Mr Mark Francois

When I have finished this point, yes. The Forces Pension Society points out that the system is recoverable because the changes are subject to a consultation and are not currently due to come in until April 2027. Nevertheless, this is still a potentially worrying situation, especially for armed forces families in which parents are in a committed relationship with multiple children but have not, for whatever reason, decided to marry. We were prepared to give the Minister the benefit of the doubt about that in Committee. Indeed, without wishing to be uncharitable, when I raised it he seemed slightly taken aback by the problem. I say that because my suspicion is that when the Treasury came up with this, the Ministry of Defence was blissfully unaware of it. I therefore suggest that MOD Ministers may not be directly at fault, but it is nevertheless their personnel and families who may be affected. Towards the conclusion of the Committee, I strongly suggested to the Armed Forces Minister that he should take this away for discussions with the Treasury, as there will be a consultation exercise on the changes before they come into force in the 2026-27 financial year, with the opportunity to change the policy and avert the problem.