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My Lords, this first group of amendments addresses the scope of the Armed Forces covenant. I will speak to Amendments 1, 2, 3 and 4 in my name, and I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Smith of Newnham, for her support. They all relate to page 2 of the Bill and all, after the word “forces” on lines 13, 16, 19 and 21, seek to insert the words “and the Royal Fleet Auxiliary”. The modest amendments in this group correct an anomaly in the Bill as a whole and give clarity and certainty to the RFA, which is widely acknowledged by us all as a vital part of the Royal Navy and the UK’s national security and defence.
In winding up at Second Reading, the Minister addressed the position of the RFA in acknowledging that the Government have given the Armed Forces Commissioner responsibility for RFA personnel in Clause 31. Given this, it seems nonsensical that the RFA is covered in this way in one part of the Bill but not in another. Are the Government really saying that RFA personnel are recognised as part of the broader Armed Forces community when it suits, yet fall outside of the statutory legal duties applied to that community for members of the Regular and Reserve Forces? Can the Minister explain why the RFA is included in the commissioner’s powers but is excluded from the rest of the Armed Forces covenant?
The Minister is aware that I have been focused on the status of the RFA for some time. It is my belief that it is a vital, but always overlooked, part of our defence. The main issue stems from the unique position of the RFA as a civilian-manned naval auxiliary fleet owned by the Ministry of Defence. Rather than accounting for the risks and sacrifice they take as seafarers supporting military operations, the Government seem to view RFA personnel as just another type of civil servant. This is to fundamentally misunderstand their role and function.
Let us not forget that members of the RFA work to the same standards and are trained alongside other military personnel, and, if they are deployed on military operational service, they come under the same rules and regulation as the Royal Navy. At this time of constrained resources, they are frequently tasked with roles that would formerly be given to warships. They are not civil servants.
I noted that, during the Recess, Veterans Minister Calvin Bailey visited RFA “Tidespring” and “Mounts Bay”, where improving the welfare and morale of the crew, and supporting their families, was high on his agenda. The Minister was quoted as saying that the RFA had slipped from public consciousness, despite quietly underpinning operations, as he described it, like a “big … Swiss Army knife”.
Like other branches of the Armed Forces, the RFA has experienced considerable recruitment and retention challenges. Recently, in order to fulfil its remit, the RFA was having to move personnel between vessels, stretching the workforce dangerously thin and leading to questions about whether ships could be crewed effectively and safely. Commodore Sam Shattock, head of service, has sought to address this. He has had to reduce the operating fleet for now, but he has also reviewed the training and career framework to streamline progression and ensure that personnel are developed and deployed more efficiently. I am pleased to note that recruitment is increasing and that applications have reached their highest level in five years.
I am heartened also to hear that the new Armed Forces Commissioner has already met Commodore Shattock and is fully aware of the unique position of the RFA. On assuming office, she stated:
“Ultimately, my purpose as Commissioner is simple: to ensure the lived experience of those who serve is understood, valued and continuously improved”.
This Bill includes those who serve as part of the RFA in her remit, and the Minister has previously acknowledged that members of the RFA are part of the Armed Forces community, so again I ask: why are they not included in the provisions of the Armed Forces covenant in Clause 2?
My amendments would result in a very small extension of the covenant by numbers. If you take a total Armed Forces population of around 140,000, plus veterans and families, we are talking about only an additional 1,700 serving RFA members, plus veterans and families. It is an increase of less than 1.5%.
The RFA population would welcome recognition as beneficiaries under the Armed Forces covenant: a covenant founded not on status but on military service, such as that provided in areas of conflict and crisis by members of the RFA. My amendments would give these men and women the clarity and recognition they deserve.
Defence Minister Luke Pollard recently told the Portsmouth News:
“We’ve got the opportunity to reset the relationship with the seafarers within the RFA, and it means we can start the process of valuing the RFA more. I feel they have been undervalued in the past”.
The Government can start the process of valuing the RFA more right here, by accepting my amendments. If the Minister does not wish to accept them then, given our shared appreciation for the men and women of the RFA, I look forward to his response and his explanation of why not. I beg to move.
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My Lords, as I set out at Second Reading, I am supportive of the Government expanding the scope of the Armed Forces covenant, building on the work the previous Government undertook in the Armed Forces Act 2021. I say to the Minister that although, as the Minister, I was somewhat diffident about this expansion, now that this Government have seen fit to provide it, I am 100% in there and want it to work as well as possible.
My amendments in this group are intended to strengthen that legal duty. As drafted, the Bill extends the covenant legal duty to four persons. New Section 343AZA(4) specifies that those persons are
“a national authority; a local authority; an education body; a health body”.
New Section 343AZB(2) sets out the definition of “national authority” as being
“a Minister of the Crown, within the meaning of the Ministers of the Crown Act 1975; the Welsh Ministers; the Scottish Ministers; the First Minister and deputy First Minister in Northern Ireland acting jointly, a Northern Ireland Minister or a Northern Ireland department”.
