The Northern Ireland Secretary has told The Independent that the Government's promised amendments to the controversial Troubles Bill will be brought to parliament on Monday (12 October 2026). The amendments will then be debated by the 'Committee of the Whole House' in the Commons Chamber on Monday, 19 October. UPDATE: The amendments have now been published ; see our first

At this stage we are not aware of any BAFF ex-service member who has received an “Overpayment of Armed Forces Pension” letter from Equiniti Paymaster.

As the Forces Pension Society (FPS) have pointed out, the letters say Equiniti has “received instructions to revise your AFPS benefits…..as payment of AFPS benefits are made from public funds, Equiniti Paymaster are

New trench system at Eastmere Village STANTA - GOV.UK - Landmarc Support Services

I've seen criticisms of the DIO's £4.4 million investment in new trench training facilities. Some points have been understandable, others not so much.

There is certainly a legitimate debate about defence priorities, including the need to improve service accommodation. However, realistic trench training is not an optional

Afghans who worked with UK forces were wrongly refused relocation and left facing years of danger, delay and uncertainty, according to the House of Commons Defence Committee.

The Defence Committee’s report into the Afghan data breach makes sobering reading. The accidental disclosure of personal details relating to thousands of Afghans who had supported UK forces was a serious failure with

A new campaign, Shoulder to Shoulder, has been launched by senior former military leaders and veterans to encourage Parliament to modify the 'Troubles Bill' draft legislation dealing with Northern Ireland legacy cases.

The campaign website includes a suggested message to send to your MP, and also gives the opportunity to sign up for future updates.

The website is at: 

An important legal case concerning the pension rights of Armed Forces reservists is due to return to court later this year.

The Forces Pension Society (FPS) reports that a hearing has been fixed at the Court of Session in Edinburgh for 8 October 2026, following the Ministry of Defence’s continuing attempt to challenge the successful claim brought by former

The Sun reports that a soldier has been convicted at court martial after sending pictures to his (RAF) girlfriend from a secret mission.

According to the paper, "The trooper, known only as Soldier A, took his personal phone on covert ops and had pictures of secret bases, prisoners of war and enemy fighters slain by his comrades."

He was sentenced

For an update see Exercise Haruka Storm back on for the autumn. We previously reported that:

A British Army training exercise in Kenya has been cancelled amid a dispute between the UK and Kenyan governments over the future terms under which British troops operate in the country.

The exercise, due to begin in September and involving 1st Battalion, The

Statistical terminology is hardly the most important issue affecting serving personnel or their families.

The Ministry of Defence has for some time preferred the term "non-UK" instead of "Foreign and Commonwealth" - often abbreviated as F&C.

The Ministry of Defence has announced a new UK-wide study into cancer among serving personnel and veterans who have served since 1990.

The research will use existing NHS records, so no action is required by serving personnel or veterans. Initial findings are expected to be published annually from 2027.

Current evidence suggests that overall cancer rates among Armed Forces personnel

The Afghanistan Inquiry has released further witness statements and transcripts.

The fullest media report at the time of writing is by Tom Ball in The Times - SAS called me Taliban apologist, officer tells Afghanistan inquiry.

Allegations involving British or allied forces in Afghanistan are inevitably highly sensitive and controversial, including for BAFF itself.

Strong differences of opinion inevitably

A report in The Sunday Times highlights continuing concerns about the condition of some Service Family Accommodation (SFA), linking the experiences of military families to the Government's decision to defer part of its planned investment in defence housing.

The report by Dominic Hauschild, Defence Correspondent, and Lottie Hayton, centres its investigation on the experience of Army wife Leah Emmett, whose young daughter

According to a recent story in the Telegraph, the Ministry of Defence is still supposed to be rewriting its transgender policy, more than a year after the Supreme Court judgment on the meaning of "woman" in the Equality Act, leaving commanding officers and service personnel uncertain about the applicable rules. 

Women’s organisations and campaigners quoted by the paper argue that

Good to see Armed Forces Day being celebrated once again in many places across England, Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland, which had "more than a dozen events" from Edinburgh and Glasgow to Thurso and Dumfries.

