Guidance

VAPC London: meeting minutes 22 June 2022

Updated 19 September 2024

Venue: Barclays Rise, 41 Luke Street, London EC2A 4DP with some members joining using Microsoft Teams

Time: 4pm to 5.30pm

Present

• Sir Bill Charles (BC) – Chairman
• Caroline Flynn Macleod (CFM)
• Annabel Goulding (AG)
• Carl Hunter (CH)
• Bishnu Gurung (BG)
• Robin Herzberg (FRH)
• Matthew Neave (MN)
• Larry Stone (LS)
• Alex Woolgar-Toms (AWT)
• Frances Luczyc Wyhowska (FLW)

Apologies

• Jim Blake (JB)
• Oliver Leeming (OL)
• Nick Mazzei (NM)
• Wendy Morris (WM)
• Charles Perrett (CP)
• Alpa Raja (AR)
• Brian Willmore (BW)

Welcome

The chairman welcomed everyone to the meeting.

Apologies for absence

It was noted that JB, OL, NM, WM, CP, AR and BW had been unable to attend.

Minutes of 23 March 2022 meeting

The minutes, which had been circulated, were approved and ready to be sent to the Ministry of Defence for publication.

Action: BC

Reports from the teams

FRH had prepared a report on the work of the National Steering Group on Employment and Transitioning which included three members from London (FRH, LS and FLW), one from the East Midlands (Stav Melides), one from the Southwest (Guy Williams) and two members from Wales (Bev Garside and Lisa Rawlings). Issues discussed included (i) continued focus on understanding and sharing best practice on employment and transitioning across the regions (ii) sharing information on apps such as Civvy Street, Leafguard, Jobopp and Forces Connect (iii) encouraging the UK Government to fund dedicated Armed Forces Liaison Officers across all local authorities in the UK (iv) encouraging employers to sign up to the Armed Forces Covenant, the Defence Employer Recognition Scheme and the Guaranteed Interview Scheme (v) requesting regional data on Career Transition Partnership performance from MoD so we can evaluate the performance in each of our regions and (vi) encouraging MoD to focus on people who are likely to struggle during transition rather than having a blanket approach to all leavers.

AG briefly updated on the work of the National Steering Groups on Finance & Debt and on Veterans & The Law.

LS suggested using contacts in other regions to increase our public engagement especially with members of parliament.

FLW reported on her recently discussions with the CEOs of various veterans’ charities and on her recent visit to Europe in support of veterans.

BC’s Report / Reporting of the members of LVAPC as the regional group under the TOR and as LVAPC

1. BC expressed his strong view that our role should be to provide to the minister, from an independent and informed standpoint, views on whether Veterans UK and the Office of Veterans Affairs are delivering to an acceptable standard. However, Veterans UK and the Office of Veterans Affairs are repeatedly asserting that we need to demonstrate to them that we are delivering on the strategy and the covenant. This seemed to invert the process, especially in the context that the minister has accepted our proposal that we should have oversight of the performance of Veterans UK. Nor had there been any discussion so far on the implementation of this agreed recommendation. BC also said that it would be inappropriate for Veterans UK and the Office of Veterans Affairs to be involved in deciding how VAPCs are governed if the independence of VAPCs was to be preserved.

2. BC also expressed his concern that no progress had been made on finding a sponsor to take our private members bill through parliament and, in that context, committee members were faced with a decision individually on whether they wished to continue serving on the London VAPC in the context that most of our work, particularly on the welfare of veterans, remained outside the scope of our remit as defined by the legislation currently in place i.e. the War Pensions Act 1921 (as amended).

3. CFM, CH, BG, FRH, LS and FLW all indicated that they were prepared to continue membership of the VAPC, despite the lack of legislative support, in the context that the Terms of Reference provided some cover for any work outside the scope of the act. AG, MN and AW-T echoed BC’s concerns about the lack of legislative support and said they would consider the matter further and would revert to BC in due course. There was a widespread view that members would only want to continue if the leadership of BC as chair continued to be available.

4. BC confirmed, that in this context, he was prepared to continue as chair of the committee.

5. BC also expressed the view that the best way of making an impact was to get our recommendations into the London regional report and, from there, into the national summary report to the minister. This national summary report had been previously prepared a member of the Southwest VAPC, Anica Alvarez Nishio, and he hoped that Anica would continue to undertake this important task.

6. It was noted that a Scottish Member of Parliament was seeking a public inquiry into the administration of the Armed Forces Pension Schemes and that this might help our cause. After the discussion the following was agreed:

• (i) there was general support for the approach in BC’s report and subject to alteration of the recommendation on employment and transition after further discussion with FRH and LS for the recommendations in that draft were supported
• (ii) to give BC the authority to complete the report by the members of LVAPC, to support or refuse support for the summary prepared by Anica or any other proposed document / summary or letter proposed under the reporting process in the relevant timescale (BC indicated that if practicable he would circulate documents before they are finalized and would consult with a FRH and LS on the passaged relating to employment and transition
• (iii) the aim of the report is to show how the members of LVAPC (and its parallel group) see the product of their projects being by reference to what to what they see as the best way in which they can add value to the achievement of the Veterans’ Strategic Plan
• (iiiv) to include the description of the planned work provided by Alex Page. It engages the identification of needs, resources and has a link to AFC issues, initiatives and other good practice
• (v) to complete the part relating to employment and transition by adopting the report of the national steering group on employment and transitioning and the earlier work on this area by our team – this work clearly links to AFC issues
• (vi) to complete the part relating to the work thus far with Members of Parliament as reported to the meeting by CFM – which also has a link to AFC issues, initiatives and other good practice
• (vii) as in the draft to refer to the housing project which is also likely to engage the AFC, initiatives and other good practice
• (viii) as in the draft to reaffirm the LVAPC position on the issue relating to standard tasks of Veterans UK in administering the compensation schemes – and this links to an objective of the national finance team
• (ix) as in the draft to reaffirm the LVAPC position on the issues relating to a statutory base for VAPC members and so the need for the Private Members Bill
• (x) save as recorded above members did not identify (i) what other areas are most likely to engage the AFC in London – both in respect of the duty and its wider application and take up or (ii) experience / knowledge that addresses any of the issues in the headings of the template
• (xi) It was also noted that the chair of each chair was due to submit their next regional support in November 2022.

Next steps

It was agreed that the focus of future work would be through (i) our membership of the various national steering groups and (ii) the work being undertaken Alex Page and others to map veteran support across the London boroughs.

Any other business

FRH mentioned that he had become aware of a notice on the MoD website that [military] units are “advised…to utilize” the Service Insurance and Investment Panel, an organization which is “recognized by the MoD”. He said he was making inquiries about the nature of the panel, whether MOD had made an assessment to make sure there was fair competition for these services and how competitive the panel’s charges were.