Government Should Honour our Armed Forces with a 'Veterans Covenant' - Burstow

The lack of support for veterans and confusion over what services are available to servicemen and women once they leave the armed forces was put on the Parliamentary agenda today (Wednesday 13th Jan) when Sutton and Cheam MP Paul Burstow co-sponsored his new 'Veterans Welfare Bill'.

Concerned by reports that too many veterans end up with inadequate access to health services or financial support, Mr Burstow is co-sponsoring legislation proposed by his colleagues Michael Moore MP, under the '10 Minute Rule' procedure, that would introduce a 'Veterans Covenant' setting out a duty of care for veterans in the same way that the Military Covenant does for serving members of the armed forces and their families.

Mr Burstow believes that the Ministry of Defence should be obliged to ensure that veterans' needs are properly assessed and their access to support monitored appropriately. His Bill seeks to improve the coordination and implementation of existing support programmes available for those who have served in the armed forces, and would require the Secretary of State for Defence to report to Parliament on veterans' welfare issues on an annual basis.

Commenting Paul Burstow said:

'Ministers quite rightly pay tribute to the sacrifices that our armed forces make on our behalf, but the simple fact is that in many cases the level of support they receive from the Government is unacceptable.

'Making the Government's responsibilities to our veterans explicit and ensuring that information on welfare is accessible can only improve the quality of services offered to former servicemen and women around the UK.'

'It is only right that the assistance offered to our veterans after they leave the armed forces reflects the extent of the sacrifices that so many of them have made on our behalf. I believe that the measures proposed in my Bill would be a positive first step towards addressing the failures that have left some veterans isolated, vulnerable and out of pocket.'

ENDS.

Notes to Editors

The outline of the Veterans' Welfare Bill Mr Burstow co-sponsored today (13 January) is as follows:

'That leave be given to bring in a Bill to require the Secretary of State to review and report to Parliament annually on the support provided to armed forces veterans across the United Kingdom in respect of access to health services, access to welfare schemes and access to other support, and for connected purposes.'

Proposals in the Veterans' Welfare Bill will include:

• The establishment in statute of a Code on Veterans' Welfare ('the Veterans' Covenant') which will set out a 'duty of care' to veterans and the right to an individual 'needs assessment' (at the time of leaving the armed forces and at key points in later life) which spells out to which health, financial and other services they should have priority access and an agreed means for producing a monitoring report, at appropriate points, showing how they have accessed those services
• Placing a duty on the Ministry of Defence to implement the Veterans' Covenant by (1) leading and co-ordinating the work of UK government departments and liaising with the devolved administrations; (2) maintaining a Register of Veterans which records the needs assessments and results of the monitoring reports; and (3) preparing an analysis of the issues arising from a review of the monitoring reports
• Requiring the Ministry of Defence to report to Parliament annually on the implementation of the Code and the review of the Register of Veterans

Background information:

Problems faced by veterans include:

• Priority access to the health service (including mental health services)(1)
• Access to housing and employment advice (2)
• Lack of financial support (3)

Current failings:

• Veterans who need help are often unaware of the support they are entitled to claim. (4)
• Those responsible for providing assistance are often unclear of the requirements. (5)

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1 Figures obtained by the Liberal Democrats have shown that only 50 of the total 31,700 individuals in Scotland eligible for a war pension benefited from the NHS priority treatment scheme between the introduction of the programme in 2008 and July 2009.

2 Research conducted by York University on behalf of the Ex-Service Action Group on Homelessness suggested that there were around 1,100 homeless veterans in London during 2008. www.veterans-aid.net/pdf/esag.pdf

3 Research from the Royal British Legion (RBL) has shown that many veterans have been forced to wait an unacceptable amount of time before receiving grants to which they are entitled. In the case of Disabled Facilities Grants, the RBL found that a number of local authorities get around statutory time limits for issuing grants by delaying taking a formal application forward until many months after the applicant initially approaches them for assistance.

4 In an Ipsos-Mori poll of 491 people who had contacted the Royal British Legion regarding War Disablement Pensions, only 36% were aware that they were entitled to priority medical treatment. www.britishlegion.org.uk/campaigning/the-legion-manifesto/veterans--their-families

5 In a 2009 survey of 500 GPs, 81% of those questioned said they knew not very much or nothing at all about priority treatment. Furthermore, 85% had not informed secondary care providers of a veteran's entitlement to priority treatment in the past 12 months. www.britishlegion.org.uk/media/205299/manifesto-veterans.pdf#nhs