The fact that Glasgow held (and were always going to hold) an official AFD event is perhaps worth noting in view

A report just released by the National Audit Office says that the Ministry of Defence lost the taxpayer around £14.5 billion over the life of the Annington Homes deal, compared to where we would be if the 1996 deal had never happened.

But there is also praise for the action finally taken by MoD to repurchase more than 36,000 service

The Australian Department of Defence announced a couple of months ago that it had commissioned a major Army study into how repeated low-level blast exposure may affect soldiers’ long-term cognitive function. The Daily Telegraph (Sydney) now has a paywalled story that:

Secret report warns ADF weapons risk brain injuries to troops
Secret Defence documents have revealed Australia’s military was warned 15

Following the resignations of John Healey and Al Carns, Hamish de Bretton-Gordon writes in the Telegraph that Air Chief Marshal Sir Richard Knighton, who as Chief of the Defence Staff is the professional head of the armed forces, should now "show that he represents British servicemen and women by falling on his sword as well", because –

Given the colossal insult

The resignation of John Healey MP as Defence Secretary marks the end of a period in which, whatever one's political views, Defence had at its head someone who had prepared thoroughly for it in Opposition and, when the time came, did not disappoint.

I haven't met Mr Healey personally, but I've heard him speak a couple of times at RUSI

The latest report from the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee contains a striking observation about the Army's troubled Ajax armoured vehicle programme. It concludes that the Ministry of Defence is placing "unrealistic expectations" on soldiers operating the vehicle safely while underlying noise and vibration issues remain unresolved.

Anyone who has spent any time in an armoured vehicle – which

The Independent Inquiry relating to Afghanistan has just released a large tranche of redacted/anonymised evidence documentation.

Update 30.05.26 - The special reduced £5 subscription has been agreed and will be rolled out shortly. It will only be on offer for a short period during the transition to an association.

As members know we are in the process of reorganising BAFF with a view to giving up its company registration, at least for the time being. The

I rather dislike the insulting expression "pearl-clutching" - meaning the exaggerated expression of outrage - but a report in The Times suggests a certain amount of pearl-clutching over the proposed merger of King's College London and Cranfield University.

The report by the newspaper's Education Editor (thetimes.com 25th May) quotes various KCL academics who have concerns about the merger. A

The Chair of the Independent Inquiry relating to Afghanistan has granted Core Participant status to five individuals "who held command roles or senior positions within UK Special Forces between mid-2010 and mid-2013."

Lord Justice Haddon-Cave's decision was announced on the Inquiry website on 20 May.

Under the inquiry rules, Core Participant ("CP") status is only granted with consent of the individual,

Today, 22nd May 2026, is the fifteenth anniversary of the official end of Operation Telic, the formal name for UK operations in Iraq that began with the 2003 invasion and subsequent removal of the dictator.

UK combat forces, primarily based in the southern city of Basra, had withdrawn from Iraq in July 2009, but, since then, at the request of the

We thought it might assist Glasgow City Council members if they were to see an example of a previous parade in which the Freedom of a council area was formally conferred on the Royal Regiment of Scotland.

Here's a high-quality video of the Freedom Ceremony on 12th October, 2015 conferring on the Regiment the Freedom of the Highlands:

[Thanks to

It was a perfect news story for a Monday morning. Potentially comic (depending on your sense of humour), defence spending involved, and plenty opporunity for harrumphing; with extra points for getting the word 'woke' into reader comments and the twittersphere.

Yes, according to a story first reported by The Times' Defence Editor and widely shared, the Royal Navy is planning

Congratulations to the whole team involved in getting medical assistance and supplies to the remote British Overseas Territory of Tristan da Cunha to help a British national with suspected hantavirus.

The UK Health Security Agency had confirmed on Friday that a British national had disembarked from the cruise ship MV Hondius to the South Atlantic island of Tristan da Cunha,

Voting on 7th May in England? Don't forget to bring Photo ID with you, if voting in person at the polling station.

What forms of Photo ID are acceptable?

Voting in England on 7.5.2026

Defence Identity Cards (MOD form 90) and HM Armed Forces Veteran Card (MOD form 100) are acceptable.

A full list of acceptable forms of ID can be

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If you're a serving or former member of the UK Armed Forces, you can join BAFF today. The subscription is £7.50 for 12 months.

