Baroness Goldie (Con)

My Lords, in a similar vein to the previous group, I think I am pretty well on a similar page to the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, particularly on Amendment 25, which seeks to ensure that the service victims’ code cannot be restricted to exclude victims of sexual offences or domestic abuse. The amendment seems to me to close what looks like an unintentional gap. A servicewoman whose case is prosecuted in the civilian courts should not receive a lesser standard of service-provided support than one whose case proceeds through the service justice system. That seems to me a matter of basic fairness. I hope that the Minister will consider the merits of this amendment or at least explain clearly why, and in what circumstances, the Government believe that such an exclusion could ever be justified. Amendment 24, I suggest, requires greater caution. I infer from the remarks of the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, that she recognises that this has to be approached with care. The amendment would remove a commanding officer’s power to hear summarily any charge of assault or actual bodily harm where the conduct amounts to domestic abuse, requiring referral instead to the service police or the Director of Service Prosecutions. I do not dismiss the intention behind the amendment. There is a real and understandable concern that summary hearings may not be the right forum for allegations of this seriousness and that commanding officers, however well-intentioned, may not always be best placed to handle matters with the particular dynamics that domestic abuse involves. The reason why we must proceed with great care here is that the amendment touches upon the authority of the chain of command—something that is and must remain absolutely central to service discipline. It is that authority which underpins the cohesion and ultimately the ability of our Armed Forces to fight and prevail when called upon. Any change that narrows a commanding officer’s jurisdiction, even for good reason, has consequences that ripple outwards into how units are led and how discipline is maintained. Those consequences deserve to be understood before any legislation is enacted. I am not saying I oppose this outright. It may well be that this is precisely the direction that service personnel themselves want to see. I would not be surprised if many, particularly among victims, support exactly this change. But we do not yet know that with confidence and I am uncomfortable about pursuing so significant a shift in the chain of command’s jurisdiction on the basis of good intentions alone. What is needed is careful, structured consideration by the Ministry of Defence, drawing on the views of senior officers who carry responsibility for discipline across the force and, just as importantly, of the commanding officers at unit level who would actually exercise or lose this power. I ask the Minister to commit to precisely that engagement and to report back to this House on its findings before a change of this magnitude is made.