§ Question again proposed, That this House do now adjourn.
§ 11.48 a.m.
§ Mr. MellishI was saying, just before we left the House to go to another place, that this is a non-party debate on the Territorial Army, in the sense that there is no party acrimony. I am most grateful, as are my right hon. and hon. Friends, to the hon. Member for The Wrekin for raising the matter so that in this great House of Commons we are able to pay our tribute to the Territorial Army on the celebration of its golden jubilee.
I am not qualified to talk about the glorious past of the Territorial Army which can be read by all those who are interested. The work of the Territorial Army down the years has been something in which anyone who has the slightest claim to be British can take the greatest pride. The trouble is that the British are too undemonstrative at times. We will always concede the right of Arabs, Indians, Russians and everybody else to feelings of nationalism, and we understand their claim to national pride. Yet in some respects we almost deny it to ourselves.
Patriotism is a very great thing and although, when considering Britain's history, one can easily emphasise those times when Governments and even sovereigns have done great harm, we can all agree that whenever the British have been called upon to fight for and help their country in time of stress vast numbers have been ready to take up arms and to fight for what they believe to be right.
1793 The Territorial Army represents the very finest of those people. It is criticised in peace time, when everybody wants to forget the Territorials and to ignore them, but when war comes the British people expect and usually find that at the beginning of any war there is a nucleus of people trained and ready to fight for their country and for the things in which they believe.
I hope that I shall be forgiven if I refer to the local Territorial unit in my constituency, since it is a unit of some note. It was originally formed in 1798 as part of the old volunteer Army. It was disbanded and reformed several times and, like many others, it was reformed once again in 1908 when it became known as the 22nd County of London Battalion, The Queen's.
The unit's story is typical of many such units. It received very little support in those days, but when war broke out in 1914 it served in France, taking part in the battles of Loos, the Somme and Arras. Two Victoria Crosses were won by members of the unit, Lieut.-Colonel Barton and Private Jack Harvey.
In the last war, the unit had a record of which we have every right to be proud. It took part in the evacuation of Dunkirk, going from there to North Africa and fighting from E1 Alamein to Tunis, and then on to Salerno. The unit then went to France and to North-West Europe. It had a brilliant record, although receiving but little publicity, and I count it a great honour to be able to refer to those men today.
One other feature of the unit's story is that for a number of years its honorary colonel was our distinguished Serjeant at Arms, Major-General Hughes. That was an honour for Bermondsey and the unit and I want to place on record how grateful we are for what he did at that time.
The Territorial Army invokes the best sense of patriotism and loyalty in the best of our people who believe in the best of the things for which the British stand. We had a ceremony today which interrupted our debate. I remember that when I first became a Member of Parliament, nearly twelve years ago, I used to find some of these interruptions rather a bore. They seemed to me to be unnecessary. However, the longer one is a Member the more one understands and appreciates 1794 these ceremonies, recognising that they represent an age when people had to fight hard for democracy and all that it means.
Although I do not care for the way in which the present Government are handling matters, we can all agree that we have the finest democracy in the world, and it is to those people who have always been ready and able to defend what we believe to be right that we should give thanks.
It is impossible to say how the next war will be fought, but we know that one of the primary purposes of the Territorial Army will be home defence. However, that does not preclude the possibility of the Territorial Army having to fight anywhere in the world. In name and in fact it is the reserve army of Britain. The more we reduce our Regular forces, the more important it becomes to have efficient reserves.
The Territorial Army has been called a very cheap insurance policy, but its rôle is now so important that I hope that there will be no cheeseparing, an attitude which would be penny wise and pound foolish. It might be argued that today we are under-insuring with our regular conventional forces. The Territorial Army is our only conventional reserve land force and the Government would be making a fatal mistake if they tried to under-insure twice.
