HC Deb 30 March 1995 vol 257 c745W
Lady Olga Maitland

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will make a statement about the future status of the Royal Navy"s Flag Officer Training and Recruiting organisation. [18011]

Mr. Soames

The Flag Officer Training and Recruiting organisation will be launched as a defence agency of the Ministry of Defence on 1 April 1995, and will be called the Naval Recruiting and Training Agency.

The NRTA"s owner will be the Second Sea Lord and Commander-in-Chief Naval Home Command. It will carry out its training activities at a number of training schools based in naval establishments in the south of England and operate recruiting centres in all regions of the UK. The chief executive"s headquarters is collocated with that of the Second Sea Lord and Commander-in-Chief Naval Home Command with HM naval base, Portsmouth.

The agency"s primary role is to recruit to the Royal Navy and Royal Marines and to train and develop personnel, both service and civilian, for their individual tasks in the naval service, as and when appropriate throughout their subsequent careers.

As the first chief executive of the new agency, Rear Admiral J. P. Clarke will be offered new opportunities to build on the current organisation"s professional expertise and high performance standards. In maintaining the NRTA"s contribution to front-line capability, the chief executive will actively seek to improve efficiency and value for money of his organisation.

The chief executive has been set the following key targets for the financial year 1995–96:

  1. 1. To achieve 90 per cent. of deliveries of categories of personnel to the trained strength from initial training within accepted variances.
  2. 2. To achieve wastage rates for new entry officers, apprentices and ratings no greater than 25 per cent., 30 per cent. and 20 per cent. respectively.
  3. 3. By 31 March 1996, to complete the process of establishing optimum pipeline times for all categories of initial training, and determine baseline figures for overruns against which future performance can be measured.
  4. 4. To maintain a success rate in excess of 95 per cent. in career and pre-joining training.
  5. 5. By 31 March 1996, to agree with NRTA"s key customers a positive feedback system and criteria for the measurement of the extent to which personnel trained by NRTA satisfy the customers" requirements.