Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what assessment he has made of the adequacy of the salary level for Armed Forces reservists.

Reserves enable our Armed Forces to meet the threats we face at home and overseas, by providing the scale, skills, agility and connection to society needed, in a cost-effective way. Defence believes that the pension and salary offered to today’s Reservists represents fair and competitive remuneration.

A pension has been part of the offer to all Reservists since 2015 who are enrolled in the Armed Forces Pension Scheme 2015 (AFPS 15). This is the same scheme in which Regular members of the Armed Forces are enrolled. AFPS 15 is a non-contributory scheme and is calculated according to average earnings over a Service person’s career.

All Armed Forces salaries up to 1* rank, including those for Reservists, are reviewed by the independent Armed Forces Pay Review body (AFPRB). On 29 July 2024, the Government accepted the AFPRB’s recommendations in full for the 2024/25 Pay Round, which was paid in September salaries, backdated to 1 April 2024. Most personnel up to and including 1* rank received an overall 6% increase. This was the largest headline percentage uplift in 22 years for our Armed Forces.