Armed Forces

(asked on 1st February 2016) - View Source
Questioner
Lord Touhig Portrait
Lord Touhig
(Labour - Life peer)

Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government how many regulars there were in the armed forces on 31 December in (1) 2009, (2) 2010, (3) 2011, (4) 2012, (5) 2013, (6) 2014, and (7) 2015.

Answered by
Earl Howe Portrait
Earl Howe
Shadow Deputy Leader of the House of Lords
This question was answered on 10th February 2016

The information is not held in the format requested. However, the table below shows the total number of UK Forces Service personnel, the number of Regular personnel and the number of Volunteer Reserve personnel as at 1 April each year for the years 2009 to 2015.

Prior to 1 April 2012 statistics for UK Forces Service Personnel were not held in a format suitable to answer the question. However some of this information is available on line at the following link:

http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/personnel/military/quarterly-personnel-report

UK FORCES SERVICE PERSONNEL2

UK REGULAR FORCES3

VOLUNTEER RESERVE1

1 April 2009

..

188,600

34,790 e

1 April 2010

..

191,710

33,490 e

1 April 2011

..

186,360

31,260 e

1 April 2012

221,330

179,800

31,310

1 April 2013

211,340

170,710

30,360

1 April 2014

198,810

159,630

28,860

1 April 2015

195,690

153,720

31,260

  1. Volunteer Reserve includes mobilised volunteer reserves, High Readiness Reserves and those volunteer reserves serving on Full Time Reserve Service and Additional Duties Commitments, Non Regular Permanent Staff and Expeditionary Forces Institute. Sponsored Reserves and University Officer Cadets are excluded.

  1. UK Forces Service Personnel comprises UK Regular Forces, Gurkhas, Military Provost Guard Service, Locally Engaged Personnel, Volunteer Reserve, Serving Regular Reserve, Sponsored Reserve, and FTRS of unknown origin. University Officer Cadets are excluded. Unless otherwise stated, includes trained and untrained personnel.

  1. UK Regular Forces Full-time trained and untrained personnel and excludes Gurkhas, Full Time Reserve Service (FTRS) and reservists.

Rounding

Figures have been rounded to the nearest 10, though numbers ending in a “5” have been rounded to the nearest multiple of 20 to prevent the systematic bias caused by always rounding numbers upwards.

Symbols

e – estimate

.. – Not Available

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