Al Carns

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Parliament's party history for this member: Labour (4 Jul 2024 – present).

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1. 3 Nov 2026·Parliament·Al Carns

   Young People and Work: Milburn Interim Report

   Nearly a million young people are outside education, employment or training. We call them NEETs, but we should consign that term to history as it defines them entirely by what they are not, and it tells us nothing about what they can do or how they can get there. I have been spending a lot of time in Selly Oak. Earlier this year, I brought local employers together to talk about what they were seeing. They told me that too many young people were reaching them without the confidence or basic communication skills needed to get into work. Some of those problems start exceptionally early: at 10 to 16, not 16 to 24. I have spoken before about boys and young men. Just 62% of boys are school-ready, compared with 75% of girls, and they fall further behind through school. The NEET rate nearly trebles at 18, when the statutory participation age ends. If school has not worked for them and there is no obvious next step, it is disappointingly easy to drift out of sight. I am convinced that we need employers’ involvement much earlier with work exposure to inspire, embolden and enlighten, and to close the gap between expectation and reality across the job market. The Government should be obsessed with closing that gap. As we invest in rebuilding British industrial capacity, we need to think about where the workforce will come from. If a company is expanding a factory with public support, who are we training to work there? If the company knows it will need technicians in five years, it should be working with schools and colleges much earlier. An apprenticeship will not be the immediate answer for everyone, as some young people will need help before they are ready or before an employer is willing to give them their first experience of work. The youth guarantee needs to reach those people. Alan Milburn estimates the annual cost of youth inactivity at £125 billion, which is an extraordinary amount of money. Minister, are we working across the Department for Education, the Department of Health and DWP? Are we working earlier with 10 to 16-year-olds? Are we closing the gap between expectations and the reality of the job market? We should be much better at bringing employers and education together, and in doing so we should consign the term “NEETs” to history.

   Hansard source
2. 20 Oct 2026·Parliament·Al Carns

   Northern Ireland Troubles Bill

   I have found the conduct of the debate, today and yesterday, deeply encouraging. It has been thoughtful and meaningful, and the passionate speeches that we have heard have informed my insight and understanding in respect of Northern Ireland veterans and of all the other issues. Indeed, my hope for democracy, candour and a progressive Parliament has generally been restored, following other debates that I have had the privilege of sitting in on. As you will know, Ms Ghani, I spoke to the Committee yesterday about some of the changes that the Government have made to the Bill. I am grateful to the Secretary of State for those changes: he has listened. The change on equivalence matters to me, as do protections against people being investigated again and again for some of <span id="1013" class="column-number" data-column-number="1013"></span>the same events. However, I still think that we have got the architecture of the Bill wrong from the start. What happens to outstanding inquests is of concern, and balancing truth and reconciliation with justice is almost impossible. Let me explain why. We have 38 inquests that have stopped. They will restart under the Bill; some will go back to the coronial system, while others will go to the legacy commission. It would be useful if the Secretary of State could tell me whether the inquests that sat with the Solicitor General can go straight to the commission, or whether will they need to be opened, as inquests, before they move to the commission following a recommendation.

   Hansard source
3. 20 Oct 2026·Parliament·Al Carns

   Northern Ireland Troubles Bill

   That is encouraging to know, but although these are deaths from the same conflict being considered decades later, we are deliberately providing two different routes for dealing with them. For more than 12 months I have recommended that we create a single centralised body to deal with the troubles-related issues. I know that there are some who would be uncomfortable with that, particularly those who represent families who have waited a very long time for an inquest, and I understand why that is. I am not suggesting for a moment that those families should lose the work that has already been done; the evidence gathered should go with the case. Nor am I seeking to prevent prosecutions. If the commission finds evidence that someone committed a criminal offence, whether that person wore a uniform or belonged to a terrorist organisation, that evidence should go to the prosecuting authorities. I am trying to get us to one process in which we can have some confidence. There is a reason why I feel strongly about this. We need to be very careful about the history that we are creating through the legacy process, and also to think about why it is impossible to balance truth and reconciliation with justice. The state kept a great many records during the troubles; of course it did. Operations were recorded and reports were written, and the people involved can often be identified. There is an enormous amount of material about what the British state did and did not do. The IRA and other terrorist groups did not keep operational records. There is no equivalent archive sitting somewhere with records of who gave an order, who carried it out, and what happened afterwards.

