Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, pursuant to the Answer of 4 September 2014 to Question 208271, what steps he plans to take to (a) encourage members of the armed forces to join a credit union, (b) establish a military credit union and (c) provide payroll deduction for those wanting to join a credit union; and if he will make a statement.

As the hon. Member is aware, I fully endorse the expansion of existing, strong credit unions to the Armed Forces community and the Ministry of Defence (MOD) has for many months been working to bring this about.

As part of this initiative, the MOD's payroll provider is working with officials to scope and cost payroll deductions for a credit union. Further work is underway to determine the criteria for access to this facility, and to develop an education campaign for our personnel to enable them to make informed choices.

We anticipate this complex work will be completed during summer 2015.