MILITARY ESTABLISHMENTS. (Hansard, 8 February 1911)

§ THE DUKE OF BEDFORD

My Lords, I beg to ask the noble Lord the Under-Secretary of State for War the Questions standing in my name on the Paper—viz.:

1. The total number of non-commissioned officers and men serving in the Regular Army in the United Kingdom on 1st February, 1911.
2. The number of the above under twenty years of age.
3. The number of non-commissioned officers and men due to proceed abroad before the end of the present trooping season.
4. The total number of officers, noncommissioned officers, and men deficient in all branches, combatant and non-combatant, of the Territorial Force on the 1st January, 1911.
5. The number of non-commissioned officers and men now serving in the Territorial Force under twenty years of age.
6. The number of officers, non-commissioned officers, and men in the Territorial Force who have not completed their recruit's course of musketry.
7. The number of officers, non-commissioned officers, and men in the Territorial Force who in 1909–1910 failed to reach the qualifying standard for musketry, but who were afterwards, in accordance with Army Order 38 of 1910, returned as qualified, and the number who did not attempt to qualify under Army Order 38 of 1910.
8. The number of officers, non-commissioned officers, and men of the Territorial Army who have been absent with and without leave from camp on two occasions during their service.

70 The Questions need no explanation, as the information I seek is a more matter of numbers.

THE UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (LORD LUCAS)

My Lords, with regard to the first three Questions of the noble Duke only the January figures are available. As to the first Question, the answer is 120, 837 non-commissioned officers and men. The answer to the second Question is 26,720 rank and file only, not including non-commissioned officers, but, of course, they are very few indeed in number. in answer to the third Question, the number of non-commissioned officers and men due to proceed abroad between January 1 and the end of the season is 3,523. As to Question four, the Territorial Force was below its establishment on January 1 by 1,514 officers and 44,106 non-commissioned officers and men. As to Question five, the latest figures obtainable are those of October 1 last, when 83,088 non-commissioned officers and men out of a strength of 257,337 were under twenty. The officers' ages are not available. As to Question six, out of a total strength of 73,813 officers and men who fired the recruits' course last year, 13,033 did not complete it. That does not mean that they did no musketry at all. Some may have done a good deal, but they did not complete the course. The Army Order to which the noble Duke refers in his seventh Question was issued in the month of February—that was, before the musketry of the year had begun—and therefore I think all the recruits who fired last year fired under the conditions of that Order. The number who did not attempt to qualify under that Order I cannot give; but the number of those who did not complete, though they may have attempted to do so, was 6,263. I am afraid I am unable to answer the eighth Question, as it would require a special return, which would take a great. deal of compiling. Of course, I can give, and have given, the number of men who did not attend camp in any particular year, but I cannot find out how far the men who did not attend camp in one year were the same who did not attend in another without asking for a special return.