MoD's decision-making on Afghan cases ‘a disaster area' that could be likened to ‘a crime scene', court hears
Thousands of applications for sanctuary from Afghans with credible links to special forces units CF333 and ATF444, known as the Triples, were rejected by the Ministry of Defence (MoD). Their pleas for help were rebuffed by the government despite these units being paid and trained by the British and the soldiers fighting alongside UK special forces (UKSF) in Afghanistan.
The MoD is undertaking a review of some 2,000 applications of Afghans linked to the units, after The Independent, along with Lighthouse Reports, Sky News and the BBC exposed how they were being denied help.
The court heard that the review of some 2,000 applications is only looking at cases that were referred by MoD caseworkers to UK special forces for input.
The High Court also heard that the MoD rejected the resettlement application of one senior commander from the Triples units, who was in the units at the time of a key incident being examined in the Afghan war inquiry.
A former senior member of the Triples, who is now in the UK, is bringing the legal challenge on behalf of commandos still in Afghanistan - challenging how the review has been carried out. The case is an application for judicial review which, if granted, would see the scheme further challenged in the courts.
Thomas de la Mare KC, for the claimant, told the court on Wednesday that there had been an effective blanket ban on approvals for these ex-servicemen who fought side-by-side with the British forces.
He told the court that decisions on whether to help these Afghans were 'life and death decisions', with Triples members or their families being murdered or tortured because of their support for UK forces.
Speaking about the decision-making within the MoD, he said: 'The decision-making process prior to the review is almost a crime scene, it's a disaster area.'
He added: 'It's almost as disastrous an area of decision-making as it's possible to conceive.'
He argued that information about how the approvals were made should be made public 'to restore public confidence and trust in the decision-making process'.
Mr de la Mare continued: 'There is a widespread perception that there is an issue of conflict of interest or bias in this process. Those conflicts of interest were vented very clearly in January 2024, and they were a key part in the decision-making process.'
The court also heard that political pressure was put on MoD decision-makers to 'sprint' through resettlement cases. This prompted concerns about the quality of decision-making, which resulted in an internal review where 'a pattern of blanket refusal of Triples claims referred to UKSF became obvious', the court was told.
Flaws in the decision-making process included people being 'inappropriately reliant on UKSF personnel', particularly 'during the 'sprints' that took place through the summer of 2023', the court heard.
Caseworkers before the review lacked access to relevant records and were insufficiently experienced.
The court heard that then-minister for veterans affairs, Johnny Mercer, wrote to Oliver Dowden in January 2024 to raise concerns about how the process was being carried out. He highlighted that the role of UKSF personnel in the decision-making process was 'deeply inappropriate' and represented a 'significant conflict of interest'.
Mr de la Mare added that until the Triples review was announced in February 2024, a 'vanishingly small' number of the special forces commandos had been approved for relocation to the UK.
He told the court that senior ministers had decided to conduct a review 'on the basis that all credible claims of Triples membership were in scope'. However, Mr de la Mare said this had been narrowed to just re-examine cases where the Afghan applicant's case had been referred to UK special forces.
The hearing is due to conclude on Friday, with a decision expected in writing at a later date.
