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Armed Forces Personnel

As the hon. Gentleman knows, those issues tax the Army and the Royal Marines, who seek to deal with similar issues all the time. The Army is trying desperately to drive down what it calls, in its imitable way, the breakage rate in training. I have spoken to the hon. Gentleman outside the Chamber. I am more than happy to pick his brains, and the Army is more than happy to accept any contribution that he or anyone else can make to try to improve that situation. The offer remains open for an ongoing conversation. As the hon. Gentleman knows, many people are applying their brains to the problem. Nobody wants a 35 per cent. drop-out rate in the infantry, but people want hard, tough training that turns out recruits who are capable of surviving in the kind of environments in which we expect them to operate. It would do nobody any favours to soften that training in order to lower the drop-out rate. The result may well be personnel who are not properly equipped, and therefore casualties in theatre that could be avoided. Getting that balance right is enormously difficult. People are applying themselves. I know the hon. Gentleman thinks an awful lot about this issue, and I am more than happy to continue the conversation with him about whether he can make a contribution to it.