Examination of Witnesses (Questions 280
- 299)
WEDNESDAY 12 JANUARY 2000 (Morning)
MR COLIN
BALMER, MAJOR
GENERAL JOHN
KISZELY AND
MR TREVOR
WOOLLEY
Mr Hepburn
280. Can I just ask why that particular exercise
was taken out of the programme? In today's climate, when you are
talking about Balkans activity and whatever, I would have thought
arctic conditions would have been imperative for a modern force.
(Major General Kiszely) Clearly, it is an exercise
we wished very much to take part in, but the Commander-in-Chief
Fleet whose decision it was to cancel that exercise found that
in-year he, in order to keep his budget balanced, was required
to do the belt tightening that Mr Balmer referred to, as a result
of which he took the decision that he would re-order his priorities
and he would cancel that exercise.
Chairman
281. One of the problems with incessant belt-tightening,
which you have been going through for as long as I can recall,
is that training is down-graded, and this must have an overall
adverse effect on the capability of the armed forces. If the Marines
take a hit in this year what efforts are going to be made to ensure
that any further exercises proceed? Is there any rational process
by which ships who are engaged in an exercise which is cancelled
are not going to lose the skills necessary to maintain their professionalism?
(Major General Kiszely) Clearly it would be very important—in
particular in the Royal Marines' case—to try and accommodate
their exercise in future years. To go back to the question of
whether there were any specific exercises cancelled purely for
financial reasons, in addition to those mentioned there are a
number of ship deployments that have been cancelled in the past
year—14 in number—but only one of which, which was
HMS WESTMINSTER's deployment, was for in-year budget management
reasons. One other was a change to maintenance days, which is
HMS LEDBURY, but the remainder of those 14 cancellations or withdrawals
of vessels from exercises were for operational or redeployment
reasons.
(Mr Balmer) To come back to your question, clearly
the role of the Commanders-in-Chief Fleet, Strike and Land Command,
is to generate forces which are appropriately trained, and wherever
it has been necessary to cancel exercises—for whatever reason,
whether it is a budget judgment or for reasons of operational
deployment—it is the role of that Commander-in-Chief and
his staff to assess how best to make up that lowered capability.
They will be looking hard in the next year to ensure that they
can do whatever is necessary to bring those troops back to the
right level. I think one of the factors at play in the case of
the Royal Marines is that they are likely to be involved in Balkans
deployments next year rather than an arctic deployment, and that
made the judgment about cancelling arctic training this year a
little easier to take.
Chairman: Will you pass through your
chain of command the request that we would be grateful to be informed
of any cancellation of an exercise at that time, rather than waiting
for information to percolate through some time later, because
it is a very serious issue.
Mr Colvin
282. May I just continue on this and then hand
over to my colleagues? Most of these exercises are multi-national,
so when we talk about cancelling exercises does that just mean
Britain opts out and the exercise continues without us, or does
it mean the whole thing has to be cancelled?
(Major General Kiszely) Generally speaking it is the
case that these are large, multi-national exercises and the exercise
continues without our participation.
283. What do the French have to say about that?
(Major General Kiszely) Some of the exercises mentioned
have also involved other nations who were involved in the Kosovo
deployment, and they have to withdraw from some of these exercises
as well, for obvious reasons.
284. The Chairman has already asked some questions
about the impact of exercises being cut on readiness and availability,
but what about the question of morale? I was a serving soldier,
as you are now, and to be prepared to go on an exercise and then
suddenly to be told "No, we cannot do it because we have
not got enough money" must have a terrific impact on morale.
(Major General Kiszely) Actually, this is finely balanced
nowadays because with the very large over-commitment that the
forces are involved in, some of these exercises have actually
been cancelled in order to ease over-commitment in order to help
retention. So although your point is correct, that on most occasions
people very much look forward to going on exercises, with the
over-commitment there is at the moment that is not always true
today.
285. We call it "over-stretched" rather
than "over-commitment". I think the previous Secretary
of State actually began to use that word.
(Mr Balmer) Because it is an element of both, I think,
we are suffering from a combination of factors at the moment.
We have a lot of commitment to exercises and to operations but
we also have some shortages of people, and it is the two things
combined which have led to the over-stretch—which is the
term we do, indeed, regularly use now.
286. Last question from me. You are in the process
of implementing the Army's new Formation Readiness Cycle. What
impact has the cutting back of these exercises had on your ability
to deliver on that?
(Major General Kiszely) Undoubtedly it does impact.
The Formation Readiness Cycle is due to be in operation towards
the end of next year, but undoubtedly there will be an effect,
in particular of the very large scale deployments which have taken
place and the fact that some of these exercises are being cancelled,
not only for deployment reasons but, as I mentioned just now,
for over-stretch reasons. The impact of that may well be to delay
the Formation Readiness Cycle's full operation.
287. For how long?
(Major General Kiszely) It rather depends on the scale
of those operations and how quickly the Army reaches its manning
target, because undermanning is a very large factor here.
(Mr Balmer) We still expect 12 Mechanised Brigades,
which is the new deployable brigade, to be in the Formation Training
Cycle in 2001, which is roughly when it was planned.
Mr Blunt
288. Is it a reflection of the political priority
given to the armed forces that HMS WESTMINSTER has an operational
deployment cancelled whilst it can be on duty at the Dome?
(Mr Balmer) I could not comment. It is certainly not
anything that I have heard as a factor in the decision.