At present, the morale of the Territorial Army is very high, following the jubilee celebrations earlier this year. Recruiting is going very well, since the suspension of part-time National Service. I am glad to put on record the fact that many employers today recognise their duty in allowing their employees to have time off—in many cases with pay—to become part of the Territorial Army. I would emphasise that we need a lot more employers with the public spirit to do that, and I would add that we also need help from the trade union movement, in encouraging its members to join the Territorial Army.
It would be a good thing if this were officially notified to every branch of the trade union movement, through the T.U.C. The Territorial Army belongs to all of us; there is no politics in it, and it is right that the trade union movement, which is such an important part of our economic way of life today, should play its part in making certain that the 1795 Territorial Army gets as much support as possible.
Recruiting for the women's Service is not as good as it ought to be, and I believe that it has very great problems. It, too, needs every encouragement, and I hope that the Under-Secretary of State will tell us what can be done to encourage women to join their part of the Territorial Army.
Territorial Army recruiting depends upon the population and the age group in the locality, and one of the things that we have to remember is the problem of the new towns. I ask the Under-secretary for a straight answer on this question: why have not we found the money to start Territorial Army units in the new towns? Is it not ludicrous that we should build a new town with a population of 60,000 or 70,000, the vast bulk of whom are under 40 years of age, and then fail to do anything to attract those people to join the Territorial Army? It is about time the Government decided to do something about that, and I hope that we shall get a sensible answer today.
The country must be prepared to spend money upon attractive Territorial Army centres. Let the centres match up with other buildings, and provide comparable amenities. Let us get away from the idea that the worst is good enough for the best soldier; that the roughest of accommodation is good enough for the man who is prepared to give up all his time in training in the belief that he may be called upon by his country in an emergency, and that while he is doing it we can let him train in what is almost a barn. Let us give him decent training conditions.
Let local architects of imagination produce buildings which, in addition to fulfilling military requirements, can also provide first-class clubs, because we must get it on record that the function of the Territorial Army is not just a question of training men to kill other men; it is a means by which men can get together and spend one or two evenings a week in first-class enjoyment.
The hon. Member for The Wrekin mentioned that this matter was discussed in another place. I see that Field Marshal Lord Harding asked whether there was an overseas rôle for the Territorial Army 1796 in conditions short of an all-out war. Reading through that debate, I find that that question was not dealt with by the Minister who replied, and I ask the Under-Secretary whether he will answer it today.
Here again, I believe that the reduction in our Regular forces underlines the importance of the Territorials. Much of our debate has been taken up by the interruption which took place, and I know that other Members want to speak, and that the Under-Secretary must reply. Since I have been a Member of Parliament I have had the privilege and honour of going out of this country quite a bit on one or two tours. I have seen many other parts of the world. I had six years in the Army most of which I spent in the Far East. This much I can say today: I think that Britain is the greatest country in the world. The more I go abroad the more I become convinced that our way of life and our people are worthy of the highest praise. No matter how great the hardship, somehow there is in the British people the courage to face it. They are not emotional.
I am different from the average Briton in that I get emotional. The average man is not emotional, but he has guts and courage, and on issues of this kind the Government should give him all the support he deserves. I believe that the Territorial Army is worthy of the very best we can give it, and that it would be a very poor Government which found an excuse not to give it those things to which it has a right.
§ 12 noon
§ Mr. Anthony Kershaw (Stroud)I join with my hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin (Mr. W. Yates) and the hon. Member for Bermondsey (Mr. Mellish) in paying tribute to the Territorial Army. The hon. Member for Bermondsey referred eloquently to the unit in his constituency which took part in the last war. I had personal acquaintance with that unit during the war and I can confirm what magnificent soldiers were in it. In saying that, I do not wish to yield pride of place to any units outside my own county. The Gloucestershire Yeomanry and the Gloucester Regiment fulfil their part, as do all the Territorial units, in the difficult days which come their way.
