Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Jim Shannon and Richard Bacon

Thursday 23rd May 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mr Bacon]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right that it is an important subject, and the Public Accounts Committee was due to take oral evidence on it on 17 June. I will certainly draw his concerns to the attention of the new Chair of the Public Accounts Committee when I know who he or she is.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his response. This is a massive subject and will have to be scrutinised greatly in the next term of government. What assessment has been made of the potential negatives of AI within the defence industry and Government, and what steps will be taken to combat them?

[Mr Bacon]

I think the short answer is that there is inadequate awareness inside Government—although there is some awareness—that there are potentially very large negatives with artificial intelligence. Indeed, one of the inventors of artificial intelligence has written a book on precisely that subject. I suspect that it is something the Government will continue to assess.

Army Reserve

Debate between Jim Shannon and Richard Bacon

Wednesday 2nd February 2022 Commons Chamber

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

First, I congratulate the hon. Member on bringing the debate forward. I concur and entirely support the figures to which he refers, because the figures that I have from within Northern Ireland indicate that the position is similar for us in Northern Ireland. I have been made aware of the proposed restructuring of our Army Reserve, medical units and infantry in Northern Ireland, leading to a 10% reduction in numbers. I declare an interest as a former reservist and part-time soldier for 14 and a half years.

Northern Ireland has a commitment to the reserves, an ability to recruit and a willingness to deploy. Indeed, Northern Ireland has contributed comparatively more to operations overseas than any other region. The reduction that the hon. Gentleman refers to is ludicrous. I fully understand the need to restructure and to meet up-to-date operational needs, but why throw away the willing volunteers that we have in Northern Ireland? I cannot understand where we are going.

[Mr Bacon]

I very much agree. The hon. Gentleman made the point that Northern Ireland has contributed disproportionately to the reserves. I should declare that when I did my final passing out camp in the intelligence corps, we shared our barracks with the Royal Irish Rangers; indeed, I passed out with a Royal Irish Rangers pipe band. I must say to anyone who has not experienced it that they should not knock it until they have tried it. There is nothing quite like marching in Army formation with an Irish pipe band. As he said, the Northern Irish have contributed hugely to the reserves and we are all in this House grateful to them for what they do.

Much worse than the actual cut in numbers is the way in which the cut is proposed, including the erosion of the already fragile structure of all our combat units, instead of simply closing a few. The essence of effective reserves, both for use in small operations and to form a basis for regenerating a larger army, is putting together a body of officers and soldiers who train, study and socialise together, building links of comradeship that can stand the test of combat.

Britain did that successfully in the two world wars and more recently in Iraq and in the early part of Operation Herrick in Afghanistan, where formed companies of infantry, and sub-units from other elements, were successfully deployed. Unfortunately, in the latter stages of Operation Herrick, that approach was torn up and reserve units were exclusively used to backfill regular ones—“augmentation”, as the Army calls it. That offered no command roles for junior reserve officers, just supporting posts.

The consequences were dire. The “Reserves in the Future Force 2020” report uncovered that the junior officer base of the Army had disintegrated, and applications for reserve Sandhurst courses collapsed. Putting that right and moving back towards formed bodies was at the heart of the rebuilding programme of the past decade. Indeed, in the past two years, we have seen a yeomanry squadron rotate successfully into Operation Cabrit in eastern Europe and two reserve infantry battalions, 6 and 7 Rifles, provide the framework for Operation Tosca in Cyprus.

That is why the widely discussed proposals for the cuts in the Army Reserve are so devastating. Instead of simply disbanding a few reserve units—perhaps from an area such as logistics where there is a successful record of using armed civilian contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan—I understand that the plan is to devastate every infantry battalion by reducing the manning in three company battalions to just 340 and in four company battalions to 430. Each company will consist of just two rifle platoons and a single section of support weapons, instead of a support platoon.

Besides the obvious point that this seems a very odd time to reduce our reserves of anti-tank weapons and mortars, that will leave each company much smaller and with no in-house staff for the residual support element. Given that nobody gets a full turnout, even when manning recovers from the devastation of covid, that would leave a sub-unit structure without the critical mass for company-level training. At battalion level, it will become impossible to generate a formed company for an extended deployment, as the proportion of even a well-recruited unit who can take many months off work in peacetime is inevitably limited.

That brings me to the state of the reserves recruiting programme. During covid, the collapse in activity was damaging to units, much of it, I suspect, concealed in the statistics by a failure to discharge non-attenders. So the decision largely to turn off the reserve pipeline for many months was ill judged, but, since it restarted last year, astonishingly, the marketing has been done without consultation or even co-ordination with reserve units, or with the reserve forces cadets associations with their local footprint and knowledge. The Minister will know that that has not produced the surge that the Army Reserve hoped for, and badly needs, after the setbacks of covid. I await the figures for the most recent quarter with some trepidation.

There is now a threat to the progress that has been made on reserve officer courses at Royal Military Academy Sandhurst. Three years ago, the post of deputy commandant reserves, which had played such a big part in the recovery of reserve officers, was abolished. Now, the decision has just been taken to sideline the reserve colonel at Sandhurst, to whom the various university officer training corps reported. The reserves depend on the OTCs for the bulk of their officer supply and much of their training, and almost all OTCs are commanded by regular officers. Now they will answer to a regular officer, too. So the senior reserve voice has been frozen out of that critical area for the health and regeneration of the Army Reserve. OTCs may become little more than recruiting organisations for the Regular Army.

Those concerns about manning are reinforced by a number of other emerging trends. At a time when covid and the recruiting pause have left such gaps, is it really a good time to suggest that, where units can recruit above strength and their neighbours cannot, they will be forbidden to do so? That would punish those who are successful, and make it a certainty that we will never recruit up to our new, further reduced target.

In a separate “Future Soldier” document, the reserve component narrative states at paragraph 3, line 4:

“An assured and capable Reserve will require a new approach to training, basing and force generation that sets the Army Reserve up for success. Reservists may not need to give more of their time; but making much better use of their time will be essential.”

That is exactly right, but let us look at the detail.

To take training first, many experienced reservists would say that the biggest waste of their time is the approach of many of the arms schools, which insist that reservists are trained at the same slow speed as regulars, despite reservists having a higher educational minimum standard and, crucially, needing to make progress in the short periods they can spare from civilian jobs. Some forward-leaning institutions, such as Chatham and Larkhill, have modularised, pushing out much of their courses to units and making use of distance learning. Others, such as Bovington and Leconfield, continue to insist on courses being almost all delivered on site and frequently at a very slow pace—a considerable problem for reservists whose day jobs and homes are far away.

What is being done to tackle those institutions that simply do not understand that reserves need to be prepared in a way that fits around their civilian work patterns?

Turning to basing, there are plans that elements of the reserve estate will be closed and that units will be grouped in larger, better centres. Although, in principle, this should improve some dire accommodation, we need to be cautious. Most journeys to training take place in the rush hour, so peak traffic journey times are critical in assessing the expectation that recruits with demanding day jobs will be willing to travel after a hard day’s work. This is particularly seen in threats to delete successful sub-units. Unless the alternative location is close, it will simply drive people away, further reducing manning.