John Bercow
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Armed Forces Redundancies
John Bercow Excerpts(11 years, 11 months ago)
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Mr Speaker
Order. As Members can see for themselves, a large number of right hon. and hon. Members are seeking to catch my eye and I am keen to accommodate the level of interest. If I am to have any chance of doing so, however, my ritual exhortation to brevity takes on a particular importance.
Derek Twigg (Halton) (Lab)
I think we will come to regret the cuts to our capability. My question relates specifically to medical staff. Can the Minister say exactly how many medics will be made redundant as a result of the plans he has announced today? What impact will they have on medics cross-service, particularly on operations and in places such as the Queen Elizabeth hospital in Birmingham, and on the expertise and experience in the medical division of our armed forces?
Mr Francois
Mr Speaker, I know you have asked for brevity, but as the hon. Gentleman has mentioned the military-managed ward at the Queen Elizabeth hospital it would be remiss of me not to pay tribute to the wonderful people who work there and the marvellous service they provide to our wounded and injured personnel. Bless you, Mr Speaker.
There may be some small reductions to the number of Army medics in this tranche, and some small reductions in naval and RAF medics and dentists in tranche 4. The details are still being worked through, but the hon. Gentleman, who has done this job, will understand that if we are downsizing the regular forces, it makes sense to downsize concomitantly the size of the medical division—but no more than that.
Mr Speaker
I am grateful to the Minister for his blessing, which is considerably more than either of us offered the other when first we met in September 1983.
Sir Menzies Campbell (North East Fife) (LD)
Can we have an assurance that those selected for redundancy will not include any of those who have specialist skills, such as intelligence gathering, that would assist in the achievement of the ambitious agenda announced by the Prime Minister yesterday?