The human race can only evolve if we learn, and I sincerely hope we do.

  • Rob Wilson – 2016 Speech on Local Charity Day

    robwilson

    Below is the text of the speech made by Rob Wilson, the Minister for Civil Society, in London on 14 July 2016.

    Good Morning.

    Thank you Pauline for your introduction.

    Many thanks to The Leatherseller’s Company for hosting us. Our civil society has a long, proud history so it is fitting that today’s event is generously hosted by an organisation with a similarly rich history.

    Today, as our civil society continues to evolve, we still see the same selfless generosity, warmth of spirit and sheer determination to make a difference.

    The result of the EU referendum is bringing about change for our country. In light of these changes, our work with you is becoming even more imperative.

    We must continue building a bigger and stronger society with compassion at its heart – small charities and community groups exemplify this spirit.

    It is one of the great privileges of being the Minister for Civil Society that I see first-hand your amazing work.

    A few weeks ago, I visited a small, local charity in Guildford called Halow, which supports young people with learning disabilities. I was privileged enough to meet with their beneficiaries and to see the impact that Halow has on their lives.

    Following this meeting I will visit MyBnk, which empowers young people to take charge of their futures.

    Yet whilst small charities make up 97% of all registered charities in the UK, all the media coverage seems to go on the big guys.

    It ignores what the vast majority are doing, day in, day out, to serve their communities.

    Through tough times, I’ve been impressed to see many small, local charities adapting to challenges by finding different sources of funding and banding together to reduce costs.

    It is impressive to see these charities adapting whilst keeping focus on what is best for their communities.

    Local Charities Day

    We should shout from the rooftops about the energy, the commitment, the expertise that small and local charities bring.

    And that’s why I am delighted to announce plans for a Local Charities Day – a celebration of local charities and community groups that will take place later this year.

    Raising their profile to help them get the recognition they deserve.

    We want to help small, local organisations become more independent, more resilient and more sustainable. That is why we are building capability, encouraging giving, supporting investment and cutting red tape.

    On capability: through our Local Sustainability Fund we granted over 260 smaller organisations close to £18 million to help them secure and improve the future of their services.

    The Small Charities Fundraising Training Programme has helped hundreds of small charities increase their income. A great achievement.

    On giving: we have provided match funding for fundraising campaigns like Localgiving’s Grow Your Tenner because we want to get more people giving to small local charities.

    The Independent Dormant Assets Commission could help government identify hundreds of millions of pounds for good causes too. This will become a big opportunity for small, local charities.

    On investment: I launched our new £80 million Life Chances Fund last Monday. This fund will develop more Social Impact Bonds, helping charities and social enterprises get the finance they need to deliver payment by results contracts.

    Good for charities, great for local public services.

    But as small and local organisations reach out into their communities, I am only too aware that small charities have been impacted by the poor fundraising practices of some large organisations.

    That is why we have supported the setup of a new Fundraising Regulator. That regulator will put the public back at the heart of fundraising.

    I have been very clear that small, local charities should not be unduly burdened by any changes to fundraising regulation.

    In fact, we have cut red tape for small, local charities, by raising the audit threshold from £500k to £1 million.

    As you can see, small and local charities are a major focus of our work.

    But I want us to do more.

    To get this work right, I need to hear directly from small and local charities and all of you here.

    Fundraising

    Organisations like the Foundation for Social Improvement and the Small Charities Coalition tell us that fundraising, public services and governance are vital issues.

    Let’s take the first one: fundraising.

    The reason we are all here today is to discuss how to encourage more giving to small and local civil society organisations.

    Take for example organisations with an income of £100,000 or less. They make up 83% of the sector in terms of the number of charities. But they account for less than 5% of the total income.

    So how do we help direct resources to all the small, local groups?

    It is part of my mission as Minister for Civil Society to challenge how we can do more to encourage giving and philanthropy.

    A recent report by New Philanthropy Capital suggests that an additional £4 billion could be unlocked from the affluent in Britain. That is serious money.

    Many on high incomes already make huge contributions to causes close to their hearts. Some of you here today are amongst them.

    Yet studies show that overall those on higher salaries give less, relative to their income.

    I want to know what more we can do to encourage giving by those who have more. That’s our focus for the second roundtable this afternoon.

    I want these roundtables to have a real impact on our next steps, within government and across the sector.

    That’s why government is committing up to £1 million over the next 2 years. £1 million to take forward ideas that develop our culture of giving.

    I’ll be particularly interested in ideas that bolster the efforts of small and local groups to fundraise effectively.

    So please don’t be shy in sharing your views!

    We also need to raise awareness of their vital work. Too often it goes under the radar. We need to change this.

    That is why I said earlier, I want to hold a celebration of local charities and community groups later this year.

    And as part of that celebration, we will encourage giving to these groups.

    So we will offer £250k in match funding for a fundraising campaign that does just that.

    Helping them to raise vital funds for their work on the front-line. Helping them to reach new donors. And helping them get the recognition and support they deserve.