In 1914, when the Territorials were called up and had to go abroad at short 1797 notice, they were ready to fight expertly in about three months, but as arms have become more complicated and training more difficult it has become impossible for them to be first-line troops in a European war of the type for which we are training the Regular Army in so short a time. Under conditions of modern warfare it is clear that a period of six months or perhaps more is needed before the Territorial Army can be brought up to the full efficiency required.
Although the Army has become more complex, the spirit in which the Territorials serve is just as important; perhaps even more important. If it is not fit to fight a European war, there is one type of operation for which it is fitted. I join with the hon. Member for Bermondsey in asking my hon. Friend to deal with the question whether the Territorial Army has a rôle to fill overseas at present. It would be a very good thing for the morale of the Territorials if some kind of rôle could be laid down for it.
The training for Civil Defence is no doubt a necessary training. It is the sort of thing that in the last war consisted of gas drill once a week, on Saturdays, when the commanding officer could not find anything else for the men to do before they went on leave. But it is a nuisance, and it is boring. Although the Territorials loyally take part in it and become expert in the drill, I believe that we must regard the Territorial Army as a first-line reserve. Training takes up a large part of the Territorial Army's time, and it is necessary that the men should enjoy it.
At one time, in the South African War, we had the Imperial Yeomanry, consisting of volunteers from the Territorial Army who were all put into one unit when they got abroad. Would it be possible for a proportion of a large Territorial unit to enlist in the Territorial Army on a slightly different engagement, namely, one which would make them liable to be asked to serve abroad without the whole Territorial Army being embodied, and without all the alarms and Foreign Office difficulties which might otherwise be involved" Could these men be sent abroad during peace time?
Not everybody would be able to do this, but there are some men who, through business or family circumstances, would be able to undertake to go abroad; they 1798 could drop their businesses for three or six months and disappear, as it were. Not everybody would be able to do that, but perhaps one-third of a large Territorial unit might be, with the proper compensation. If suitable arrangements were made they would probably be willing to go abroad for a limited period.
They might be employed on duties which have to be carried out from time to time in Colonial Territories and also in European territories, when the Regular Army had to go elsewhere. They could quite adequately discharge the duties required. They are all well-disciplined Territorials, who can command the technique necessary to use the more modest inventions of present-day armaments. They can use the ordinary armoured car, tank, and infantry weapons. They would be a valuable help to the reserve of the Regular Army. This idea would provide a great deal of interest for each unit. A squadron, a company or a sub-unit might be made available to go abroad.
I now wish to mention the question of the amount of the training grant, which was also mentioned by my hon. Friend. None of us wishes to see any cut in the grant to Territorial units, but in defence of my hon. Friend—if he needs defending—I would point out that there is a point of diminishing return in regard to the amount of money which can be spent. If a unit has a large amount of money to spend it can go driving armoured cars round the country, get rid of a great deal of petrol, and do a lot of training instruction—all of which is not a very great improvement upon what it could do with less money.
It may be that there is room for a more flexible application of the grant, so that the rising unit, which has to have two drill nights a week to fit everybody in, can have more money than the unit which needs to drill only once a week. That is a matter of administration, but I feel that it is necessary, because limits are put upon the amounts of training grants and we must see that good use is made of them. I join with my hon. Friend in hoping that the Territorial Army will continue to grow in spirit and in numbers.
§ 12.6 p.m.
§ Mr. R. T. Paget (Northampton)I attended the last Territorial manœsuvres, and I do not think that anybody could 1799 feel that they were very convincing. Since then the Territorial Army has been treated by the Government as a kind of adult extension of the Boy Scout movement. I would be interested to know whether it has any other function. In the First World War the Territorial Army was scrapped in favour of a new division. In the Second World War, more rationally, we sent Territorial battalions to Norway, where those very gallant but quite incompetent troops had a disastrous experience. From that point onwards we learnt sense, and, apart from name, the Territorials have lost their identity in the new armies that we have formed. Most of the officers concerned with Regular troop training that I have come across have said that they would much rather form a unit out of new troops, because there are less bad habits to get them out of.
