---

Future of the Territorial Army

The hon. Gentleman is spot on. The 2006 National Audit Office report specifically referred to the fact that many of those in the TA—about one in three—reckoned that there was insufficient support for their employers. To make further cuts on top of that surely does not send the right message to employers that they should take seriously their contributions to the defence of the nation. That is causing even more damage. When we have time to plan, we can often find innovative ways to do things, or see that the same job can be done with less money. However, that operation takes time. Emergency cuts such as these are rarely efficient and often destructive. What Department would be able to cope with this proportion—30 per cent.—of its budget going in one fell swoop? What Department would be able to cope with such a massive reduction with just a few weeks' notice? No Department would be able to cope with that—it would be absolute chaos. That is what would have happened to the TA had the cuts proceeded. This is an indication that the MOD is in a financial hole that it has dug for itself. It shows that Ministers have lost control of their budget. Let me take as an example of that something that is close to my heart and that the Minister hears me going on about all the time—the aircraft carriers, which are finally going to be commissioned on Rosyth. There have been two incidents recently. The first is the last-minute two-year delay, which is putting an extra £1 billion on the budget, taking the costs from £4 billion to £5 billion. That has been planned for years, but suddenly, at the last minute, there is a change of tack and an increase in the time scale of two years, and it costs us an extra £1 billion. Secondly, there have been recent reports that the carrier spec will be changed so that one carries aeroplanes and the other carries helicopters. We do not know whether that is true, as Ministers have not told us, but if it is, it has again happened at the last minute. That is no way to run a defence budget, and such emergency cuts are having a huge impact on how we are running our defences. In recent months, the Prime Minister has made great play from the Dispatch Box of Labour's desire to protect the front line and cut backroom bureaucracy. As the Secretary of State leaves the Chamber, I wonder whether he will appear on the next party political broadcast to use the cuts proposed for the TA as an example of how that has been achieved. This episode surely damages Labour's claim that it is protecting the valuable and slashing waste. What message does the episode send to the TA? A former major, Mark Cann, who served for 12 years with the TA, recently said that the cuts would be a significant deterrent to new recruits and would send""a message from the politicians at the top that 'we don't value you'."" There is already dissatisfaction. The 2006 NAO report showed that one fifth of TA members were not satisfied with the level of training that they were given. If cuts are made to a level of training that was already inadequate as far as TA members were concerned, surely that will cause the TA further damage. It is often difficult to tell exactly what is going on in the MOD. It does not tell us an awful lot and its budgets are opaque. We found out about the cuts because the TA is in the community and we have friends and relatives who are part of it, but what else has happened? What other cuts have been made that we do not know about? Will there be a series of parliamentary statements over the coming weeks to explain what else is being considered? The Secretary of State enlightened us on some matters, but I presume that they are only part of what is being considered. We would like to know what else is going on so that we can help. We have helped on this occasion, with a cross-party effort to find a solution to the problem, and if Ministers trusted us a little more with information we could perhaps help them even more. It is interesting that the RAF and the Navy have not come to the same conclusion as the Army about their reserves. Why is that, and did Ministers seek their advice before making their decisions about the TA? Perhaps the Navy and RAF are not as cunning as the Army. I suspect that, as was suggested earlier, the Chief of the General Staff knew that the cuts would create huge uproar and would be reversed and that he would get his own way. If he is that cunning, that is interesting, and I wonder why the Secretary of State did not see it coming. Perhaps he is equally cunning and was trying to persuade the Prime Minister that the cuts were not palatable, and it has been an organised plan all along. I wish that the MOD could be so organised and well planned more often.