Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, if he will publish the total number of (a) available regular training places and (b) places that have been filled at (i) ITC Catterick, (ii) ATC Pirbright, (iii) ATC Winchester, (iv) ATC Harrogate and (v) Royal Military Academy Sandhurst in each of the last six months, broken down by course.

I refer the hon. Member to the answer given on 4 July 2017 to Question 1968 and my subsequent letter of 17 July 2017. The numbers of the available regular training places and places that have been filled since June 2017 are shown below.

Course capacity is planned at the beginning of the year to meet the Army requirement and takes into consideration the regular intake requirement, training wastage, compliance with instructor to student ratio, separate sex courses and the management margin. The total number of initial training places identified does not therefore represent the Army intake requirement for Regular officers or soldiers.

Regular Soldier

Catterick Common Infantry Course Standard

Regular Officer

Royal Military Academy Sandhurst

For officer training, the capacity of each course is 270, but this will include a variable number of overseas officer cadets.

Data in the tables have been taken from information used to manage the loading of courses. They are single service estimates which have not been validated and have not been subject to the same level of quality checks as official defence statistics.

Figures have been rounded to 5 to limit disclosure and ensure confidentiality. Rounding is necessary, as a means of disclosure control and the preservation of anonymity; it also improves the clarity of output and conveys an appropriate level of precision to users.