As for sending the Territorial Army abroad, I do not think that its record or performance provides a very hopeful outlook. Nevertheless, there is a tremendous function for it at home. In an atomic war it is probably the only form of force which will be of any real use to us. Almost its first function in such a war would be to take over the government of the country, because there would be no civilian government. After an atomic war we would have to go over to military government, and I should think that in the Territorial organisation we would have the one thing which could provide that government.
I would like to see the Territorial Army take over the civil defence function of the Home Office. I should like to see it organised for purely local military defence, in the area which it knows. I would also like to see it trained to be able to run and govern its locality. The civil government would be utterly broken down; it would not be able to exist under atomic bombardment. If we rethink the function of the Home Guard we can give the Territorial Army the task of keeping our defence going and making it impossible, after atomic bombardment, for the enemy to occupy this country cheaply. This would be the most important function of all if the horror of atomic war came upon us.
§ 12.10 p.m.
§ The Under-Secretary of State for War (Mr. Julian Amery)The affairs of the Territorial Army were debated in another place quite recently and occasion was taken there to pay tribute to the Territorial Army in this its jubilee year. I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin (Mr. W. Yates) for having given us an opportunity today to pay our tribute and to make our contribution to the consideration of Territorial Army problems.
On Monday, my right hon. Friend the Minister of Defence, in our debate in the House, gave some figures which show the encouraging trend in Regular Army recruiting. The House will be glad to know that the picture in the Territorial Army is equally encouraging. Our target, I think the House knows, is to arrive at 50 per cent. of establishment by 1962. This means, in simple terms, raising the Territorial Army from about 73,000 all ranks to 160,000 all ranks in that time.
Progress so far has been excellent. In 1956, we were losing between 450 and 460 men per month from the Territorial Army. These are all round figures. Last year we were gaining about 700 per month. The gain in the first six months of this year has been just under 2,000 a month, which is, I think, a very encouraging figure. June was a record month with an intake of other ranks which topped the 3,000 mark.
As in the Regular Army, though for completely different reasons, there has been a shortage in the recruiting of junior officers. I say for very different reasons. I think that the chief one is that the young man of what we might call officer material tends to get a commission during his National Service and to feel, when he comes out of the Army, that he wants to take a rest from military affairs for a while. So we have had a situation where the older officers have been retiring from the Territorial Army and have not always been replaced in sufficient numbers.
All the same, the position is by no means bad. We have 72 per cent. of establishment of officers already. There has been a net loss of about 500 a year in the last two years, but with the ending 1801 of National Service I think that the prospect of changing this trend is fairly good. The new conditions announced by my right hon. Friend, in answer to a Question a week or two ago, are, I believe, already encouraging an upward trend in officer recruiting.
My hon. Friend the Member for the Wrekin, if I understood him aright, recommended more pay for junior officers. As he will know better than I, he being a serving Territorial Army officer, there are already what might be called certain egalitarian aspects of this pay. The bounty is the same whatever a man's rank. The mess grant is the same. His suggestion is, however, an interesting one and we shall certainly have it studied. But I see certain difficulties at first sight. When the Territorial Army goes to camp the junior officers receive Regular rates of pay. Is my hon. Friend suggesting that they should get more than the Regular officers of the same rank serving alongside, them? I think that we should have to look at this matter rather carefully.
The hon. Member for Bermondsey (Mr. Mellish) referred to the women's side of the Territorial Army. There was a rather serious drop in strength in 1956 which continued in 1957. But I am glad to say that this trend has been reversed. The first six months of this year show a small but steady increase month by month in the strength of the Territorial W.R.A.C. It now stands at 4,700 which is the highest total since 1955. I should like to take this opportunity of stressing that the Government attach the greatest importance to the recruiting in really satisfactory numbers of women for the Territorial as for the Regular branch of the W.R.A.C.
My hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin stressed the importance of making plain to the country what the Territorial Army was for, what its rôle was. Other hon. Members who have intervened in the debate have made the same point. I will try to make my own contribution on this subject, though it is, I think, always impossible in discussing military matters, whether it be a discussion on reserve forces or active forces, to define quite precisely all the different conditions in which they will be used. Indeed, that is a point which the hon. Member for Bermondsey himself made.
1802 The Territorial Army and the Army Emergency Reserve are the national reserve of disciplined manpower. They are organised on a territorial, a geographical, basis and they are trained to fight. The importance of this reserve has, in our view, been illustrated, and, indeed, abundantly proved, in the last two wars. I do not altogether agree with the strictures which the hon. and learned Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget) made on the contribution of the Territorial Army in the last two wars. I think that without it we should have found it extremely difficult to fight at all.
As my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister said the other day, we in this country have a propensity for going to war and then preparing for it. Nevertheless, the Territorial Army was substantially prepared for both conflicts when they came, and it made a tremendous contribution in them. After all, when we remember that we had no National Service at all before the First World War, and only started it just before the Second, we cannot fail to realise that without the Territorial Army we should simply have been brought to a standstill in our military effort within a few months at most.
For some time to come, of course, we shall still have in this country large reserves of trained manpower. Some of these reserves go back to the last war. We also have a very large element which was trained by National Service in the post-war years. This large reserve of manpower would be organised in the Territorial Army if a conflict should, unhappily, come in the period while the reserve was still fit for service. After that, we shall be going back to the old pattern and the Territorial Army will, apart from the Regular Army reserves, be very nearly the only reserve of trained manpower.
I should have thought that the decision to rely on small all-Regular forces threw a very enhanced responsibility on the Territorial Army, and its value in our defence effort will be no less great than before 1914 and 1939. Indeed, it may well be greater. It is not easy to assign priorities to the rôle of any defence force. The unforeseen always happens in war, and I suppose it is logical that when the unforeseen does happen it is the reserve forces which are most affected.
1803 In our view, therefore, the main thing is to train the Territorial Army in modern fighting techniques. Against this general background, we think that the primary rôle of the Territorial Army can best be defined by the phrase, "Home defence in all its aspects." In global war we would see this as being the defence of this country against invasion, which is not impossible, and Civil Defence and aid to the civil power, as the hon. and learned Member for Northampton suggested.
It might well be, as the hon. and learned Gentleman said, that the Territorial Army would be the nucleus of any renewed effort for continued national life and, indeed, of resistance to whatever further attack there might be after the initial nuclear exchange. In conditions short of global war and, therefore, of nuclear war, there might be a situation where, with our small all-Regular forces, the primary function of the Territorial Army would be to allow those all-Regular forces to go overseas. The Territorial Army would be holding the fort for them here. We must not forget, too, that though the Territorial Army was created originally for home defence on two major occasions, in 1914 and in 1939, it had to go overseas. We cannot exclude the possibility that the Territorial Army might again have to be embodied in that way.
The hon. Member for Bermondsey and my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Mr. Kershaw) made suggestions that went a little beyond the embodiment of the Territorial Army and its despatch overseas, as in the other two wars. My hon. Friend suggested that there should be units of the Territorial Army who would be specially earmarked for tasks of this sort. I have heard a number of suggestions to this effect from the Territorial Army and, of course, the House will know that at the time of the Suez operations, in 1956, quite a number of Territorial officers suggested that they might go and play a part in them. I am not in a position to make any suggestion on that point. But I can tell my hon. Friend and the hon. Member for Bermondsey that their suggestions will be looked at in the War Office in our general study of these matters.
The organisation of the Territorial Army must clearly be matched to our 1804 concept of its role. We proposed to keep the divisional structure because it is probably the one best suited to the regional character of home defence. I think that the hon. and learned Member for Northampton would agree that it is amazing what one can do with a division in terms of the organisation of life in a community in the event of a breakdown of normal facilities.
