To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many calls have been logged on the armed forces anti-bullying confidential support line in the last 12 months; what procedures are in place to ensure that steps are taken to address (a) allegations of bullying and (b) identify patterns of abuse and bullying blackspots; and by what means the Service Complaints Commissioner is kept informed. (230898)

The armed forces do not run an ‘armed forces anti-bullying confidential support line'. However, the Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Families Association runs a ‘confidential support line' for a range of issues such as welfare, health and terms of service including concerns about bullying and harassment. The support line is available to serving personnel (of all services) together with their families and former members of the armed forces.

Calls to the support line are logged under a series of generic headings including 'equality and diversity' which includes those concerning bullying, harassment and discrimination. During the period January to December 2007, the most recent period for which figures are available, 170 calls from serving service personnel relating to equality and diversity issues were logged, together with a further 19 from family members and veterans.

The Department's unified diversity strategy makes clear that bullying and harassment are not tolerated under any circumstances and that the penalties for offenders are potentially severe.

Joint Service Publication 763 'The MOD Harassment Complaints Procedure' sets out the procedures for all MOD Service and civilian personnel making, responding to, advising on, investigating, and deciding on, complaints of harassment.

All units are required to have at least one qualified Equality and Diversity Advisor (EDA); larger units will have several. In addition to providing help and advice to individuals, EDAs are required to keep unit equality and diversity logs. The logs are regularly reviewed by unit commanders and statistical information is drawn upon by a tri-Service Evaluation Group (at commodore, colonel and group captain level) chaired by the Director Service Personnel Service Conditions along with other reports and statistics to identify trends and areas of concern.

While conducting unit visits, the independent Service Complaints Commissioner is given access to unit logs and it has recently been agreed that she will also be provided with statistics from these logs bi-annually.