Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how many merchant navy (a) ratings and (b) officer cadets have been trained in each year since 2000-01.

The number of new entrant cadets, the number of cadets in training and the number of trainee watch ratings who start training each year can be found in the tables below.

The figures in Table 1 show the number of cadets supported by the Support for Maritime Training (SMarT) scheme who started training in each year since 2000-01.

Table 1: UK officer cadets under SMarT1 scheme (1999-2016)

These figures are derived from SMarT returns for SMarT1 training and may include a small number of EU trainees resident in the UK. Numbers are rounded to nearest 10. Figures for 2016-17 are not yet available.

The figures in Table 2 below show the number of watch rating trainees who have been supported by SMarT each year since 2011-12. The data held by the MCA for ratings training prior to 2011-12 includes concessionaire training and does not provide an accurate reflection of watch rating training.

Table 2: UK watch rating trainees under Smart scheme (2011 – 2016)