Minister of State for the Armed Forces

Minister of State for the Armed Forces
Royal Arms as used by Her Majesty's Government
Incumbent Mark Lancaster since 12 June 2017
Ministry of Defence
Member of	Defence Council Admiralty Board Army Board Air Force Board
Reports to	Secretary of State for Defence
Nominator	Secretary of State for Defence
Appointer	Prime Minister Subject to formal approval by the Queen-in-Council
Term length	No fixed term
Inaugural holder	Peter Blaker
Formation	1981
Website	www.mod.uk

The Minister of State for the Armed Forces is a high-ranking ministerial position, subordinate only to the Secretary of State for Defence, at the Ministry of Defence in Her Majesty's Government.

The post is currently held by Col Mark Lancaster, in the Second May ministry.

Role

The responsibilities of the Minister of State for the Armed Forces are:

• All matters regarding Regular and Reserve Armed Forces
• Operations including Iraq, Counter-Terrorism, UK Operations, Northern Ireland and the Balkans
• Bilateral defence relations outside the NATO/Europe area
• Inquiries, Boards of Inquiry, Inquests
• Legal issues including detention
• Arms and Export Control
• Regional issues and the devolved Administrations
• The agencies DASA and DVA

List of Ministers of State for the Armed Forces

Colour key (for political parties):
  Conservative   Labour   Liberal Democrats

Name		Portrait	Term of office		Political party	Prime Minister		Defence Secretary
	Peter Blaker		29 May 1981	13 June 1983	Conservative		Thatcher	Nott
								Heseltine
	John Stanley		13 June 1983	13 June 1987
								Younger
	Ian Stewart		13 June 1987	25 July 1988
	Archie Hamilton		25 July 1988	27 May 1993
								King
					Conservative		Major	Rifkind
	Jeremy Hanley		27 May 1993	14 June 1994
	Nicholas Soames		14 June 1994	2 May 1997
								Portillo
	John Reid		2 May 1997	27 July 1998	Labour		Blair	Robertson
	Doug Henderson		27 July 1998	29 July 1999
	John Spellar		29 July 1999	7 June 2001				Hoon
	Adam Ingram		7 June 2001	29 June 2007
								Reid
								Browne
	Bob Ainsworth		29 June 2007	5 May 2009	Labour		Brown
								Hutton
	Bill Rammell		5 May 2009	11 May 2010				Ainsworth
	Nick Harvey		13 May 2010	4 September 2012	Liberal Democrats		Cameron (Coalition)	Fox
								Hammond
	Andrew Robathan		4 September 2012	7 October 2013	Conservative
	Mark Francois		7 October 2013	11 May 2015
								Fallon
	Penny Mordaunt		11 May 2015	15 July 2016	Conservative		Cameron (II)
	Mike Penning		15 July 2016	12 June 2017	Conservative		May
	Mark Lancaster		12 July 2017	Incumbent
								Williamson

References

External links

• www.mod.uk