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If you're already registered here as a 'BAFF Military Supporter' - which includes fomer members whose subscriptions have run out - you can

An essential part of 'successor BAFF', which will take the form of an Unincorporated Association, is a new Constitution.

A draft of the new Constitution is now available for logged-in users (including for the time being lapsed members and BAFF Military Supporters) to see and comment.

The new Constitution will effectively replace the Memorandum of Association of the current BAFF

Thanks BAFF for the ongoing coverage of the Troubles Bill and related muddles. As the Federation's original chairman and currently assisting with the ongoing BAFF restructuring, I thought it would be worth reminding ourselves of the Federation's position over the years on the applicability of law to military operations - and especially on so-called 'legacy investigations' taking place years after

With a significant procedural motion concerning the NI Troubles Bill expected on Monday (27 April), the picture is supposedly complicated by the expected absence of the Armed Forces Minister Al Carns, who is believed to be visiting troops engaged in defensive missions against Iran in the Gulf.

His absence from a key Commons moment raises questions in some minds about:

The saga of Northern Ireland Troubles legislation continues in Parliament on Monday (27 April), following a statement by the NI Secretary Hilary Benn last week.

Mr Benn's written statement confirmed that the Northern Ireland Troubles Bill remains central to the Government’s approach, describing it as an effort to finally address a long-standing failure to deal with the past. Nearly three

The position as of spring 2026 is a bit of a moving target, but can be summarised in three overlapping strands: (1) the existing 2023 Act (partly in force but legally damaged), (2) court challenges undermining it, and (3) new legislation currently working its way through Parliament but delayed.

1) The current law: the 2023 “Legacy Act”

The operative statute

The Renters' Rights Act 2025 is intended to implement Labour Party manifesto commitments to 'overhaul the regulation of our country’s insecure and unjust private rented sector'

The Act only applies to England, and will be brought into force in three phases, with the first phase expected to come into force on 1 May 2026.

While the Act is intended to

Work continues on reorganising BAFF to change its structure from a registered Company Limited by Guarantee to an ordinary unincorporated association.

The driver for the change is simply cost, specifically the next year's fee quoted by the accountants who act as company secretaries and provide the registered office.

The website will continue, as will volunteers' work on cases and campaigns.

This year's Armed Forces Day national event will be hosted by Rushmoor Borough Council at Aldershot and Farnborough on Saturday, 27th June 2026, with other events taking place across the UK on or around the same date.

When Armed Forces Day was started by the then Labour government one view was that armed forces personnel were hardly honoured by

An MOD written parliamentary answer to James Cartlidge MP (Cons, Shadow Secretary of State for Defence) reveals that in just under 20 months, nearly sixty thousand applications to join the armed forces were rejected on medical grounds.

The answer also revealed striking disparities amongst the figures for the respective services -

Rejections per service

• Army: 45,680 rejected on medical grounds

According to an independent report commissioned by the Afghanistan Inquiry, there were 'serious failings' in a Royal Military Police (RMP) inquiry into allegations arising from operations in Afghanistan.

The report by the former Chief Constable of Kent Police, Alan Pughsley QPM examined two RMP investigations: Operation NORTHMOOR and Operation CESTRO. Both concerned allegations that UK Special Forces (UKSF) had unlawfully killed

I wonder why this has come to mind today. Maybe it's because I attended a recent ceremony marking the 35th anniversary of the end of active operations in the Gulf; Op Granby to the Brits, Desert Storm to our major allies.

But Ive been refreshing my memory on something that happened in that conflict. A strategic bridge over the wide

Civil Nuclear Constabulary (CNC) held this week a webinar exploring opportunities for service leavers and veterans in armed policing.

Over 30 people joined the webinar and heard from serving Authorised Firearms Officers (AFOs) about transferable skills, their relocation journey, and how they had integrated into the local community.

The webinar covered the role of the CT-AFO, the Civil Nuclear Constabulary’s mission,

We are working on proposals to change the BAFF Constitution.

This will mean discontinuing the formal company registration to save costs, following an increased quote from the company secretaries for producing the accounts etc and providing the registered company office.

We will convert to an unincorporated association, mirroring the current constitution as much as possible.

Because an unincorporated association cannot