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Written Question
Armed Forces: Medical Treatments
Tuesday 23rd April 2024

Asked by: Siobhain McDonagh (Labour - Mitcham and Morden)

Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how many military personnel were waiting for medical treatment on 15 April in each of the last five years.

Answered by Andrew Murrison - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Defence)

The information is not held centrally and could be provided only at disproportionate cost.


Written Question
Armed Forces: Medical Treatments
Tuesday 23rd April 2024

Asked by: Siobhain McDonagh (Labour - Mitcham and Morden)

Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how many military personnel are waiting for medical treatment.

Answered by Andrew Murrison - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Defence)

The information is not held centrally and could be provided only at disproportionate cost.


Written Question
Navy: Advertising
Tuesday 23rd April 2024

Asked by: Siobhain McDonagh (Labour - Mitcham and Morden)

Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how much the Royal Navy spent on advertising (a) above the line, (b) on Tiktok, (c) on Facebook and Instagram, (d) on Snapchat and (e) on Twitter in each financial year since 2017.

Answered by James Cartlidge - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)

The Royal Navy (RN) has spent the following overall sums on marketing with above the line media and social media platforms since Financial Year 2017-18:

Financial Year

Social Media

Media (Excluding Social)

2017-18

£423,990

£7,697,349

2018-19

£784,161

£14,528,656

2019-20

£1,626,458

£15,699,198

2020-21

£1,824,316

£13,428,792

2021-22

£1,615,263

£14,037,031

2022-23

£1,682,000

£14,025,000

2023-24

£2,593,000

£16,191,000

The breakdown of spend by individual platform is commercially sensitive and it would therefore be inappropriate to provide this level of detail.

In accordance with advice from the Government Communication Service, the RN does not currently use the TikTok platform.


Written Question
Aircraft Carriers
Tuesday 23rd April 2024

Asked by: Siobhain McDonagh (Labour - Mitcham and Morden)

Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, pursuant to the Answer of 13 February 2024 to Question 12520 on Aircraft Carriers, when the UK Carrier Strike Group with a wholly sovereign air wing and escort fleet last sailed on (a) exercise and (b) deployment.

Answered by Leo Docherty - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence) (Minister for the Armed Forces)

Sovereign aircraft, escorts and support ships have formed the core of the UK Carrier Strike Group (UKCSG), but each deployment has also involved contributions from partner nations. All UKCSG deployments have involved participation in a range of multinational operations and exercises.


Written Question
Air Force: Advertising
Friday 15th March 2024

Asked by: Siobhain McDonagh (Labour - Mitcham and Morden)

Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how much the RAF spent on advertising (a) above the line, (b) on Tiktok, (c) on Facebook and Instagram, (d) on Snapchat and (e) on Twitter in each financial year since 2017.

Answered by Andrew Murrison - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Defence)

This question has been interpreted as spend on advertising for Recruitment. With regards to the figures for 2017, I will write to the hon. Member and place a copy of my letter in the Library of the House

Year

2018

2019

2020

2021

2022

2023

2024

Spend £

742,162

9,453,479

8,334,191

2,820,455

8,541,160

11,240,860

2,209,334.

Year

2018

2019

2020

2021

2022

2023

2024

Facebook/Inst

£52,735

£887,324

£874,933

£310,407

£158,550

£610,013

£179,662

SnapChat

£63,001

£178,558

£6,663

£542,277

£654,943

£175,206

Twitter

£48,384

£11,152

£83,269

£4,992


Written Question
Army: Advertising
Friday 15th March 2024

Asked by: Siobhain McDonagh (Labour - Mitcham and Morden)

Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how much the Army spent on advertising (a) above the line, (b) on Tiktok, (c) on Facebook and Instagram, (d) on Snapchat and (e) on Twitter in each financial year since 2017.

Answered by Andrew Murrison - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Defence)

The table shows the cost of the Army’s recruitment advertising costs by financial year.

