Written question asked by Alistair Carmichael (Liberal Democrat) on Wednesday, 3 March 2010, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Friday, 5 March 2010. It was answered by Lord Beamish (Labour) on Wednesday, 10 March 2010 on behalf of the Ministry of Defence.

Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Families Association

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how much funding his Department has provided for the Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Families Association in each of the last five years.

Answer: This information is not held centrally.The Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Families Association Forces Help is a registered charity and provides a variety of services that are available to current serving personnel, their families and veterans. They receive funding from a number of areas including contracted services arranged and paid for at a local level. In 2009, they also received £50,000 for a specific project from the Veterans Challenge Fund, which is run by the MOD.To determine how much funding has been provided in the past five years would require a manual search of records in many different locations that would incur a disproportionate cost.

Secondary information