§ 11. Mr. Mulleyasked the Secretary of State for Air what reorganisation of personnel and stations is to be made consequential to the decisions not to acquire the Skybolt missile for the Royal Air Force and to take the Thor missile out of service; and if he will make a statement.
§ Mr. H. FraserThe cancellation of Skybolt does not of itself call for any changes in our present organisation: Bomber Command will continue to provide the strategic deterrent until about 1970. The rundown of the Thor system will enable us to close a number of stations and will yield manpower savings of between 3,000 and 4,000 men.
Recruitment has been restricted where necessary to take account of this. The men released by the Thor rundown will be given suitable employment elsewhere in the Service.
§ Mr. MulleyI thank the Secretary of State for that Answer. Can he not give us a little indication of his thoughts on the development of the Royal Air Force? Surely he is not now planning on exactly the same lines as when it was proposed that we should acquire Skybolt and when we had the Thor missile in use? Surely some recasting of the Air Force's personnel requirements is bound to flow from this situation, and possibly some new requirements in terms of equipment? Can he not give us some idea of the lines along which he is working?
§ Mr. FraserThe hon. Gentleman has invited me to make a very long speech. I could speak for about half an hour on many of these points. The development of an armed Service, which is as flexible as the Air Force must be, is a continuous process.
§ Mr. Emrys HughesDoes not the Minister realise that the Prime Minister gave us to understand that when we spent large sums on providing Polaris for the Navy we would be compensated by a reduction in the Air Force? Does the Minister mean that we shall continue to spend large sums on the Air Force and large sums on the Navy at the same time?
§ Mr. FraserWe propose to continue to maintain an independent deterrent here, and that is going to cost a great deal of money.