Reserve Forces: Deployment
(asked on 16th July 2026) - View Source
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what proportion of reservists have been mobilised for operations in each of the last five years.
Answered by
Calvin Bailey
Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Defence) (Minister for Veterans and People)
Our Reservists make a vital contribution to the nation’s security, supporting operations at home and overseas. The figures are as follows:
Table 1: Proportion of Unique number of Reserve Personnel Deployed in financial year (FY)2021-22, FY2022-23, FY2023-24, FY2024-25 and FY2025-26[1].
| FY2021-22 | FY2022-23 | FY2023-24 | FY2024-25 | FY2025-26 |
Reserve Personnel: FR20 and Serving Ex-Regular Reserve Strength at end of FY | 39,400 | 37,460 | 36,220 | 35,940 | 36,280 |
Of which Deployed during the FY | 920 | 1,730 | 1,850 | 1,160 | 1,060 |
Percentage of Reserve Personnel Strength at end of FY that Deployed | 2.3% | 4.6% | 5.1% | 3.2% | 2.9% |
[1] Financial Year is the period from the 1 April up to the 31 March of the following year. Strength figures for FY's are for the strength at the end of each FY, for example, for FY2021-22 the reserves strength figure is as at 1 April 2022.