Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what steps he is taking to improve service life for serving personnel from Newcastle-under-Lyme and their families.

This Government is committed to improving service life for our Service personnel and the families who support them.

We have already awarded the largest Armed Forces pay increase in 22 years, ensuring that the starting Armed Forces’ salary is in line with the National Living Wage. We are working to establish a new Armed Forces Commissioner as an independent champion for our Service personnel to raise issues which impact on service life, drive up standards and deliver the homes our Service families deserve, and modernising and refining our recruitment policies and processes to attract, and then retain the best possible talent, including direct-entry cyber recruits.