§ Mr. Nicholas Wintertonasked the Secretary of State for Defence (1) if he will give a breakdown by rank of the numbers of individuals serving in each regiment within the Territorial Army in Cheshire;
(2) if he will list in the Official Report those units of the Territorial Army and their respective strengths which are based in Cheshire.
§ Mr. LeeA breakdown by rank of the number of individuals serving in each Territorial Army unit based in Cheshire, together with the respective strengths of those units as at 11 December 1984 is as follows:
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Unit Location Officers Soldiers Major Capt. Lt. 2/Lt. Total WOI WOII S/Sgt. Sgt. Cpl. L/Cpl. Private Total Totals C Troop, 213 (South Lancashire Artillery) Battery, 103 Air Defence Regiment, Royal Artillery Widnes — 1 1 — 2 — 1 2 4 9 9 31 56 58 Detachment 224 (North Staffs) Field Ambulance, Royal Army Medical Corps (Volunteers) Crewe — — 1 — 1 — — 1 — 1 1 18 21 22 Detachment 224 (North Staffs) Field Ambulance, Royal Army Medical Corps (Volunteers) Macclesfield — 2 — — 2 — — — 1 2 2 18 23 25 Detachment 207 (Manchester) General Hospital, Royal Army Medical Corps (Volunteers) Macclesfield 2 4 — — 6 — — — — 1 9 29 39 45 Detachment 208 (Manchester) General Hospital Royal Army Medical Corps (Volunteers) Ellesmere Port 2 2 — — 4 — — 1 5 1 4 11 22 26 Totals 12 23 14 7 56 1 13 17 65 93 113 483 785 †841 Notes:
* A detachment of C company is based at Northwich.
† These figures represent numbers of Territorial Army soldiers only, and do not include Regular Army staff, non-Regular permanent staff or civilians attached to these Territorial Amy units.
§ Mr. Nicholas Wintertonasked the Secretary of State for Defence if he will outline his plans for the future strengths of those units of the Territorial Army currently based in Cheshire.
§ Mr. LeeAs part of our phase II expansion of the Territorial Army, plans for which we announced in March, we intend to begin raising a new battalion in the Cheshire area in 1986, which will be called 3rd (Volunteer) Battalion The Cheshire Regiment. This will be based on two existing companies of 2nd Battalion Mercian Volunteers at Ellesmere Port and Stockport. A headquarters for the new battalion will be raised initially at Northwich and will move to Runcorn. A new company will be raised at Macclesfield and the detachment of B Company, 2nd Battalion Mercian Volunteers at Crewe will expand and become D Company of the new battalion. We also plan to expand 207 (Manchester) general hospital, Royal Army Medical Corps (Volunteers), which recruits partly in Macclesfield, by about 100 posts. In addition, we intend to raise new home service force companies based in Warrington and Runcorn, and a platoon of a company based in Liverpool will be raised at Widnes.
§ Mr. Nicholas Wintertonasked the Secretary of State for Defence if he will state the average annual training time undertaken by individuals serving in the Territorial Army.
§ Mr. LeeDuring the training year 1983–84 the average number of training days undertaken by the whole of the Territorial Army was 35.9 per man.