    Public services

    Let me now turn to the second issue: public services. We greatly value the positive impact that small, local charities can have. These organisations work hard to reach communities and those most in need. They can improve the outcomes of public services.

    We want to unpick the barriers that prevent charities from playing an effective role in improving public services. That is why we are hosting a series of open policy events.

    Governance

    And the third issue, governance and leadership in civil society organisations: These must be of the highest quality to enable the sector as a whole to reach its full potential.

    The sector itself must take the lead in this. But government recognises we have a role to play.

    This is why we are developing joint proposals with our partners in the sector for stronger leadership and governance. This work will support small, local organisations in particular.

    The results of all these conversations will drive what the Office for Civil Society and Innovation does to support small and local charities in the next phase of our work.

    And we will share what we are going to do as a result.

    Small and local charities are passionate about the people they help. They serve their communities. They are accountable to them.

    I will be doing all I can to ensure these responsive, locally engaged and committed organisations get the recognition they deserve.

    Thank you.

  • Jim Shannon – 2016 Speech on the Iraq Inquiry Report

    Below is the text of the speech made by Jim Shannon, the DUP MP for Strangford, in the House of Commons on 14 July 2016.

    It is a pleasure to speak in this debate, and to follow the previous speakers, who have a great wealth and depth of information and knowledge to bring to it. If I wanted to sum up my comments I would say, “Mistakes made and lessons learned.”

    British forces peaked at 46,000 during the invasion phase, but of course due to the way the tours system worked at the time, more actually served. I pay tribute to the 179 very brave and courageous servicemen and women who gave their lives during the campaign, and also to those gallant Members of this House and the other place who served.

    The Chilcot inquiry and report have raised many questions, and the general public need answers. The lack of answers on key issues is the cause of much of the public’s rage. We followed the American lead without properly analysing intelligence. That is absolutely clear from the now public comment of Mr Blair to the then President of the United States:

    “I will be with you, whatever”—

    unconditional support.

    We need to be much more discerning about the way we interrogate intelligence material and information. It is imperative to note that the plan for success was absent. In 2003, there was outrageous and unexpected success, for which we had no plan. No one was able to foresee Hussein capitulating so early, and thus Iraq fell apart with no one to deliver the stable, successful programmes that existed, such as the oil for aid programme. We did not have a plan, a vision or an understanding of what would happen if we were successful in battle at that time. The vacuum that plunged the entire region into instability is felt strongly to this day, not only in the region but across the world.

    We also did not understand the complex society of Iraq. There was no understanding of cultural sensitivities or local divisions, sectarianism or politics, which meant that our presence was further resented as time went on and things did not get better. There was also the unprecedented Shi’a majority uprising in Basra, where the Iran-Iraq war was most pronounced. All these things were unforeseen.

    We cannot keep sending forces to places that they are unprepared to go to, in terms of equipment and understanding the reason. Estimates of the length of time a mission may take need to be more conservative and honest in future, not only to prepare our armed forces fully, but to regain the much-damaged public trust. I was not a Member of this House at the time of the Iraq war, but constituents have come to me who were sending socks, boots, food, body-warmers and, on one occasion I am aware of, body armour, to their people in Iraq. There is something wrong when our people serve overseas and we, their families, have to send them stuff the Army should give them when they first go out. There needs to be an honest conversation about that.

    A lot of the things that went wrong can be explained by a lack of resources. We simply have not got the capacity to fight on so many fronts anymore. It is now clear that we greatly underestimated the capability of the enemy. What worked against rocket-propelled grenades in Ulster was not fit to take on 250-lb improvised explosive devices in Iraq. That is another important learning point that must be taken forward.

    I want to talk about veterans, and the family support package when the soldiers were away. At that time, just two soldiers were left at headquarters to look after family affairs, and given the number of deaths and injuries, the situation became almost overpowering for them. I know things have changed, and I welcome those changes, but we have to build on this and make sure that the veterans are not forgotten, as some in the past have been. We need foresight, and we need to build on lessons learned and to continue learning, so that we only move forward in how we treat our armed forces.

    I want to talk about the pension of a gentleman who served in uniform. His story will be well known to those who read The Sunday Times. His name is Chris Braithwaite, 41, a former major in the Duke of Lancaster’s Regiment who served in Afghanistan, the Balkans and Iraq. He said:

    “When we were in Basra, we were subjected to rocket and mortar attacks daily for seven months. This was a great worry for my wife, Laura, but we believed that the financial support which is provided by the army in recognition of long service would reflect that family sacrifice—until the rug was pulled from under us.

    On the same day that I received the Queen’s diamond jubilee medal in recognition of my service, I was given the news that I would be made redundant just 87 days short of the 16 years’ service I needed to receive an immediate pension.”

    We are talking about people who fought for Queen and country. They did their bit, but when they needed support back home, it fell short with a vengeance. We must take care of our veterans. We must make sure that they receive absolutely first-class service from the state. It is vital that they are offered, and get, the best.