Media Name

2018-19

2019-20

2020-21

2021-22

2202-23

Facebook

£231,425

£576,454

£494,971

£532,996.82

£606,351

Snapchat

£79,903

£130,020

£204,345

£388,521.19

£479,342.14

Twitter

£55,431

£203,164

£129,277

£196,164.98

£90,000

Display

£1,292,885

£3,506,037

£3,804,808

£3,500,017

£2,309,891

Out of Home

£287,000

£451,614

£190,000

£200,000

£150,000

Radio

£388,980

£1,813,738

£859,134

£1,045,000

£964,998

Paid Search

£209,532

£699,264

£1,153,600

£1,355,525

£1,165,874.32

TV

£1,992,500

£3,076,945

£4,429,580

£2,524,105

£3,594,987

Please note the following notes/caveats:

  1. These figures are single Service estimates based on management information which is not gathered for statistical purposes or subject to the same level of scrutiny as official statistics produced by Defence Statistics.
  2. The data for financial year 2018/2019 represents costs from November 2018 to March 2019.
  3. The breakdown prior to November 2018 is not held. This data would need to be produced by an external contractor who no longer provides this service for the Army.
  4. Spend on Facebook advertising from March – May 2023 will be incorporated in the 23/24 financial year, as this is the period for which the services were procured.
  5. Spending on Instagram is incorporated in Facebook figures, as both fall under the umbrella of Meta.
  6. Recruiting Group do not advertise on TikTok.
  7. For the purposes of this answer, ‘above the line’ is taken to include Display, Out of Home, Radio, Paid Search and TV.


Written Question
Armed Forces: Parachuting
Friday 15th March 2024

Asked by: Siobhain McDonagh (Labour - Mitcham and Morden)

Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, pursuant to the Answer of 23 February 2024 to Question 13532 on Armed Forces: Parachuting, if he will break down the data provided by (a) broken bones, (b) respiratory illness, (c) punctured lungs, (d) other injury and (e) death.

Answered by Andrew Murrison - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Defence)

From 1 January 2016 to 31 December 2023, a total of 527 Service personnel sustained injuries from parachuting. Of these:

  1. 143 had broken bones (fractures)
  2. 1 had a respiratory illness
  3. 382 had other injuries

There was one fatality as a result of parachuting in 2021.

This information was drawn from a number of databases and relied on manual data extraction based on specific search terms.

The type of injury was identified from a number of different variables in the data including the free text narrative of the description of the incident. The MOD Health and Safety systems are not medical databases and do not contain clinical diagnoses. The databases are also live and therefore information is subject to change or revisions. As a result, there is a risk of inconsistency with the data, and the returns may not be exhaustive.

Any records that did not contain one of the search terms used has been categorised as ‘other’. These are reported conditions including but not limited to sprains, pain, bruising and lacerations.


Written Question
Firing Ranges: Death and Injuries
Wednesday 6th March 2024

Asked by: Siobhain McDonagh (Labour - Mitcham and Morden)

Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how many people suffered (a) death and (b) injury on his Departments firing ranges in each year since 2018.

Answered by Andrew Murrison - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Defence)

Since 2018, there have been two fatalities involving UK Armed Forces personnel on firing ranges. These occurred in 2018 and 2021.

During the same period 1,429 people sustained injuries on firing ranges. The table below provides a breakdown of injuries by year between 1 January 2018 and 31 December 2023:

Table 1: Number of people injured at firing ranges broken down by year.

'Table 1 lists all injuries linked to firing range activities. These injuries range from superficial e.g. abrasions, lacerations, physical strains, falls to more severe e.g. gunshot wounds, hearing loss.'

Calendar Year

Total

All

1,429

2018

158

2019

160

2020

168

2021

243

2022[1]

332

2023

368

[1] The annual increases in 2022 and 2023 may be due to improved reporting levels due to a new reporting system being introduced.


Written Question
Armed Forces: Injuries
Wednesday 6th March 2024

Asked by: Siobhain McDonagh (Labour - Mitcham and Morden)

Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how many military personnel reported non-freezing cold injuries in each year since 2018.

Answered by Andrew Murrison - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Defence)

The number of UK Armed Forces personnel with a record for a Non-Freezing Cold Injury (NFCI) in each year since 2018 is presented in the table below:

Year

Number

2018

406

2019

334

2020

263

2021

354

2022

302

2023

421

The data is compiled from the following medical, safety and casualty reporting systems to provide the most complete picture possible:

  1. Defence Medical Information Capability Programme
  2. MOD Health and Safety reporting systems
  3. Joint Casualty and Compassionate Centre Notification of Casualty system
  4. Defence Patient Tracking System

These systems have been searched for coded information or text entries relating to NFCI: information entered as free text is not included.


Written Question
Defence: Helicopters
Wednesday 6th March 2024

Asked by: Siobhain McDonagh (Labour - Mitcham and Morden)

Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what the average vehicle availability rate was for (a) Chinook, (b) Wildcat Mk1, (c) Wildcat Mk2 and (d) Merlin HM2 in each year since 2018.

Answered by James Cartlidge - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)

I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave on 20 December 2023 to Question 6474 to the hon. Member for Easington (Mr Grahame Morris).