   Hansard source
4. 20 Oct 2026·Parliament·Al Carns

   Northern Ireland Troubles Bill

   I thank the hon. Member for the intervention, but when the records exposed threaten either national security or individual security, we must take that into account.<span id="1014" class="column-number" data-column-number="1014"></span> Yesterday, I think we all agreed that families deserve justice and answers, and indeed that many want closure, but with the majority of the murders during the troubles and conducted by terrorist organisations remaining unsolved, there just is not the evidence to get to the truth or to justice. I would like to ask: how is the Bill going to change that? Let us think about that. How is this Bill going to change the amount of evidence, and where is the new evidence to come from? I think we need to be honest with the families: do we genuinely believe that ex-IRA or Unionist terrorists are going to come and give information to this process? If by coming forward to offer information to provide answers that would at the same time self-incriminate the witness or individual providing the information, how many will participate? I hear people talk about Ireland and about new biometric and forensic evidence-gathering capabilities, but there just is not the evidence to get to the truth. The reality—I could be wrong, and if I am proven wrong, I will hold my hand up—is that very few terrorists, if any, will come forward. The quest for the truth will rely on slivers of new evidence—and I mean slivers, although that does not mean we should not investigate them—that are found or indeed that arise from Ireland opening and giving the UK access to its extensive archives. Do we believe Ireland will do that? It would be politically very difficult and legally painful, and indeed it would lead to questioning the reputation and moral compass of successive Irish Governments. We need to be honest with families: this Bill will not magically produce new evidence, and that creates a very real problem when, 30 or 40 years later, we try to establish the truth through legal proceedings. Material available to investigators is inevitably much richer on one side than it is on the other. If we put the cases through different processes as well, we will make the problem even worse. I have described this before as creating a hierarchy of truth. I do not mean that as a slogan, but something quite specific. What can be investigated most easily becomes what gets investigated most thoroughly, and what gets investigated most thoroughly produces the most findings. After enough years have passed, those findings start to become the history of the conflict. I do not believe anybody in this Chamber intends that to happen—I genuinely do not think that is the case—but intention is not really the point. We need to look at where the system we are building eventually takes us. The Bill is trying to prevent repeat investigations, and I welcome the work to do so. I will, however, give a small example. Soldier B from Coagh has not been charged, but has had eight years of legal process, and three court cases have ruled that his actions were justified and there was appropriate use of force, yet the family have received legal aid to take the case again to the Supreme Court. Soldier B is unlikely ever to be charged, but he has undergone eight years of legal uncertainty and will endure many more. This is not about prosecutions; this is about the process being wielded as the punishment. I come at this as a Labour MP. The Good Friday agreement asked an enormous number of people to do very difficult things. There were decisions made as part of that settlement that many people found very hard to accept, and still do. Prisoners walked out of jail, and people who had been enemies were expected to sit in <span id="1015" class="column-number" data-column-number="1015"></span>government together. Blair and Mo Mowlam understood that there was no settlement available that could somehow settle every account from the previous 30 years, but they were trying to stop another generation having to live the same argument. I worry that we are in danger of doing the opposite with legacy. In 10 or 15 years’ time, the Northern Ireland people’s understanding of what happened will come in large part from what is being established now. If over those years one part of the conflict has been examined again and again, because that is where records and people are available, while much of the activity of terrorist organisations remains beyond reach, we should not be surprised if people begin to draw conclusions from that. That would be a poor legacy for a Labour Government to leave them. None of this diminishes what families have been through. There are people—hundreds of people—who have spent decades trying to find out what happened to someone they loved. They are entitled to pursue the truth, and I would never vote for a system designed to deny it to them. However, I also know veterans who have lived for years with the possibility that somebody will reopen an event that has already been examined, sometimes more than once—in many cases more than once. Many of those people are now very old men, and we cannot keep pretending that endless process is the same thing as justice. The Government have chosen to strengthen the legacy commission, and I think that is the right thing to do. If we believe the commission can do this work, let it do the work. We should give it these outstanding cases and the material already collected and let the families take part, and if it finds evidence that belongs before a court, that is where it should go. Even the Joint Committee on Human Rights has questioned the justification for having two approaches to these revived inquests. I think that is a fair question, and I have yet to hear a convincing answer, other than that it will stress-test the framework agreement with the Irish.

