I have looked that the draft document on corporate manslaughter and would wish to make the following comment.

  Whereas the consultation documents says that Military training where it reflects conflict situations is exempt I am concerned that this offers a significant grey area for our Armed Services to hide behind.

  In the name of training for various situations our armed services sally forth into all sorts of training such as:

—  caving in latin American countries that do not know they are there

—  tramping up and down volcanic regions and getting lost

—  jungle training

—  boating down the Zambezi

—  sail boat training

—  learning to fly

—  learning to ski

—  parachuting

  Whereas in some cases military training is fully justified a couple of the examples refer to situations that poorly managed training could have led to disaster and loss of life. In cases such as these I would say that the training was more for pleasure and if someone dies due to negligence the MoD should be held to account. I believe a clear distinction between vocational (in the field training) and development training should be made. Often on miltary training courses individuals are made to continue past their limit, where this may build them as people it may also kill them and the leader in this type of case should be held responsible, so should the MoD for allowing such training to continue. Where training funds are requested from Sports Committees, the MoD sees the plan/operational order and has the opportunity to comment; often these are sketchy to say the least. On such occasions they should be asking the question as to what procedures are being followed, has diplomatic agreement been obtained and has a risk assessment been carried out. The concern over whether Corporate Manslaughter may apply should weed out some of the badly run expeditions and prevent injury.

14 June 2005