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Armed Forces: Reserves

My Lords, I can answer only one question here and now because that was a description of the past and I have to admit that we are in a different place, and we have been quite open about the fact that we are in a different place. We are looking forward to an entirely different reserve in the future. An entirely different reserve has, de facto, been in existence since roughly 2002 in terms of how it is deployed. Interestingly enough, I can answer the final challenge as I do recall the words of Sir Winston Churchill. The seven recommendations accept the reserves’ important role in representing the military within our communities. They are the footprint of the military in most of our society—in places of work and in the community. We acknowledge for the first time that that is a useful part of their role.