Asked by: Jeremy Hunt (Conservative - South West Surrey)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what progress his Department has made on the development of Joint Force 2025; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Anne-Marie Trevelyan - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
In 2015 we set out a step change in our ambition for UK Defence; the ambition to be able to war-fight at scale by 2025. Our headmark for this is Joint Force 2025, a highly capable deployable force of around 50,000 personnel drawn from all services. We have made significant progress in delivering the Maritime Task Group, Army Division, Air Group and Joint Forces that make up this deployable force. But there are still challenges. We know the threat picture for the UK has evolved since 2015, this was acknowledged in our Modernising Defence Programme, and there is still work to be done to ensure we are on track for delivery by 2025. The forthcoming Integrated Review on Security, Defence and Foreign Policy and the Comprehensive Spending Review provide us a unique opportunity to refresh our plans for Defence to make sure that we are delivering the right capability to keep the country safe now and in decades to come.
Asked by: Jeremy Hunt (Conservative - South West Surrey)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how much and what proportion of his Department's built estate has been released to the public sector for development; what the reduction to the size of that estate has been as a result of the release; and how many properties have been built on land previously owned by his Department in each of the last three years.
Answered by James Heappey
Since 2015, the Ministry of Defence's built estate has reduced in size by 1.3% and is currently 73,900 hectares.
The Ministry of Defence releases land for a mix of housing, economic growth and job creation uses. Since 2010, the Department has released land with a Housing Unit Potential of up to 8,321 houses.
The Department holds no information on the number of properties built on land sold for development as this would be a matter for the new owner of the land and local planning authorities.
Asked by: Jeremy Hunt (Conservative - South West Surrey)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how many maritime patrol aircraft his Department has purchased since 2015.
Answered by James Heappey
The Ministry of Defence has ordered nine P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft from the US Government by Foreign Military Sale. Of these, the purchase of one aircraft was completed in October 2019, with a second purchase due for completion imminently.
Asked by: Jeremy Hunt (Conservative - South West Surrey)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what recent assessment he has made of the number of military personnel serving in the (a) Royal Navy, (b) Royal Marines, (c) RAF and (d) Army; and what assessment he has made of the trends in those numbers in the last five years.
Answered by Anne-Marie Trevelyan - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
While there has been a downward trend in strength over the last five years, the Government is committed to maintaining the overall size of the Armed Forces and is taking forward a range of measures to improve recruitment and retention. Importantly, the Armed Forces continue to meet all their current commitments, keeping the country and its interests safe. The Armed Forces are fully funded to meet their target strength and we continue to increase funding to Defence year on year.
The Ministry of Defence keeps the numbers of military personnel under close review. On a quarterly basis we publish UK Service personnel statistics on strengths, requirements, intake, applications and outflow, by Service. The latest edition, with information as at 1 October 2019 and showing trends since 1 April 2012, can be found at the following website:
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/quarterly-service-personnel-statistics-2019
Asked by: Jeremy Hunt (Conservative - South West Surrey)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what recent assessment he has made of the number of military personnel serving in the (a) Maritime Reserves, (b) RAF reserves and (c) Army reserves; and what assessment he has made of the trends in those numbers in the last five years.
Answered by Anne-Marie Trevelyan - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
While there has been a downward trend in strength over the last five years, the Government is committed to maintaining the overall size of the Armed Forces and is taking forward a range of measures to improve recruitment and retention. Importantly, the Armed Forces continue to meet all their current commitments, keeping the country and its interests safe. The Armed Forces are fully funded to meet their target strength and we continue to increase funding to Defence year on year.
The Ministry of Defence keeps the numbers of military personnel under close review. On a quarterly basis we publish UK Service personnel statistics on strengths, requirements, intake, applications and outflow, by Service. The latest edition, with information as at 1 October 2019 and showing trends since 1 April 2012, can be found at the following website:
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/quarterly-service-personnel-statistics-2019
Asked by: Jeremy Hunt (Conservative - South West Surrey)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what progress has been made on the development of an unmanned combat air system programme with France; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by James Heappey
The UK is continuing to work with France in the £65 million Future Combat Air Systems Technology Development Co-operation (FCAS TDC) programme. This programme is primarily aimed at improving the interoperability of current and future UK and French combat air platforms.
Asked by: Jeremy Hunt (Conservative - South West Surrey)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how much money from the public purse has been spent on (a) new equipment and (b) equipment support for the Armed Forces since 2015.
Answered by James Heappey
The Department publishes detail on total equipment spend in the annual Defence Equipment Plan. We do not separate procurement and support spend. Total outturn for the Equipment Plan from 2015 can be found on page 21 of the Defence Equipment Plan 2018. The outturn for 2018-19 will be published shortly.
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/788481/20190318-EP18_v3.pdf
Asked by: Jeremy Hunt (Conservative - South West Surrey)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how many Apache AH1 helicopters are in service; what the annual maintenance cost is of those helicopters; and what the average number of operating hours are for each Apache AH1 helicopter.
Answered by James Heappey
There are 44 Apache Mk1 helicopters currently in service.
In 2018-19, based on an in-service fleet of 50 Apache Mk1 helicopters, the total annual maintenance cost was £33 million, and the average annual number of flying hours per Apache Mk1 was 183.3 hours. Six Apache Mk1 helicopters have since been withdrawn from service and are undergoing dismantling for conversion to the AH-64E variant.
Further to the answer I gave on 21 January 2020 to Questions 4324 and 4325, the calculation for the Apache maintenance cost per hour was based on 2019 flying hours. In the footnote to the table this was incorrectly recorded as based on financial year 2018-19 data. To ensure consistency, the table below provides revised Apache maintenance costs, based on financial year 2018-19 information:
Type | Apache |
Cost per annum | £33 million |
Cost per hour | £3,601 |
*Numbers are rounded and to the nearest hour.
Asked by: Jeremy Hunt (Conservative - South West Surrey)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what the expenditure of his Department was in net cash requirement terms in each of the last five years; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Anne-Marie Trevelyan - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
Expenditure on net cash requirement in each of the last five years can be found in table 1 of the open data source tables relating to our finance and economics annual statistical bulletin: departmental resources 2019 which is available at the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/mod-trade-industry-and-contracts-2019/finance-and-economics-annual-statistical-bulletin-trade-industry-and-contracts-2019
Asked by: Jeremy Hunt (Conservative - South West Surrey)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how many British Army units are (a) deployed on operations throughout the world and (b) able to be deployed within 48 hours; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Anne-Marie Trevelyan - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
83 British Army units currently have personnel deployed on 32 operations around the world.
There are two units earmarked to deploy headquarters, lead sub-units and specialist capability overseas within 48 hours. In the same timeframe, three further units, as well as an additional 1,500 personnel from across the Army, are ready to support operations within the UK covering support to the Police and civil authorities, for example for flood relief.