Armed Forces Bill

Part of the debate – in the House of Lords at 3:47 pm on 31 October 2006.

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Photo of Lord Craig of Radley Lord Craig of Radley Crossbench 3:47, 31 October 2006

My Lords, in Committee I expressed reservations about the wording of Clause 8. It was convoluted. It identified tasks that, if not fulfilled, would mean that an offence of desertion would have been committed. I tabled a probing amendment to allow the Minister to explain why we should accept Clause 8, whose definitions of desertion differ significantly from those used in the existing single-service Acts. Those identical definitions were introduced by the Armed Forces Act 1971, which amended the Naval Discipline Act 1957 and the Army and Air Force Acts of 1955.

The Minister's response did not satisfy me. He admitted that,

"the wording of the clause takes more than one reading to be clear to the layman".

But servicemen are laymen, not lawyers, apart from a very few people in the legal branches of the services. Is it too much to expect government support for plainer English in the Bill?

The Minister suggested that the wording of the existing Acts meant that:

"If a soldier were due to go to Germany for a training exercise but went absent because of some temporary trouble at home, he would be guilty of desertion, rather than merely absent without leave. That would be too harsh".—[Hansard, 24/7/06; col. 1636.]

I agree. If temporary trouble at home were the sole reason for his absence, surely he should never have been charged with desertion. But if he was to go to Germany and absented himself and there were indicators that that was, in the words of the amendment,

"with the intention to avoid serving", in Germany or anywhere else overseas, then a charge of desertion would seem appropriate.

The definitions of desertion in subsection (2) of the amendment are taken, word for word, from the existing legislation; the only variation is the splitting of the second definition into two parts. That is to limit a punishment of up to life imprisonment solely to someone found guilty of desertion before the enemy. Compared with the convoluted wording of Clause 8, these definitions are much clearer. Can we not stick to them? Subsection (3) of the amendment follows the wording in Clause 8(4) but is adjusted to restrict the punishment of life imprisonment to someone found guilty of desertion when before the enemy.

My understanding is that the present legislation has not proved defective in achieving convictions for desertion. It is well known throughout the three services; it is a straightforward, much clearer definition than that in Clause 8. In view of the major and complex tasks faced by all three services in transferring from existing legislation to the new Act, it would seem sensible and highly desirable to avoid changes and differences, where possible. If the existing definitions are retained in the new statute, there will be no need to re-write that part of the manual of service law. Each of the existing Acts covering the three services uses the same wording.

I also dislike the reliance on specific tasks as part of the new definition. That does not arise in the three existing Acts or in my amendment. As I pointed out in Committee, the reference to "property" in Clause 8 leaves many questions unanswered, given the definition of that word in Clause 374. Clause 8(3)(c) on,

"military occupation of a foreign country or territory", defines a relevant service. But does a "country" or "territory" include those of the European Union or the Commonwealth? We might be expected to help out if there were a problem in one of those. What about British overseas territories, where a service man or woman might be posted? I expect that there may be answers based on legal expertise to some of these points, but I should like them to be clear to non-legal service personnel as well. I raise them to underline my concern at the way in which the clause is constructed, with its complex definitions of "relevant service". It may not be as all-embracing as the authors had intended.

I also asked in Committee whether "occupation" covered every conceivable situation from a large-scale invasion to a few servicemen being attached to a unit of the country or territory at the relevant authority's request. I have not had a response to that.

My probing amendment in Committee sought to give the Minister the opportunity to explain why it was thought necessary to introduce a totally different construct to describe the offences of desertion. It is totally different from the existing one, which all three services have relied on for more than 35 years, since 1971, and which they will rely on until the new Act is introduced. The Minister was not able to help in Committee but perhaps he can this time, and I shall listen with care to his response. I beg to move.