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An agent followed: Bull's first TV gig, in 1995, was giving health tips for a travel show on Sky. A meeting with John Craven landed him a job on Newsround ('I ended up doing Saturday mornings with an aardvark called Otis'). His list of credits is extraordinary, including kids' talk show Sort It!, Watchdog, Watchdog Healthcheck. Then he did Tomorrow's World in 2002 to 2003. 'I killed that,' he says. 'I was the last presenter of that.' He wrote books on teenage health, established a PR company, campaigned to put fruit on Virgin trains, was a ubiquitous presence on morning chat shows and met the Royal family. Prince Philip 'had the most brilliant sense of humour. I remember one day when we were in Buckingham Palace' – for the Duke of Edinburgh awards – 'and he came in and he looked at me and said, 'Not you again.' And I said, 'Well I could say the same for you, sir.' He loved that kind of sparring.' On another occasion, the Queen asked him the secret of a long life after he'd had 'three or four glasses of champagne'. He replied: 'You're doing pretty well without me.' There was a deathly silence. 'I thought I've either played this really well or it's a disaster. And she laughed.' All very interesting, but what I really want to hear about is Most Haunted Live!, the interactive paranormal show he fronted from 2002 to 2005. 'Outta 30 years' [career], you've chosen that one?' he asks with mock surprise. Shortly after he was appointed Reform chair, Bull was asked by Richard Madeley on Good Morning Britain if he believes in ghosts. 'I said, 'Look, things happen I can't explain.' And [he] said, 'What?' Now, I had a split second judgment to decide. Do I say, I'll tell you over dinner? Or do I launch in, full-throated – which was a foolish move, but I did.' Bull then recalled that after one edition of Most Haunted Live, relaxing in a hotel, the psychic Derek Acorah had told him his late grandmother was present in the room: then 'his face changed, he jumped on top of me and he tried to strangle me'. Bouncers pulled Acorah off. The next day, Acorah apologised and explained that when talking to Bull's grandmother, an 'evil spirit' had possessed him. I ask: 'Is there a part of you that thinks he was looking for an excuse to jump on you and strangle you?' 'Sure.' He admits: 'I must sound like a complete fruit loop.' But in the end the joke was on Madeley. A poll revealed that a plurality of Reform supporters believe in the paranormal, 'so there's a splash on one of the newspapers saying, David Bull is on the money'. Bull's transition to politics began at a drinks reception in the mid 2000s. 'There were various MPs around, and I was having a go at them and saying: 'None of you ever do anything and you're all useless.' And one of them said to me: 'Well, why don't you do it?' And I thought, right, I will then, 'cos I like a challenge.' David Cameron put Bull on his A-list of parliamentary candidates and he was chosen to fight Brighton Pavilion, though he pulled out a year before the 2010 election. His father was terminally ill, so he returned to Suffolk. He was asked instead to head a Conservative review on sexual health. Bull left a mark in Brighton by attending Pride in a t-shirt that read 'I've come out... I'm a Tory'. He is openly gay: is it easier to be homosexual than Right-wing? 'Yeah, hundred per cent,' in fact, 'being gay is a bit dull. Pride has kind of fulfilled what it's set out to do, which was to grant true equality.' 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If you've got female parts but are biologically a man, where do you put them?' The obvious answer is 'they should be in their own prison'. But we can't do that, so 'that's why she said it needs to be done on a case by case basis, and that's why everyone's gone absolutely ape over the whole thing'. As to Frake's argument, he says: 'I don't think it is unreasonable but it's not what people want to hear.' He is 'fiscally conservative' yet 'socially liberal': one of his first encounters with Farage was in 2014, when he criticised the then Ukip leader for saying the NHS shouldn't treat migrants with HIV. 'I may or may not have written on Twitter [now X], after a drink, that he was an idiot.' So it came as a surprise in 2019 when he received a call from Farage – 'who I'd never met' – to say, 'I want you to stand for the European Parliament: right now.' For the north-west, rather than his home in Suffolk, where candidates were needed. Bull, who was enthusiastically pro-Brexit, won and served a few bizarre months in Brussels. 