22 June 2006

Remarks by the Rt Hon Gordon Brown MP, Chancellor of the Exchequer, at the Imperial War Museum

Check against delivery

Let me start by saying how pleased I am to be here this evening.

Just a few days before we mark the first national Veterans’ Day.

To honour those who have given so much for our country.

And thank all of you here involved in Veterans Reunited. I know I speak for both Tessa Jowell and Tom Watson, our Minister for Veterans, who are here tonight, in saying the work you do is magnificent – bringing together thousands of veterans and young people to remember and learn about their service and sacrifice, their dedication and courage.

And in thanking Sir Peter Squire, Chairman of the Trustees of the Imperial War Museum, Robert Crawford the Director General and all of you who work here for hosting tonight’s event – let me say there is no more fitting place for tonight’s event than the Imperial War Museum.

This museum has itself become a national institution that defines our country.

It started as the idea of ordinary people who saw the sacrifices of the First World War, before being established formally in an Act of Parliament in 1920.

Its centre here in this building in London. But now with museums in Manchester, Duxford Airfield in Cambridgeshire, HMS Belfast on the Thames, and – underneath my office in the Treasury – at the Cabinet War Rooms, it covers much of the country.

And its founding statement as relevant today as it was in 1920: “conceived not as a monument of military glory, but rather as a record of toil and sacrifice.”

The truth is there is nothing that we will ever do that can adequately thank the millions of people - like all veterans here tonight - for what they have done for us.

We remember their sacrifice – a self-sacrifice of those who believe in something bigger than themselves.

We salute their personal courage – what Winston Churchill called the best gift of all, the ultimate quality on which all other human qualities depend,

And we pay tribute to the service they have shown our country - and that make us all proud to call this country Great Britain.

Both in difficult hours and on joyful days, we draw strength from the very best of Britain – British people who give of themselves, whose qualities of character are the shining threads in the fabric of our society.

Everyday they should be remembered in every part of our land, a legion of courage who fought for our country, who teach us through their heroism, courage and sacrifice the freedoms we enjoy today.

People who knew and did their duty: to stand and not to yield, and so to affirm a cause.

Men and women who have fought for a noble cause, borne great burdens, stood up for high ideals and brought the greatest of hope to our country in its most desperate of hours.

Quiet heroes who showed not just by great individual courage, but by an extraordinary common humanity expressed through public service - that duty, obligation and service to others are at the core of every community, and every society.

Let us not forget too those who serve in our armed forces today with such distinction and bravery, both here in Britain, but also overseas in Iraq, Afghanistan and all over the world.

And our pledge is that we too will defend the security of our county in the times to come.

So let us never forget but always remember.

I am proud that we can say that veterans badges – our recognition of service - are now available to all those who served up to 1960, including those who did national service, and that tonight I can inform you a total of over 250,000 badges have now been awarded, with 3,500 new applications each month.

And as we prepare for Veterans’ Day next week, tonight’s event is only the beginning.

On Sunday, a parade will be held to mark National Service Day at the National Memorial Arboretum in Staffordshire. And I can confirm that in addition to a £1.5 million donation from the proceeds of the coin to mark the 200th anniversary of the Battle of Trafalgar, the Defence Secretary Des Browne, is also underwriting the remaining cost of creating, the Armed Forces Memorial at the Arboretum.

On Monday, the 150th anniversary of the institution of the Victoria Cross will be commemorated with a service at Westminster Abbey followed by a reception for all living recipients of the Victoria Cross and George Cross.

On Veteran’s Day itself, as part of hundreds of events right across the country, I will have the honour of hosting a special reception in the Cabinet War Rooms, following a similar event, in my constituency in Kirkcaldy the day before.

On 1 July, our country will mark the 90th anniversary of the first day of the Battle of the Somme with a series of events in France, followed on the 12 July, by a Battle of Britain reception at RAF Bentley priory and then on 27 July, a special event for veterans of the Korean War at the Arboretum.

And it because we should always remember, that I am so pleased to be here this evening to support Veterans Reunited.

Over £45 million of funding from the Lottery – and I am pleased the Big Lottery Fund’s chair, Sir Clive Booth, is here tonight – has supported over 17,000 projects involving over 11 million people.

First, Heroes Return has helped 39,000 veterans and their friends and families revisit sites around the world where they served during the second world war.

Second, Home Front Recall has supported over 3,000 projects and events celebrating those who men and women who served here in Britain.

And third, Their Past Your Future, a programme that has done so much to bring young people and veterans together: nearly 2 million people have visited the exhibitions as they toured to over 70 towns and cities across the country; over 700 schools have taken part in commemorative activities; and hundreds of children have visited historic sites in different parts of the world.

This is why I am so pleased to be able to announce tonight that the Big Lottery Fund will be giving a further £4 million to build on what has been achieved under Veterans Reunited and extend it into next year and beyond:

helping more young people to meet veterans and listen to their stories;
offering to more people the chance to visit historic sites and experience for themselves the real objects, documents and artefacts that deepen our understanding of our past;
and, using digitised archiving, enabling veterans to record their experiences and school children to share them, in what I hope will become a national veterans archive – a thread that will bind generations together for many years to come.

And let me also say, I want young people – for whom even conflicts as recent as the Falklands are distant events learnt about in history lessons – to come to understand, value and live up to those qualities of comradeship, bravery, sacrifice and service that veterans demonstrate so admirably.

So I promise that we will never support proposals that diminish the importance of teaching this period of history and the service veterans gave in our schools.

Let us salute these heroes with words inscribed on Scotland's great National War Memorial in Edinburgh Castle, words I was taken by my father to read as a child, words written by Thucydides 2,500 years ago that today - as we salute you and remember your comrades - might speak for all of us: "the whole earth is the tomb of heroes...' the inscription runs '...and their story is not graven in stone over their clay, but abides everywhere, without visible symbol, woven into the stuff of other men’s lives."

So it is with these heroes and their fallen comrades whose heroism and service shows that duty, honour and courage are mighty values.

And it is with the work of programmes like their past your future – and the work you have done, and now the work you will continue to be able to do – that ensures we indeed never forget and will always remember.

Ends