HL Deb 22 July 1999 vol 604 cc1130-3

3.30 p.m.

Baroness Park of Monmouth asked Her Majesty's Government:

Whether they have sufficient trained troops available to meet their commitments in Kosovo, Bosnia and Northern Ireland in view of their commitment to provide 8,000 troops for a United Nations force anywhere in the world in the future.

The Minister of State, Ministry of Defence (Lord Gilbert)

My Lords, we are able to meet our current obligations. The Memorandum of Understanding agreed with the United Nations last month is not an open commitment to provide troops. The decision to commit UK troops to UN operations remains a national one arid will be considered case by case.

Baroness Park of Monmouth

My Lords, I thank the Minister for that distinctly "un-full" reply. This morning the Secretary of State agreed that there is serious overstretch and undermanning and an unprecedented level of commitment. He said that people should not be asked to do too much. Does the Minister agree that overstretch is hitting the families harder than ever? Does he agree that we will not retain our trained troops and comply with the SDR unless the Government reduce their commitments and start thinking about people?

Lord Gilbert

My Lords, we have been thinking about people right from the beginning—since this Government took office. It is one of the essential elements of the Strategic Defence Review, as I am sure the noble Baroness knows. My right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Defence has made several suggestions and we are now starting a review to see where we can reduce commitments.

Lord Hardy of Wath

My Lords, does my noble friend accept that while there is enormous strain in the services—partly because of the high quality of the services—the Government have introduced ameliorative arrangements to ease the difficulties? Can my noble friend tell the House how the number of troops and personnel in training compares with the number two or three years ago?

Lord Gilbert

My Lords, I confess that I have not come to the House today armed with the number of troops in training. I shall happily give my noble friend such statistics as I can raise when I return to the department. There is no question but that the Army is suffering a considerable overstretch at the moment. However, we hope considerably to reduce the numbers of our forces in KFOR over the next few months. My right honourable friend announced his intentions only yesterday in the other place. By the end of October, all being well, we shall be down to a total of the order of 5,000 or 6,000 as against a peak figure of around 14,000.

Lord Wallace of Saltaire

My Lords, can the Minister tell us how recruitment figures are going? Part of the problem is the difficulty of filling the recruitment target. In particular, since one of the problems of recruitment has been the failure to attract adequate numbers of people from the ethnic minorities, can he tell us how the new efforts to attract more ethnic minority groups are proceeding?

Lord Gilbert

The recruitment figures are extremely healthy. They do not convey the whole picture and we have a problem with retentions. I am glad to say that for the last month for which figures are available there is a net increase in recruitment over people leaving. It may be a blip, and I would not want to put too much weight upon it. But it is encouraging that recruitment has increased substantially since the beginning of operations in Kosovo.

As to ethnic recruiting, we are doing extremely well against, I have to say, fairly modest targets. In the Household Division we have been commended for our efforts. Two special campaigns were waged in Sandwell and Newham to penetrate the ethnic communities. Both exercises are going forward and have many months to run but at the moment everything is looking extremely promising.

Viscount Cranborne

My Lords, can the Minister tell the House, first, what the average tour interval is now in the emergency tour plot? Secondly, can he tell us how many infantry battalions are less than 70 per cent up to establishment?

Lord Gilbert

My Lords, again I have not come armed with either of those figures. The tour plot is going down, I can tell the noble Viscount that beyond contravention.

Lord Hylton

My Lords, can the Minister say whether British forces are being withdrawn from Kosovo before KFOR has reached its agreed and planned strength? If that is the case, it seems unsatisfactory in view of the tensions that exist.

Lord Gilbert

My Lords, the total KFOR is currently around 39,000. There have been planning figures as high as 50,000 but it is not essential that we reach that. Our forces are being taken out of theatre as our allies' contributions come through, and I am glad to say that they are coming through smoothly.

Lord Burnham

My Lords, the noble Lord mentioned the figures given by the Secretary of State with regard to retentions. However, he admitted to the Commons Defence Committee that premature voluntary retirement was running ahead of recruitment. What positive steps are the Government taking to improve retention? It is much more important to have trained men than new recruits.

Lord Gilbert

My Lords, I thoroughly subscribe to the noble Lord's final proposition. It is much more important to have trained men than recruits. We have been wrestling with the problem of retentions which has been with the Armed Forces for many years. Some recent actions of my right honourable friend have been to introduce a fairer pay structure, to increase leave for people who have just come from active service abroad, and to increase the free travel arrangements for servicemen abroad. On a longer term basis, he has introduced an increase in learning arrangements, higher education arrangements, for members of the forces to facilitate, among other things, their acquisition of civilian qualifications, so putting them in a better position and, we hope, encouraging them to stay in the forces.

The Earl of Carlisle

My Lords, can the Minister inform the House how many Territorial Army personnel are serving alongside their regular counterparts in the three operational areas mentioned in the noble Baroness's Question? Will he consider, as a way of alleviating overstretch, calling up more Territorial Army personnel? That will in turn mean that we can put on hold some of the cuts that his department has decided to inflict on the Territorial Army.

Lord Gilbert

My Lords, as the noble Lord and the rest of the House are well aware, it is the Government's policy to modernise the Territorial Army and convert it increasingly into a specialist body of men and women. There are only a handful of Territorials in Kosovo. I shall certainly consider the noble Lord's other suggestion.