§ Mr. Bestasked the Secretary of State for Defence if he will estimate the extra expenditure and the extra number of man training days if all restrictions on man training days were lifted for the Territorial Army.
§ Mr. GoodhartAs I told my hon. Friend on 12 March 1981—[Vol. 1000, c.404.]—planned expenditure on TA man training days will be higher in 1981–82 than in 1980–81, but restrictions are having to be imposed as part of the measures to contain expenditure on the defence budget. The intention is to give priority to essential operational training tasks at the expense of some lower priority tasks for which man training days have been allocated in the past. TA strengths are forecast to rise above those allowed for in the Estimates and it is reckoned that, if all restrictions were lifted in 1981–82, some 270,000 extra days would be required and that the cost would be at least £4.5 million more than our current provision.