§ LORD OGMOREasked Her Majesty's Government:
Who are the members of the Military Staff Committee formed under the provisions of Article 47 of the United Nations Charter; how many times the Committee has met during the last twelve months; what advice it has 804WA given during this period to the Security Council on questions relating to Security Council's military requirements; what is the total number of the Staff serving this Committee; who are the United Kingdom members of this staff; what has been the total cost of this Committee and its staff, and how much has been Her Majesty's Government's contribution to this cost.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEThe members of the Military Staff Committee formed under the provisions of Article 47 of the United Nations Charter are China, France, the United Kingdom, the United States and the U.S.S.R. A list of the officers serving on the Committee, as on January 1, 1962, are contained in United Nations document MN/INF/310, a copy of which is in the Library of the House.
The Committee has met 26 times during the past twelve months. It has given no advice during this period to the Security Council on questions relating to the Security Council's military requirements. The civilian staff serving the Committee were completely integrated with the United Nations Secretariat by 1959; since then, no separate staff has been specifically assigned to serve the Committee. For the same reason, the costs of these services are no longer separately identified in the estimates and could not readily be calculated.
The identifiable costs of the Committee as far as the United Kingdom is concerned are therefore confined to the travelling and subsistence expenses of the British officers concerned who travel to New York for the meetings from Washington, where they serve as members of the British Military, Naval and Air Force Missions staff. This is estimated to be £1,000 per annum.