MERCER: Don't bring out the big guns

Notts MP Patrick Mercer went on Today this morning to urge restraint in the wake of shootings in Northern Ireland.

He said: “What we don’t want is armed troops on the streets of Northern Ireland, vehicle check points and an overreaction.”

Spot on I reckon. A heavy counter-productive reaction is just what the Real IRA want.

At the moment they don’t have the support of the public and it would be playing in to their hands to give it to them with a heavy-handed response.

Mercer spent nine tours of duty in Northern Ireland as an officer with the Sherwood Foresters before becoming an MP and has first hand experience of how a peaceful situation can turn ugly.

Mercer and the think-tank

Patrick Mercer has been criticised by an academic for being “sceptical” about £1m worth of cash being handed to a think-tank run by former Muslim extremists – a story reported in The Times.

Prof Anthony Glees wrote a letter to the paper claiming the Notts MP’s scepticism did him “no credit.”

But, Prof Glees, as the chair of the Counter Terrorism Committee isn’t it Mercer’s job to be sceptical about these things?

As Lord Byron, one of Notts’ greatest sons, said: “I deny nothing, but doubt everything.”

Bad memories

Bells apparently started ringing in Patrick Mercer’s head the minute he heard about the Prince Harry’s racism story.

The Notts MP told Lobbydog he immediately steeled himself for a torrent of calls from hacks – his full comments to the Post are here.

Mercer himself was the centre of a racism scandal a couple of years ago when he said that slurs of the sort Harry made were part of army life.

Dominic Lawson laid into Mercer for criticising the Prince today, calling him a hypocrite.

But seeing as Harry directly used a racist term and Mercer was merely saying that such terms are used, I don't think he's justified.

Lobbydog thinks Harry should just make an apology in person to the people involved and put an end to the whole thing.

Iraq inquiry

The only thing worse than a blackout, is a whitewash.

MPs are right to call for an investigation into the Iraq War, like member for Newark Patrick Mercer who said today that it would be absolutely crucial.

But they need to be honest with themselves about what their role in the probe should be.

Lobbydog is not certain that MPs are capable of conducting such an inquiry at the moment without becoming distracted by politics.

More than ever recently Parliament has shown its knack for letting partisan loyalties get in the way of the real issue.

Perhaps an inquiry carried out by a judge, appointed by a cross party group of MPs would be better?

On the up

Ever since his sacking from the Tory front bench Newark MP Patrick Mercer has refused to fade away.

If anything his departure made him a more prominent voice from the Tory benches as it gave him the space to speak freely, unburdened by strict adherence to party lines.

He has been the opposition MP of choice for journalists doing stories on anything to do with national security.

Now he has been given the chairmanship of a new parliamentary sub-committee on counter terrorism, news first talked of on Lobbydog.

With an official position to give his comments more weight, we will only be hearing more from the former Sherwood Forester.

Mercer advances?

Lobbydog hears a whisper that Newark MP Patrick Mercer will soon be offered a new parliamentary position.

I can't say exactly what yet - suffice to say that it will concern national security.

Keep your eyes on the Evening Post this week for an announcement.

Women Gurkhas

Newark MP Patrick Mercer has been quoted in national papers today talking about whether women should be let into the Gurkhas.

For anyone who doesn’t know, there are four Gurkha regiments from Nepal who fight for the British Army – a remnant of imperial days.

The men are famed for their combat prowess and have fought all over the world with the Brits, receiving 13 Victoria Crosses between them.

According to newspaper reports army chiefs are angry at being forced to recruit female Gurkhas saying it may mean they have to lower combat training standards.

Patrick told the Daily Mail: “The end result will be a less flexible brigade of Gurkhas and a less capable British Army.”

It’s important to note here that the Gurkhas are unique in being the only regiment where every single soldier does infantry training.

So unlike the rest of the army, the cooks, desk-clerks and engineers can all fix bayonets at a moment’s notice and go into combat – herein lies the issue.

Speaking to Lobbydog Patrick explained that in the forces women are trained as gunners, airmen, sailors etc, but they do not serve in combat arms of the infantry.

So the problem as army chiefs see it is that women could not be let into the Gurkhas without giving them infantry combat training – to have ‘non-fighting’ troops would reduce the “combat efficiency” of the regiment as a whole.

But to combat train women – a precedent across the entire army – they suspect they may have to lower the standards of the male soldiers as equality rules dictate everyone must have the same training.

Patrick emphasises that he thinks women should be able to do whatever they are capable of and has served with armed women when he was an intelligence officer in Northern Ireland – as he puts it, “they were bloody good.”

But he adds: “I just don’t think there is a place for women yet in an infantry section. I don’t say that to be controversial, I say that because it’s straight-forward hard-nosed practicality.”

What do you think?

Novel ideas...

Lobbydog hears that Notts MP Patrick Mercer is soon to become a published fiction author.

The Tory military expert from Newark has signed a three-book deal with publishers HarperCollins.

He was just about to hand in the finished manuscript of his first offering for editing, when a technical error caused the last chapter of 8,000 words to be wiped from his computer - yet another innocent victim of data loss.

The story is going to be a historical epic, more details soon...