The MP for Wells, James Heappey , has told a political podcast that he's worried that wearing poppies has become an 'obligation' forced on people rather than a true act of Remembrance.

Mr Heappey, the Armed Forces Minister and a former officer in the Rifles who served in Afghanistan, said he would rather fewer people wore poppies because they understood what they symbolise, rather being forced to wear one because of fear of judgement.

He told the Chopper's Politics Podcast: "Veterans and people who serve see how many people are wearing a poppy and notice when you're in a place where nobody's wearing a poppy. The danger is that the act is in the buying of a poppy as a ritual and the wearing of a poppy as an obligation rather than as a considered thing to say 'This is my support for those who served and most importantly those who made the ultimate sacrifice'.

"I would far rather that the 60 per cent of the population wore a poppy but really thought about what that symbolised than 100 per cent of the population wore poppies because Twitter went nuts at you if you didn't."

Since 1921, poppies have been worn on and ahead of Remembrance Day. Over 50 million are produced each year by the Poppy Factory in Richmond, south-west London, and Lady Haig's Poppy Factory in Edinburgh, but the pressure to wear a poppy out of respect to Britain's war dead and to those who have served has grown in recent years, with people taking to social media in droves to complain if people in the public eye are not wearing one.

But he urged people to stop at 11am on Armistice Day and Remembrance Sunday on Sunday to remember Britain's fallen at ceremonies at war memorials.

"In the following two minutes some people can imagine friends, colleagues, family members that they have lost to military service. And of course you think of them," he said.

"But even if that is not the case with you, there is still one thing to stop and remember on Sunday as we do this as a nation, that right now there are people in grave danger on behalf of our country.

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"Just be thankful that the brave men and women are willing to do despicable, dangerous things for us, to give us a good night's sleep, to give us the freedom to choose whether or not to wear a poppy."

You can listen to the full interview on Chopper's Politics.