MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Four visiting British MPs leave the Islands “far more aware”

Four British Members of Parliament left the Falklands on Saturday at the end of a five day visit as the guests of the Royal Navy, under the auspices of the Armed Forces Parliamentary Scheme.

In the true spirit of the scheme, which aims, according to a press release from the Falkland Islands Government, "to give MPs and Peers, the vast majority of whom have no experience of the services, an insight into the life of Britain's armed forces that would not otherwise be available to them", the group had spent much of their visit, at sea, aboard HMS Chatham.

MPs Ed Vaizey, Tobias Ellwood, Nigel Evans and David Wilshire -Photo- , all coincidentally members of the Conservative Party, told local media on Friday that this experience of actually living with members of the armed forces, engaged in doing their job, had provided insights, which would not normally have been available on a short visit. All agreed that they would go away much more aware of the conditions faced by the sailors, soldiers and airmen involved in the defence of the Falklands.

The members of the group, which also included lone civil servant, Jason Bradbury, who works in the British Ministry of Defence's Analytical Services Agency, had discovered, for example, that the inmates of prisons in Britain had more telephone privileges than members of the forces serving in the South Atlantic and that despite the increased call on the British forces around the world, there were concerns within the ranks, mainly about pay and retention, but also about the speed with which certain units were being turned around to be sent back to operational theatres.

Despite such concerns, the MPs all concurred that this and successive British Governments were and would be, one hundred per cent committed to the defence of the Islands and to the Islanders' right to self-determination. This attitude was equally reflected in the British forces that they had met. Said Mr.Vaizey, "They all know why they are here, which is to send a clear signal to Argentina."

John Fowler (Mercopress) Stanley