Overseas Operations (Service Personnel and Veterans) Bill — Schedule 1 — Excluded Offences For the Purposes of Section 6 — Torture — 3 Nov 2020 at 18:00
The majority of MPs voted to apply restrictions on the prosecution of members of the armed forces in relation to their conduct on overseas deployment even in cases of alleged torture.
MPs were considering the Overseas Operations (Service Personnel and Veterans) Bill. [1][2]
The amendment rejected in this vote was:
- Amendment 1, page 12, line 6, at end insert—:
- “(13A) An offence under section 134 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 (torture).”
The rejected amendment was accompanied by the following explanatory statement from its proposer stating:
- This amendment is one of a series designed to ensure that the Bill’s “triple lock” provisions to block prosecutions would not apply to torture and related offences under UK law. This suite of amendments would ensure that the existing offences of torture – contained in the 1988 Criminal Justice Act and in other parts of UK law incorporating longstanding laws of war – would not be included within the Bill’s “triple lock” against prosecutions of UK soldiers.
The rejected amendment would have added a new paragraph to Schedule 1 of the Bill adding torture to the list of offences exempted from the restrictions on prosecutions provided for by Part 1 of the Bill.
Offences already excluded from the limitations on prosecution by the Bill as introduced included offences against members of the armed forces, civil servants, and defence contractors as well as a number of sexual offences[3].
The proposed restrictions only applied to offences which took place more then five years prior to prosecution[2][3].
The motion rejected by the majority of MPs in this vote was:
- That the amendment be made.
See also: Division titled: "Overseas Operations (Service Personnel and Veterans) Bill — Clause 6 — “Relevant offence” — Prosecution Required Under International Treaty Obligations" — 3 Nov 2020 at 18:00, PublicWhip.org.uk
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- [1] Parliament's webpage on the Overseas Operations (Service Personnel and Veterans) Bill, Parliament.uk
- [2] Explanatory notes to the Overseas Operations (Service Personnel and Veterans) Bill, 18 March 2020, Parliament.uk
- [3] Overseas Operations (Service Personnel and Veterans) Bill, as introduced on 18 March 2020, Parliament.uk
Party Summary
Votes by party, red entries are votes against the majority for that party.
What is Tell? '+1 tell' means that in addition one member of that party was a teller for that division lobby.
What are Boths? An MP can vote both aye and no in the same division. The boths page explains this.
What is Turnout? This is measured against the total membership of the party at the time of the vote.
| Party | Majority (No) | Minority (Aye) | Both | Turnout |
| Alliance | 0 | 1 | 0 | 100.0% |
| Con | 333 (+2 tell) | 2 | 0 | 92.6% |
| DUP | 0 | 8 | 0 | 100.0% |
| Green | 0 | 1 | 0 | 100.0% |
| Independent | 1 | 4 | 0 | 100.0% |
| Lab | 0 | 189 (+2 tell) | 0 | 95.5% |
| LDem | 0 | 11 | 0 | 100.0% |
| PC | 0 | 3 | 0 | 100.0% |
| SDLP | 0 | 2 | 0 | 100.0% |
| SNP | 0 | 46 | 0 | 97.9% |
| Total: | 334 | 267 | 0 | 94.2% |
Rebel Voters - sorted by party
MPs for which their vote in this division differed from the majority vote of their party. You can see all votes in this division, or every eligible MP who could have voted in this division
Sort by: Name | Constituency | Party | Vote
| Name | Constituency | Party | Vote |
| David Davis | Haltemprice and Howden | Con | aye |
| Anne Marie Morris | Newton Abbot | Con (front bench) | aye |