(Major General Kiszely) Clearly, the ability of a
ship to take part in a fairly static requirement, like that in
London, is rather different from one which might require it to
go wherever HMS WESTMINSTER was due to be deployed.
289. Given the personnel over-stretch being
suffered by all the three armed services, surely keeping people
operational up to the mark is likely to be more beneficial to
them and stimulating to them than keeping them on duty over the
Millennium celebrations.
(Major General Kiszely) That is true, but, as we said,
the reason why HMS WESTMINSTER's deployment was cancelled was
for financial reasons, actually, and not for over-stretch.
Mr Brazier
290. Can I take Major General Kiszely back,
for a moment, to the Royal Marines exercise cancelled in Norway.
General, you said that this was the Commander-in-Chief Fleet's
decision, which of course technically it was, but could you take
this opportunity to scotch the report that he wrote to ministers
and asked them to formally order him to cancel the exercise because
he believed it to be mistaken and to be forced only on financial
grounds? Can you confirm that is not true, and that that did not
actually happen?
(Mr Balmer) It is certainly the case that any decision
of this sort is reported to the Ministry of Defence and reported
to ministers, because it is clearly of significance; it is of
significance in itself and it is of significance in public and
political terms. So it was certainly the case that the intention
to cancel was reported to ministers, but not in the terms you
have described.
Mr Hancock
291. I would be interested, for the record,
to know how much was actually saved by the C-in-C Fleet by cancelling
the Norway training, and how much he was required to find that
he made that decision to cut that. If you have not got that information
now I would hope we could have it for the record. If I can draw
you back to what you said, if you exclude WESTMINSTER and LEDBURY
(because there were, on the face of it, reasons for that), were
any of the other 12 ships that did not subsequently take part
taken out simply because the crews were not up to reasonable enough
levels—manning levels—for them to be operationally
sound for deployment?
(Major General Kiszely) No, as I said, the reasons
that the other ships that I spoke about were withdrawn were either
for redeployment or operational tasking—or, in one case,
national tasking[1].
292. Were any of those ships' crews that were
not subsequently on exercise removed from ships to fill spaces
on ships that were on deployment?
(Major General Kiszely) That I do not know.
(Mr Balmer) It is quite likely to be the case.
293. Then it goes back to the fact, how were
crews taken off ships which were not full, if you are now saying
that those ships were taken off the training exercises to go on
active deployment? You cannot have it both ways.
(Mr Balmer) It is the case, as the Committee knows,
that we have undermanning in all three services, and that includes
the Navy. So in ensuring that all the billets that need to be
filled are filled the Second Sea Lord and the Navy have to juggle
with the manpower available. What they will have done, I suspect
(although, as I say, I cannot absolutely confirm that this is
the case) is that those ships which are deploying will have a
full complement on board, which means that some ships which are
alongside will not have a full complement on board, because at
that stage they do not necessarily need them. That is the sort
of judgment which both the Second Sea Lord and the Commander-in-Chief
of the Fleet would be making on a daily basis.
(Major General Kiszely) Certainly it would be the
case that ships that were going into refit or maintenance states
would have some of their crews transferred.
294. Absolutely, but you have just stated that
ships that are on active deployment into an area like the Adriatic
would have fully manned crews. You are actually saying that, are
you?
(Mr Balmer) It is possible that there may be a particular
weapons system which is not expected to be used that the ship
might decide not to have a full crew to man. That is a judgment
they might make on the day, but as a general principle a ship
deploying to an operational theatre will be fully complemented.
295. Can I ask that you give us that in writing—that
all ships in the last 18 months that have been deployed have actually
been fully manned?
(Mr Balmer) Subject to the point I have made about
not necessarily complementing for every capability if the capability
is not expected to be used.
296. That is slightly at variance to Parliamentary
answers.
(Major General Kiszely) Not in every circumstance,
but in general, as Mr Balmer has said, that would be the case.
Chairman: But, as Mr Mottram would have
said, it depends on how you define "fully manned".
Mr Hancock
297. Most senior sailors would say that a ship
with a 5 per cent deficit on board is in a serious situation when
it comes to long-term deployment. Many of our ships have been
at sea with in excess of a 5 per cent deficit. I am interested
to know if what you are saying is absolutely correct: that none
of the ships that were taken off exercises were simply taken off
because the ships could not be manned up to a confident level,
which meant those ships were going to do a pretty good job at
sea.
(Mr Balmer) I do not think that is the case, but we
will be happy to find out and come back to the Committee[2].
Chairman
298. Mr Spellar is coming next week, so you
can alert him to the question Mr Hancock will ask.
(Major General Kiszely) As I said, the reason they
were taken off exercises was to go on operational deployments
or national tasking. I very much doubt that there would have been
any crew taken off who were required for an exercise who would
not be required for an operational deployment—subject to
what Mr Balmer has said.
Mr Hancock
299. Coming back to the question of HMS WESTMINSTER,
is it then true or not true that HMS WESTMINSTER was taken off
its programme simply because there were insufficient numbers of
trained crew on board for it to be efficient and effective, and
that when it was not proceeded with members of the ships crew
were taken off and redeployed fairly rapidly?
(Major General Kiszely) It was the case that HMS WESTMINSTER
was taken off an exercise called FLOTEX as an in-year budget management
measure. That reason is already in the public domain and was the
subject of a Parliamentary answer by Mr Spellar on 16 December.
1 See p. 202. Back
2
See p. 202. Back
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