Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Baroness Stuart of Edgbaston and Julian Brazier

Monday 23rd February 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Brazier]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on his initiative. The north of England provides the greatest proportion of our soldiers, regular and reserve, and the relaunch of the Army recruiting campaign’s reserve component last month involved a major event in Liverpool, as he knows. There will be more in the north. Following the Secretary of State’s announcement in October of the intention to restore a post-nominal award to recognise long service in the reserves, I should like to take this opportunity to confirm that such an award will be restored for those of all ranks who achieve 10 years’ service.

[Ms Gisela Stuart (Birmingham, Edgbaston) (Lab)]

The new 77th Brigade, which will focus on psych-ops, is expected to recruit about 40 % of its members from the reserves. According to press reports, however, by Christmas only about 20 had been recruited. When does the Minister think he will achieve the full complement?

[Mr Brazier]

For obvious reasons, some of the detail of the recruiting in that area will not be published in the House, and I am sure that the hon. Lady—my hon. Friend, if I may call her that—will understand those reasons. There is, however, a big upturn in recruitment right across the reserves, as the figures I gave the House earlier indicated.

Reserve Recruitment

Debate between Baroness Stuart of Edgbaston and Julian Brazier

Monday 17th November 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Brazier]

I am grateful to my hon. and gallant Friend. He says that the policy should have been tested; the recommendations came out of an inquiry chaired by the Chief of the Defence Staff. They have been strongly and publicly supported by the Chief of the General Staff, both publicly in front of the Select Committee on Defence and privately in front of the all-party group, of which my hon. Friend is a member. We know that we can achieve this; the plain fact is that we said that it would take five years. We are unblocking the recruiting system. The units that I visit all suggest that they are well on their way. We will achieve the targets.

[Ms Gisela Stuart (Birmingham, Edgbaston) (Lab)]

When those reforms were originally launched, one of the key principles was for the reservist force to “routinely share” jobs that were once the

“exclusive domain of Regular forces”.

There was therefore that integration. Back in October, when the Chief of the General Staff suggested that reservists would be used only in emergencies, he was kind of rebuked for not being in line with Government policy. Is not the reality now that the original policy of sharing is no longer possible, and we are reduced, because of the numbers, to using them only in national emergencies?

Defence Reform Bill

Debate between Baroness Stuart of Edgbaston and Julian Brazier

Wednesday 20th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Brazier]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for her kind words. My essential point is that Parliament recognised, when the Territorial and Reserve Forces Act 1907 was put through, that reservist recruitment would never work if it were simply run by the Regular Army. It does not work. There is no reserve army anywhere in the world that is effectively run by its regular counterpart. We need a strong independent body. This new clause, which my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has generously said he will accept, will put the body that used to do this job very effectively into a powerful position as inspectors.

[Ms Gisela Stuart (Birmingham, Edgbaston) (Lab)]

For the record, it is not just a question of the mess that it all was; it is a question of the mess that it still is. My understanding is that the new clause will help to put the mess right.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Brazier]

I am not sure that I heard the last few words of the hon. Lady’s intervention; would she mind repeating it, as I could not quite hear?

[Ms Stuart]

I was suggesting that the purpose of the new clause, which I sponsored, was to put the mess right.

[Mr Brazier]

A whole string of changes affecting the recruiting group are already taking place, and I am sure that the Secretary of State will address some of them. The key point—I am really grateful for the hon. Lady’s support in signing my new clause and in raising questions in the Select Committee and so forth—is that we would not have lost 18 months if people had listened to the RFCAs, to which all this was painfully obvious 18 months ago, instead of having some regular officers arrogantly cracking on without talking to the units or the RFCAs.