Armed Forces: Redundancies

Lord Stirrup Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd January 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, I will certainly write to my noble friend on this issue. It is my understanding that most of these events are covered by the Treasury reserves.

[Lord Stirrup]

My Lords, the Minister has said that the Armed Forces should have sufficient numbers to deal with most eventualities in future. Those numbers were set out as part of Future Force 2020 in the defence review. Will the Minister reconfirm to the House that, as the Prime Minister stated when he announced the outcome of the review, it would only be viable if we had real-terms increases in defence expenditure from 2015 onwards? Without those real-terms increases, Future Force 2020 will not be achievable.

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, I can confirm to the noble and gallant Lord that that is indeed what the Prime Minister said. I cannot envisage the outcome of the next SDSR, which will be after the next election, but I very much hope that that is what will happen.