Asked by: Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask Her Majesty's Government how many units of accommodation for British Armed Forces personnel in the UK do not have en suite facilities.
Answered by Earl Howe - Deputy Leader of the House of Lords
There are approximately 134,000 Single Living Accommodation (SLA) bedspaces for the Armed Forces in the UK. From the data collated by the Defence Infrastructure Organisation approximately 51,000 bedspaces have en-suite facilities.
The figures provided are based on current data held. However, the dataset is known to be incomplete and we are addressing this by developing a bespoke Information Management System for SLA.
Asked by: Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what is their latest assessment of the quality of kit issued to British Armed Forces personnel.
Answered by Earl Howe - Deputy Leader of the House of Lords
The Ministry of Defence has a responsibility to procure and support the delivery of quality equipment for our Armed Forces. As an organisation we regularly assess kit, implementing improvements where necessary. We are confident that our personnel have the right equipment to do the tasks we ask them to undertake.
Asked by: Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what upgrades to accommodation provided in the UK to service personnel and their families have been completed since 2015.
Answered by Earl Howe - Deputy Leader of the House of Lords
The following table shows the number of Service Family Accommodation (SFA) properties which have had upgrade work carried out in the financial years stated, against each category.
The figures in the table do not include upgrades to Single Living Accommodation.
Figures for financial year 2015-16 are only held as total works completed and are not broken down into categories, as shown for later years.
Asked by: Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the potential for unmanned transport systems to supply troops on the front line.
Answered by Earl Howe - Deputy Leader of the House of Lords
The Defence Scientific and Technology Laboratory (DSTL) is leading the Ministry of Defence's research in this area, working with the US Department of Defense to accelerate and demonstrate the effective use of new robotic and autonomous systems technologies.
This includes the 'Last Mile Challenge' innovation initiative which has challenged industry and academia to look at how delivery drones and resupply robots can provide vital reinforcements to frontline troops. The challenge is worth a total of £3.8 million over the next 12 months with prototypes being built for demonstration later this year. Four of the five successful organisations are British-led with a wide range of sub-contractors from small and medium sized enterprises, industry and academia.
These capabilities and other emerging military technologies will be tested and evaluated at the Autonomous Warrior, Army Warfighting Exercise in November 2018. The exercise, which involves all three Services, DSTL, the US Army and around 50 industry participants, will test a range of research projects including in surveillance, long-range and precision targeting, enhancing mobility and the re-supply of forces, urban warfare and enhanced situational awareness. The lessons identified will support decision making for future investment in ground-breaking technology and innovation to ensure the Army and British industry remain at the cutting edge of technology and combat tactics.
Asked by: Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask Her Majesty's Government how they plan to combat the threat of modern digital mines at sea.
Answered by Earl Howe - Deputy Leader of the House of Lords
As part of the active and ongoing research into Mine Countermeasures, the Government announced in May this year that the Royal Navy is currently undertaking trials of an autonomous minesweeping system. The findings of these trials will inform future decisions on the procurement of operational systems to defeat the threat of modern digital mines.
Asked by: Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what percentage of accommodation for servicemen and women in the UK does not include en-suite facilities.
Answered by Earl Howe - Deputy Leader of the House of Lords
At present, there are approximately 135,000 bedspaces for servicemen and women, recorded on the Defence Infrastructure Organisation's Infrastructure Management System. From the data we have collated, approximately 85,000 bedspaces (63%) do not have en-suite facilities.
The Department is currently refining how we collect the data to enable us to portray a more precise figure.
Asked by: Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what is the current strength of Her Majesty’s Armed Forces.
Answered by Earl Howe - Deputy Leader of the House of Lords
The strength of Her Majesty's Armed Forces as at 1 January 2018 is 194,950.
Information on Armed Forces strength is regularly published by Defence Statistics in the UK Armed Forces Quarterly Service Personnel Statistics, which can be found at the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/quarterly-service-personnel-statistics-2018
Updated figures as at 1 April will be accessible at the same website address from 17 May 2018.
Asked by: Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask Her Majesty's Government when they expect to take the Tornado aircraft completely out of service.
Answered by Earl Howe - Deputy Leader of the House of Lords
I refer the Noble Lord to the answer my hon. Friend, the Minster for Defence Procurement (Guto Bebb) gave in the House of Commons to the hon. Member for Llanelli (Nia Griffith) on 23 April 2018 to Question 136226.
Asked by: Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what land or buildings owned by, leased by, or under the control of, the Ministry of Defence they are seeking to dispose of, and for what purposes.
Answered by Earl Howe - Deputy Leader of the House of Lords
Land and buildings that the Ministry of Defence is seeking to dispose of are shown on the Department's Disposal Database, a copy of which is attached.
The future use of any Defence land once sold is a matter for the new purchaser.
Asked by: Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the Written Answer by Earl Howe (HL4337) on 9 January, what definition of reviews was used to provide the answer.
Answered by Earl Howe - Deputy Leader of the House of Lords
As the noble Lord's question asked for the number of all reviews announced to Parliament by the Ministry of Defence, all Written Ministerial Statements since 2011 were examined and all those in which a Defence Minister announced a review of any kind were included.