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Armed Forces Personnel

I am coming to the issue of retention. Voluntary outflow from the armed forces has remained steady for the past few years. It has always been feared that a haemorrhage will follow any conflict, and two conflicts are taking place concurrently at the moment. I have mentioned tempo and the breaching of harmony guidelines, but we have not experienced the haemorrhage that we feared. I am not saying that problems do not exist within specific trades—they do, and we must deal with them—but the voluntary outflow has remained steady, which must be an indication of something. Of course it must be monitored carefully and constantly in case it moves in the opposite direction. For that reason, we have financial retention incentives for the infantry, the Royal Marines, the Royal Navy, RAF air crew and certain medical posts. For instance, we have one for specialist nurses. There are also ““golden hellos”” for medical and dental officers and specialist nurses. All those will have to be kept under review. Sometimes problems arise before they can be dealt with. We aim to be alert enough to pick up indications that a change is taking place and introduce incentives in advance. However, we must ensure that neither ““golden hellos”” nor financial incentives distort other aspects.