    I have asked this question before and I ask it again today: will we see the statistic some day that more Iraq veterans have committed suicide than were killed in the conflict? We must confront the issue of how we treat our veterans. The Chilcot report gives us the opportunity to do just that, and it must be fully assessed. More British soldiers and veterans took their life in 2012 than died fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan over the same period. These are statistical facts. I do not like having to put them before the House, but we need to recognise them.

    I want briefly to mention the reserves. This is another imperative issue, and there could be awful consequences if it is not addressed. We were using the highest number of reservists on record, and we have no method of tracking what happened to them when they came home, or of finding out whether they have fallen victim to any of the problems associated with veterans. Despite all this, the number of reservists was cut from 45,000 to 30,000 after the Iraq war. Clearly there needs to be a rethink.

    Referring to the former Prime Minister, Tony Blair, the Belfast-born commander Tim Collins, who led the Royal Irish Regiment into Iraq in March 2003, has said:

    “It may well be he was actually drunk on his self-importance having had successes in Kosovo and Sierra Leone, and having brokered the Good Friday Agreement, he genuinely believed he could do no wrong”.
    This is in keeping with the

    “I will be with you, whatever”

    memo that was sent to President Bush. It is increasingly clear that our soldiers were being sent to war by Tony Blair, no matter what. Tim Collins said at the time that people believed there had been a plan in place for the aftermath. Sadly, we all know now that this was not the case, and the results of the lack of planning were disastrous for too many. It is easy to point the finger at Tony Blair, but there were others involved. Alastair Campbell, Geoff Hoon and others in that circle of friends, or of decision makers, should take this on board as well.

    Right hon. and hon. Members will be aware of the poem by Rudyard Kipling entitled “Tommy”, and I should like to read out two verses from it—the second and the fifth. Its theme is just as applicable today as it was in its time.

    “I went into a theatre as sober as could be,

    They gave a drunk civilian room, but ’adn’t none for me;

    They sent me to the gallery or round the music-’alls,

    But when it comes to fightin’, Lord! they’ll shove me in the stalls!

    For it’s Tommy this, an’ Tommy that, an ‘Tommy, wait outside’;

    But it’s ‘Special train for Atkins’ when the trooper’s on the tide

    The troopship’s on the tide, my boys, the troopship’s on the tide,

    O it’s ‘Special train for Atkins’ when the trooper’s on the tide.”

    And:

    “You talk o’ better food for us, an’ schools, an’ fires, an’ all:

    We’ll wait for extra rations if you treat us rational.

    Don’t mess about the cook-room slops, but prove it to our face

    The Widow’s Uniform is not the soldier-man’s disgrace.

    For it’s Tommy this, an’ Tommy that, an’ ‘Chuck him out, the brute!’

    But it’s ‘Saviour of ’is country’ when the guns begin to shoot;

    An’ it’s Tommy this, an’ Tommy that, an’ anything you please;

    An’ Tommy ain’t a bloomin’ fool—you bet that Tommy sees!”

    We have a duty to look after our veterans, and to ensure that those who have served this country well are looked after.

    The Iraqi vulnerable persons resettlement scheme was set up after the war, but it has not delivered the capacity that it should have. The current reflections on Iraq are important, but they will have no impact on the ongoing dire situation in that country. The right hon. Member for Leeds Central (Hilary Benn) made the point yesterday—I shall make it again today—that many Yazidis, Shi’as, Syriac Catholics, Protestants, Sabean-Mandaeans and Sunnis, as well as many others, continue to be targeted by Daesh on the basis of their identity. Around 3.3 million have been displaced due to the instability in Iraq, and many minority groups are on the verge of disappearance.

    In June, the United Nations independent international commission of inquiry on Syria determined that Daesh had committed genocide against the Yazidis. Around 90% of Yazidis are Iraqi. Despite this evidence, the Gateway, Children at Risk and Mandate resettlement schemes, which are not nationality-specific, have taken in only a very low number of Iraqis—up to 300 in 2015. While some Iraqis might fit all the criteria under the current Syrian vulnerable persons resettlement scheme, they are not eligible for asylum in the UK because they are not Syrian nationals.

    I want to call for a modest expansion of the SVPRS and the Iraqi vulnerable persons resettlement scheme to permit Iraqis who fit the SVPRS vulnerability criteria to qualify for asylum in the UK. A modest expansion is particularly pertinent, because Iraqis have suffered as much as their Syrian counterparts at the hands of Daesh, and the death toll in Iraq continues to rise. The UK cannot absolve itself from assisting Iraqis, and making them eligible for resettlement in the UK, with the UNHCR’s recommendation, is the least we can do.

    We have heard about the mistakes, and we can learn from them and move forward. We can make the world a better place for our soldiers to serve in, with the uniform and equipment that they should have and with the support for veterans and their families that they need when they come home. Let us learn from the Chilcot report, and from those mistakes, and move forward.