   Hansard source
5. 20 Oct 2026·Parliament·Al Carns

   Northern Ireland Troubles Bill

   <em>rose—</em>

   Hansard source
6. 20 Oct 2026·Parliament·Al Carns

   Northern Ireland Troubles Bill

   I thank the Secretary of State for giving way. The reality is that, across the conventional force, we have seen an uptick in recruitment and a reduction in people leaving due to retention issues. It is the first time in 10 to 14 years that we have seen an increase—it is a huge success. We have to be careful of conflating two things that are going on within a more specialist community. One is a Northern Ireland Bill, which, whether we like it or not, does not resonate with the rank and file of the individuals in our community, and one is other inquests and inquiries that in some cases do. We need to keep a very close eye on that in the Ministry of Defence, and I am sure the Secretary of State will work with the Ministry of Defence to ensure we are monitoring it and putting remedial action in place, should that be the case.

   Hansard source
7. 19 Oct 2026·Parliament·Al Carns

   Topical Questions

   Drones are changing the way we fight and the structures used to fight. America is creating the robotic uncrewed systems combatant command; Germany is creating an uncrewed regiment; and the Ukrainians have created the Unmanned Systems Force. What projects are we moving forward with, to revolutionise the approach used in the Army, Navy and Air Force?

   Hansard source
8. 19 Oct 2026·Parliament·Al Carns

   Northern Ireland Troubles Bill

   It is an honour to follow the right hon. Member for Belfast East (Gavin Robinson). I thank the Government for putting forward their amendments. I support the no-equivalence measure, the highest bar for evidence and the double lock on prosecutions. I also thank the veterans who have come here today to observe this debate; all parties, for having a conscientious and solid debate on this issue; the Veterans’ Commissioners; and all those observing this debate from afar. If there is one takeaway from this debate, it is that this issue really should be above politics. It has gone on for so long, with so much pain among so many people, and coming to a solution in Northern Ireland for the people of Northern Ireland should be above politics. I have tabled several amendments to highlight the overarching problems that I think exist in the Bill. Although I support many of the amendments brought forward by the Government, I am still deeply concerned that this Bill opens the floodgates for hundreds of lawyers to pursue what can only be described as a strategic effort to rewrite history, to paint the state as the aggressor and to use the process as a punishment to hit back at our brave servicemen and servicewomen who served in Northern Ireland. I served in Northern Ireland in 2003, after the troubles. It was not the most kinetic environment then, but I went through the same training that those soldiers, sailors, airmen and airwomen went through before they deployed to Northern Ireland. There was a requirement for split-second decision making and to engage with a population that, in some cases, did not like us or want us to be there. It was a very difficult operating environment. I was a young troop commander at the time, but I went <span id="830" class="column-number" data-column-number="830"></span>on to serve in Afghanistan and a multitude of other operational theatres, where those skills became very useful. I know what it feels like. I went on to be the Minister for Veterans and People, and I was opened up to another side of the debate that I had not necessarily engaged with when I was a young troop commander in the Marines: speaking to victims. I spoke to victims of all sorts and all creeds, from different sides, who were seeking truth. Many had given up on the chance of justice, but they were seeking truth for loved ones and closure, usually in relation to people who had been lost during the troubles. My new clause 55, which I do not intend to push to a vote, is quite simple: it would move all inquests into the legacy commission, creating one simple body for truth and reconciliation, with an acceptance that the likelihood of justice and “prosecutions” is vanishingly small. There is a question around justice, whether we are ever going to get it, and whether truth and reconciliation should