Lord Harlech (Con)

My Lords, I am extremely grateful to the Minister and to all noble Lords who took part in this short but important debate, which encompassed both the importance of the Reserve Forces and just some of the challenges that they face. When I was a Government Whip and I sat there, it used to snap me when people—usually the person speaking to an amendment—would go round the houses and repeat everything we had just heard. Everyone in this Committee has been here for this group of amendments, so we know what was said and I will do not that. However, let me say that I am grateful for everybody’s contributions; this has been an important group. The Minister gave us an assurance that reserve service personnel will be covered by the Armed Forces commissioner. I just want to pick up on that point. I agree that there must be active communication, as my noble friend Lord Colgrain said, but the Ministry of Defence needs to be very careful in terms of what it thinks is active communication. It might think that sending an email to everyone’s MoDNet email address is communication. I have been in the reserves for six years and I got my MoDNet laptop only two weeks ago, so please do not assume that one pathway and one stream of communication will capture everybody. There needs to be a multifaceted approach to how the roles, responsibilities and rights of reserve forces personnel—as well as how those intertwine with the Armed Forces commissioner—are communicated. With that, I thank noble Lords and beg leave to withdraw my amendment.