§ Mr. PagetSurely it is enormously important that the Territorial Army should realise what this function is. I have no doubt that it has not a clue that this would be a part of its rôle
§ Mr. AmeryI am coming in a moment to training, which bears upon that point.
Though we are keeping the divisional organisation, the brigade group will be studied in the Territorial Army and rapid reorganisation into brigade groups will be quite possible if necessary. I hope that there will be no major reorganisation in the Territorial Army for some time to come. The main need is to consolidate. But some small changes are inevitable, and I think that the House will agree that we were justified in converting the five armoured regiments to armoured cars. That conversion is proceeding satisfactorily.
Training must be essentially training to fight. I agree with the hon. and learned Member for Northampton that there must also be a good deal of training in Civil Defence, and for global war. It is our intention that one year in four should be devoted primarily to Civil Defence training. But we believe that about three-quarters of the training must be to fight. Training takes three main forms. There is that at annual camp. Our plan is that units of a brigade—this answers to some extent the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin—will, wherever possible, camp together. The supporting arms will attend camp wherever special facilities are available for the kind of equipment or technique in which they specialise.
This year, the armoured regiments will do firing practice at Castlemartin. The 44th Parachute Brigade will have several airborne exercises. The 21 S.A.S. Regiment will take part in a N.A.T.O. exercise in Norway in September. Civil Defence training will take place at Millom. in Cumberland.
1805 Now for weekend training. My hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin, and others who intervened in the debate, have spoken of the limitation of the training grant. I would like to make the position on this subject quite clear. There was a limit to the training grant before the war, and again up to 1952. Last year, the Government decided on the major reorganisation of all our Armed Forces, which has since been taking place. One of our aims was to make the burden of defence on the economy less than it was, or at any rate to prevent its growing heavier still.
We thought it right that the Territorial Army should bear its share of the sacrifices that had to be made along with the active Army and the other Services. That is why we decided that there should be some limitation on the training grant. My hon. Friend the Member for Stroud has shown that there are two sides to this picture and that, while it is possible to criticise the limitation that we made, there are also undoubtedly cases where too much training has been going on, more training than was necessary.
It is our argument that enough money is being provided for all the training that is necessary at the present time. But I should like to put two further points. The first is that the jubilee celebrations are not included in the limitation on the training grant, the second that there is no ceiling on local recruiting. If we recruit more men we shall get more money to train them.
Criticism has been voiced in the debate and I know that there is criticism in some associations. I assure the House that we shall give careful consideration to the representations that have been made to us. If morale and efficiency are in any way affected we shall, of course, review the position. Where evening training is concerned, suggestions were made about drill halls and territorial centres, particularly in the new towns. There is a new hall in Corby and another has just been opened in Crawley. We are actively seeking sites in other new towns.
My hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin spoke about the importance of uniforms. I am sure he will appreciate that the decision on uniforms for the Territorial Army must form part of the discussions that are in process about the uniforms for the Regular Army.
1806 I am sure that the whole House agrees that, apart from the flesh and bones aspect of the Territorial Army that I have been discussing so far, what counts above all is the spirit, especially the spirit of service to which the hon. Member for Bermondsey referred in such eloquent terms. It has never been more necessary than today, with the ending of National Service. If there is one thing I regret about the ending of National Service it is that generations will be growing up with none of the experience of military discipline, initiative and training in leadership that National Service afforded. It will, in the years to come, be the responsibility of the Territorial Army to keep alive among our people those martial virtues of discipline, initiative and leadership without which no people can become or remain great.
I hope that the jubilee celebrations will help to bring home to the nation as a whole the importance of our Territorial Army. No one who saw the great parade, where Her Majesty the Queen took the salute, can have failed to be impressed by the enthusiasm and the bearing of those officers and men of the Territorial Army who took part in it. Many Members of Parliament were present and I hope that none suffered any ill-effects from the rain. The downpour certainly marred the last stages of that parade. Yet, in a curious way, I think that it was symbolic of something really important. It was a reminder that the Territorial Army are no fair weather soldiers.