Royal Naval Reserve (Hansard, 13 November 1992)

HC Deb 13 November 1992 vol 213 cc1005-6W 1005W

§ Mr. Trotter
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what role he envisages for the future of the Royal Naval Reserve in general; whether the volunteer reserves will retain a seagoing role; and what assessment he has made of whether adequate steps have been taken to maintain the morale and motivation of the Royal Naval Reserve volunteers.

§ Mr. Archie Hamilton
The Royal Navy's reserve forces, including the Royal Naval Reserve, will continue to have an important role in our defence plans. My right hon. Friend the hon. Member for Bridgewater (Mr. King) the then Secretary of State for Defence published in March 1992 an open government document "The Future of Britain's Reserve Forces" which described proposals for fundamental changes in the management and deployment of reserve forces both in peacetime and on military operations. As part of this process, the future use of the Navy's volunteer and ex-regular reserves, is being examined, including investigation into the future seagoing opportunities of the Royal Naval Reserve, with the aim of establishing enduring and worthwhile tasks to support the
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§ Mr. Ainger
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many individuals were given emergency decompression or re-compression in each of his Department's decompression chambers in each of the past five years; and how many of those were civilian contractors, leisure divers, military divers or victims of carbon monoxide poisoning.

§ Mr. Archie Hamilton
The information is not available in the form requested. The table shows the total numbers of service and civilian divers, and victims of carbon monoxide poisoning, treated over the last five years.
Royal Navy in the very different international climate that now exists. It is, however, too early to predict the outcome of these studies.
I am satisfied that adequate steps are being taken to keep the Volunteer reservists fully informed of developments. The assistant chief of naval staff signalled Royal Naval Reserve personnel in June 1992 reassuring them that work relating to the open government document was continuing. In addition, he holds regular meetings with senior members of the Royal Naval Reserve to inform them about the future direction of Royal Naval Reserve policy.