'I can see why the MEPs love it because you get paid really well. You only have to sign in, you don't have to do anything for the money.' Plus, 'you get a car to drive you everywhere'. In the 2019 general election, he stood in Sedgefield, placing third; in 2021, he ran in the London Assembly, coming fifth in City and East. With Boris Johnson as prime minister, Britain left the EU, and 'the Brexit Party was put on ice because it was a single issue party'. Nevertheless, Bull had become friends with Richard Tice, doing Tice's chat show out of the studio Bull had built next door to the barn: a small group decided to launch Reform to keep the populist flame burning. Farage returned for the general election of 2024, in which Bull ran for Suffolk West and took 20 per cent, and today the party polls north of 30 per cent across much of the country. Reform might be doing even better but for a series of internal rows that culminated in Zia Yusuf, the previous chair, criticising an anti-burka Reform MP and then agreeing to step aside. Yusuf did an 'amazing job' setting up 400 branches, he says, but 'it burnt him out', so Farage called Bull and asked him to take over. The role has been split in two, administration and team building, with Bull leading the latter as Reform expands and democratises. 'There's been a big disconnect I think in the past between the professional party in London and the people who do all the hard work knocking on doors and volunteering and all that dreadful stuff.' Bull travels the country 'rallying the troops'. Paul Nuttall, a past leader of Ukip, has joined as a more backstage vice-chair to take care of candidates. 'Ultimately, Nigel trusts me [because] I'm a team player.' I wonder if any of the splits that have happened have hurt? Rupert Lowe MP walked away, so did Ben Habib, a former co-leader of Reform whom Bull clearly likes. 'I have a lot of time for both of them actually. I think with Rupert, he's a really effective MP from what I understand. But I assume there's a clash of personalities.' Farage and Lowe are 'strong characters', both 'used to working for themselves'. Bull declares: 'I haven't got time for big egos.' How does he work with Farage then? 'He's the most effective orator and brilliant political mind I have ever met. If I say to him, I want you to speak for 45 minutes, he will speak for 45 minutes and zero seconds… without notes. And he's developed techniques to do that. But if we are seriously growing this to be a party of government, then we have to have a team. You cannot have the Nigel Farage show.' Bull continues: 'He's mellowing… He knows he has to build this party and – he has said this – it can no longer be about him.' It's an impression others share: I'm told Farage looked upon Yusuf with almost parental affection, and found the attacks on his character and ethnicity repellent. When Bull confided to him that he found reading his own Twitter feed demoralising, Farage replied: 'Just don't read it.' In an ideal world, would Habib and Lowe be in Reform? 'I don't think either would come back. It's a bit like a family when you've fallen out.' I suggest they're also going down a rabbit hole in their obsession with Islam and immigration. 'Remember,' says Bull, 'politics is won and lost in the centre-ground. It always has been.' Reform is about 'common sense' rather than ideology, and now that it is actually winning, it mustn't over-promise. 'One of the things that I'm really keen to impress upon our councillors – we've got 864 now – is that we absolutely have to deliver in those councils that we control because unless we can show that we're effective at local government, then people won't trust us when it comes to national government. Nigel can't do it as a one-man band, and he knows it.' Will Bull run for parliament again? 'It's hard blinking work doing that. Yes is the answer, but I'm a great believer you need affinity with the constituency that you stand for. Right? I hate people being parachuted in and I think people hate it when it happens.' He runs through the possible places – Kent, East Anglia – 'this area, central Suffolk, which is currently [represented by] Patrick Spencer'. I silently note that Spencer is on trial for sexual assault (he has denied wrongdoing); a by-election is possible. 'Might I be talking to a future health secretary?' 'Maybe. I mean, there's a lot of ifs in there, aren't there?' Bull is single. I say I'm surprised, he replies, 'So am I. Such a catch! Oh, you are kind. But it's very difficult, isn't it? And particularly given what I do now. A) I don't have very much time, as you can imagine, and B) Where do I meet anyone? I would need to date someone who likes politics,' preferably who shares his own: 'I would struggle to date someone who's uber Left-wing, for example.' He has learnt 'how lonely this job is'. He laughs, 'I'm staying in a Premier Inn' – the same one, so often that 'they've been giving me a free breakfast'. The realisation dawns: 'I am Alan Partridge!' I sense that in discovering Reform, Bull has found an even bigger family for whom he can play the fun uncle. 'I wouldn't say I'm like Nigel, but when I go into these places, there's whoops and hollers, and people are thrilled that I'm there. I'll give a speech and there's either a standing ovation or people are really moved by what I'm saying. And what I'm saying is nothing clever, it's just reaffirming their own views, I think.'