be the priority. Overnight, my new clause would worry a great deal of lawyers in Northern Ireland, as it would cut off what has become an exceptionally lucrative business. With inquests costing hundreds of millions of pounds, not only would my new clause save the taxpayer a fortune, but I believe it would centralise and revitalise, and it would create one central mechanism for troubles-related incidents. Why can that not take place? Because it breaks the framework agreement with the Irish. I am Scottish; I have an affinity with the Irish. But do we in this House—in this great place—expect the Irish to open up their police and military intelligence files and provide us with the wealth of information and intelligence that must exist on cross-border IRA activities over 30 years? Just think about that from a political perspective. We are all politicians here. Would we be keen to open up 30 years of evidence? Think of the political blowback. Think of the legal issues. Importantly, think about how that would potentially pull us or individuals involved back into the system. There are many accounts, from various sources, stating that the Republic of Ireland was used to store capabilities, weapons and explosives, and even used for terrorists to flee security forces south of the border. Are we really going to see, as the framework agreement states, reciprocal evidence gathering and exposure of IRA activities from the Republic of Ireland? To my mind, the answer is that that is highly, highly unlikely. Doing so would result in every sliver of evidence being legally scrutinised, people being held accountable and the reputation of Ireland being called into question, and it would have political consequences. I just do not think that it is going to happen in the way in which we would want it to happen.

   Hansard source
9. 19 Oct 2026·Parliament·Al Carns

   Northern Ireland Troubles Bill

   I thank the Secretary of State for the way in which he has approached this Bill. The engagement with all parties has been second to none, and I absolutely support that engagement. I have so many people phoning me and talking to me about the positivity of that engagement, so the Bill is being taken forward through the right mechanisms.

   Hansard source
10. 19 Oct 2026·Parliament·Al Carns

    Northern Ireland Troubles Bill

    I thank the hon. Member for his contribution, and for his consistent analysis, scrutiny and support of all things Northern Ireland. As my new clause is not going forward, we will continue —unfortunately, in my mind—with a twin-track approach. We will have the legacy commission on one hand, which in some cases is underfunded, and inquests on the other hand. We will waste a huge amount of money through that process, because I genuinely believe that that illusionary justice is very unlikely to come about. We will allow the process to drift on, potentially for up to 15 years. Think about what that means to someone who is 80, 75 or 70 years old—15 years of not knowing, of having to be worried about whether they will be called back or have to provide evidence in some way, shape or form about an incident 30 or 40 years ago. Sometimes, I cannot even remember what I did yesterday. We will keep our brave veterans, who I think have served valiantly, waiting in limbo. Importantly, a lot of this activity is based on several factors, the first of which is the willingness of Ireland to support us. I completely support the Secretary of State’s move to hold Ireland to account for what it has said it will do, but let us see whether that happens. The second factor is the costs, which are astronomical. At minimum, an inquest costs £20 million. There are tens of inquests to go, and even if they go into the legacy commission, we are still talking about £5 million per inquest. That is significant. Then we have politics to think about. As this process progresses, it will consider Sinn Féin’s activity—either in Northern Ireland or in the Republic of Ireland—and how that affects both the legislation and the agreements Sinn Féin have made recently. On top of all of that, if new evidence—new biometrics, the smoking gun—is found, people will only go to prison for two years, so what is the point? As for information recovery, there is no new information unless it comes from Ireland.

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