D-Day veteran could be turned away from ceremony

A D-DAY veteran who has paid £1,300 for a trip to Normandy to honour fallen comrades next weekend fears he could be turned away.

Geoff Bailey, 79, has spent months planning the tour and was hoping to march the shores he helped recapture 60 years ago with thousands of other veterans.

But just days before he and wife Sue are due to set off for the poignant anniversary, Mr Bailey of Chartres Close, has found out he may not be able to attend the main commemoration event because it has been oversubscribed.

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Mr Bailey, who was a 17-year-old midshipman on the HMS Rodney on June 6 1944, applied through two agencies for security passes for the Finals Veterans' Parade at Arromanches next Sunday.

But he was shocked to receive a letter from his tour operator on Monday telling him French authorities organising the event have underestimated the scale of requests and out of 15,000 who applied to attend, only 4,000 will be permitted on the day.

Mr Bailey said: "We have a pass from the Veteran's Agency admitting us to other commemoration services, but it's not clear whether that will allow us to the Arromanches event, which is really the only reason we are going.

"They asked us to send passport photographs for a pass to that event but they have been sent back to me.

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"We just can't seem to get an answer as to whether we will be admitted or turned away. The arrangements are all rather vague.

"I should hate to travel all that way and not be allowed to stand and pay respects to the many comrades who died liberating Europe.

"I understand there are security issues because there will be heads of state there but that's not who these events are for. They are for veterans."

The case has been taken up by MP Greg Barker, who wrote to veterans minister Ivor Caplin and even personally confronted defence minister Geoff Hoon in parliament.

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He said: "I would like to know exactly what advice the Ministry of Defence is giving to people intending to travel to Arromanches, and also exactly which agency has been responsible for this seemingly chaotically-organised event.

"The Veterans Agency seems unable to advise when these specific passes will be issued by the French authorities, how they will be allocated, and, most importantly, who will be successful. Geoff Hoon was non-committal and I think there is a complacent attitude which annoys me. I've not had the reassurances I wanted. These veterans are our responsibility and not that of the French.

"I think they are hiding behind these security issues.

"The event is not a shindig for Tony Blair and other world leaders but a poignant and extremely important occasion for veterans and it is very worrying that at this late stage arrangements are still so unclear."

Mr Bailey's battleship was responsible for firing inland and shelling German defences to make way for the invading allied forces on D-Day. He eventually made it to shore on the third day.

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He said: "I was ferrying some officers to shore from the HMS Rodney. When we got there there was still an awful mess.

"I still get emotional all these year later. I remember approaching a French man on the sea wall and he was very shaken.

"He thanked me and gave me some camembert cheese. I remember like it was yesterday.

"We attended similar events in Normandy for the 50th anniversary in 1994 and said there were no organisational problems then, even though there were thousands more veterans."

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His trip this time will take him by boat from Southampton to Cork in Ireland, then to Guernsey, then Caen in Normandy, then Zebrugge and finally Dover.

And Mr Bailey is hoping what will be his last chance to join fellow veterans for such a major event doesn't end in disappointment.

The Veterans Agency public helpline has been jammed with calls all week.

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