IT was a pretty miserable Sunday for our veterans and young people to be out paying their respects. However, I was impressed with the turnout at the two Remembrance Day services I attended. It seemed to me to exceed anything we’ve had in ten years.

On Friday, I attended a debate in St John’s Church Tisbury on the replacement of the independent strategic nuclear deterrent. I’m pleased my contention that we should retain the weapon while working towards a nuclear arms-free world won the day - but only just. If we decommission, we will lose our place at the top-table and have no influence in any disarmament negotiations.

On Saturday, I spent a couple of hours rattling a tin for the poppy appeal in Warminster and was bowled over by the generosity of people.

Admittedly in the communities which surround Salisbury Plain, we are instinctively sympathetic to the men and women of our armed forces - but our experience is replicated across the country.

I’ve had correspondence on the re-calculation of public sector pensions using less favourable indices. A wide range of public servants are affected by this but, given recent conflicts, we have serviceman particularly in mind. The effect will be to remove a lot of money from pension pots and the plight of war widows, particularly after many years as the effect of inflation bites, is cause for concern. I am sure the coalition government will be giving this special consideration in accordance with the commitment contained in its strategic defence review to rebuild the military covenant.

Should the UK help to bail out Ireland’s faltering economy?

The problem is the Irish economy may be small but it is very much intertwined with our own, particularly in financial services. One of the better decisions of the last government was to keep us out of the Eurozone - without the Pound Sterling we would now be in a very unhappy place. Any UK help for flagging European economies must have tight strings attached - such as ending the obscenely wasteful programme for building EU bureaucrats’ palaces across Europe.