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My Lords, I gave way to the noble Baroness, Lady Goldie, precisely because she had her name first on a set of amendments in this group. I am delighted that I did so because in the previous Parliament, when she sat on the Government Benches and the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, now the Minister, sat on the Opposition Benches and I still sat in this corner, I kept encouraging the Government to expand the Armed Forces covenant—not only in the way the previous Government sought to do, but to bring it within the purview of the Government and make it a duty on them. At Second Reading, I welcomed the provisions of the Bill. I am delighted that the previously diffident former Minister, now sitting on the Opposition Benches and speaking for His Majesty’s Loyal Opposition, sees how important it is to expand the Armed Forces covenant.
The amendments brought forward by the noble Baroness, Lady Goldie, and the noble Earl, Lord Minto, are valuable. Quite whether we need the level of detail in them, or how we go about them, needs to be thought about. I am sure the Minister will have all sorts of reasons why these specific amendments might not be the best way of doing it. I hope that, in his response, he can explain whether the noble Baroness is right that currently, HMRC, or the proposed defence housing service, do not come under the requirement to be under a duty to the Armed Forces covenant. If they are not under that duty, I would be happy to work with the noble Baroness to bring forward amendments on Report. Clearly, we want to make sure that the duty is on the Government and public authorities more generally. I therefore very much welcome the thrust of this suite of amendments.
I also cosigned the amendments in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Fraser of Craigmaddie, very much for the reasons she articulated. The role of the Royal Fleet Auxiliary is crucial in our defence. RFA “Lyme Bay” is—or has been—in the Middle East, responding to a crisis. It serves our security and defence very significantly. As the noble Baroness pointed out, those on the Royal Fleet Auxiliary are not civil servants in a traditional sense. They may be civilians, but the service they are giving is the sort that would seem to make coming under the purview of the Armed Forces covenant appropriate. If His Majesty’s Government disagree with that idea, could the Minister explain why and suggest ways in which it can be ensured that civilians serving on the Royal Fleet Auxiliary are not suffering any detriment, which is exactly what the Armed Forces covenant is intended to countermount?
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I welcome this opportunity to discuss the scope of the Armed Forces covenant. I thank the noble Baronesses for the speeches they have made. I found what they said convincing, although I look forward to the response from my noble friend the Minister and expect I will find his reply even more convincing.
I want to take the opportunity to raise a practical example of where I hope the provisions in Clause 2, with or without the amendment, might make a difference. I suspect it will come as no surprise to the Committee that it relates to the role of the covenant in relation to the Armed Forces Pension Scheme. I should mention here that, in the past, I have been a paid consultant to the Forces Pension Society, and I thank the society for providing me with a briefing on the matters I am going to raise. I should add that it was when working with the society that I became aware of the practical significance that members of the Armed Forces place on the covenant. It is significant not just as some general principle but as applying to practical situations.
By way of background, the Armed Forces Pension Scheme provides a world-class pension, and it is an important bond in the relationship between those who govern and those who serve—otherwise known as the Armed Forces covenant. It is designed to incentivise service, maximise the human element of defence’s operational effectiveness, facilitate servicepeople’s transition to civilian employment and provide for a dignified retirement. That is why I have been concerned by the recent reports of veterans being told that they must repay substantial sums of pension that they have received because those pensions were calculated incorrectly at some point in the past. The issue has received considerable coverage on the BBC, and in the Times, the Telegraph, the Express and the it Paper.
Please bear with me in explaining the problem, because the scheme’s administrative arrangements are a little complicated. Defence Business Services is responsible for the scheme through Veterans UK. It has contracted in turn Sopra Steria to deliver the pensions. Sopra Steria has in turn sub-subcontracted Equiniti as its paymaster, and the system is overseen by the Armed Forces Pension Board, supporting the Secretary of State for Defence as the scheme manager. There are clear doubts about how Defence Business Services, Veterans UK, Sopra Steria and Equiniti should be held to account. There are other problems, but I want to highlight the disappointing pattern of overpayments in areas such as pension sharing on divorce, early departure payments, guaranteed minimum pensions and national insurance modifications. Between 1,000 and 2,000 members have received such overpayments, which indicates a lack of rigour in calculation, inadequate training, a lack of oversight and paucity of quality assurance.
I will give the Committee two examples. I will not name the individuals involved, but the circumstances illustrate the problem. One is a 72 year-old veteran who served in the Army for 31 years, reaching the rank of warrant officer class 1, but who faces having to repay a pension overpayment of £37,500. This arose from four separate errors in the calculation of his pension. The second example is a 70 year-old former RAF flight lieutenant who was overpaid by £32,000. He queried the increase when he first received it but was told it was correct. Years later, he has now been told that there was indeed an error, and it is he, not the administrator, who is liable for repayment. It is worth noting that there are many cases with higher overpayments, but these cases illustrate the complex nature of the problems members face.
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My Lords, I will speak very briefly to support strongly what the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Brixton, just said. He brought to our attention a most significant failure in how Armed Forces pensions have been paid, calculated and mispaid.
It would be extraordinary to be told—but it appears that we will be told this—that the contractors have no obligation whatever to correct the mistakes that they have made, and that they will not be charged under some legal system to make repayments for the mistakes that they have made. It is also extremely important for those who are obliged to pay back, or are being asked to pay back, that the system they will work under is explained to them rapidly and quickly. Every day that goes by, they do not know what is to happen, and, as has been pointed out by the noble Lord, Lord Davies, some considerable sums are involved.