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18 Dec 2006 : Column 1479Wcontinued
The helicopters listed are all crewed by a team of people and cannot be flown by one pilot. The figures represent the total number of crew flying hours completed each month for each type of helicopter, divided by the number of crews of each respective helicopter cadre that were available for flying duties in the same period. The figures include all operational flying, but exclude flying hours flown by crews at the School of Army Aviation to avoid distorting the averages.
Mrs. Moon: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how much was spent by his Department on furniture made by British firms in each year since 2000. [105143]
Derek Twigg: The information requested is not held centrally or in a consistent form. However, it may be possible to extract some of the required information for financial years 2001-02 to 2004-05.
I will write to the hon. Member once this has been established and place a copy of my letter in the Library of the House.
Mr. Harper: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many UK military service personnel have been wounded and (a) returned to duty and (b) not returned to duty in (i) Iraq and (ii) Afghanistan since the commencement of operations. [105694]
Mr. Ingram [holding answer 12 December 2006]: The Ministry of Defence publishes data on battle and non-battle casualties that have resulted from our operations in Iraq from March 2003 and Afghanistan from 1 January 2006. The best centrally available casualty statistics can be found on the Ministry of Defence website (http://www.mod.uk/DefenceInternet/FactSheets/OperationsFactsheets). Work is continuing to ascertain whether casualty data for Afghanistan pre-2006 is sufficiently robust to enable figures to be published in the same format as those for Iraq.
Statistics on how many service personnel have returned to, or not returned to duty following injury are not held centrally. However, the Department is examining this as part of the process of refining its casualty data, which may take some months. When it is complete, I will write to the hon. Member with the answer he has requested and place a copy of the letter in the Library of the House.
Mark Pritchard: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what plans he has to ensure that kinetic military technology is developed through the Defence Industrial Strategy. [105296]
Mr. Ingram [holding answer 11 December 2006]: The recently published Defence Technology Strategy identifies the design, development and manufactureof kinetic energy projectiles among the priority technologies for general munitions.
Mrs. Ellman: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many jobs in his Department have been relocated (a) to Liverpool and (b) elsewhere as a result of the Lyons Review; and on how many occasions Liverpool has been considered for the relocation of staff under this programme. [102948]
Derek Twigg: The Ministry of Defence is committed to relocate 3,900 posts out of London and the south-east by 2010, and is on schedule to meet this target. As stated in the 2005-06 Annual Report and Accounts, 1,229 posts had been relocated as a result of the Lyons review by the end of the 2005-06 financial year. This information will be updated in the 2006 Autumn Performance Report. None of these posts were relocated to Liverpool.
Liverpool has not been considered as a site option for any relocations as a result of the Lyons Review. Options for relocations are generated by a search of the existing Defence Estate based on the individual requirements of each relocation and, to date, the Defence Estate's sites in Liverpool have not met the requirements for any of the relocation exercises.
Mr. Harper: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what studies his Department has (a) commissioned, (b) funded and (c) undertaken in the past five years into the mental health needs of service personnel and veterans; and how many service personnel and veterans have such needs. [101077]
Derek Twigg: The most significant recent studies relating to mental health are:
A major research study into the physical and psychological health of personnel who were deployed to Iraq on Operation Telic is being conducted by Kings College London. This work began in 2003 and entered its second three-year phase in September 2006. The first two scientific papers resulting from this work were published in May 2006 and showed that there had been no substantial increase in symptomatic ill health among regular personnel from participation in the operation. There was evidence for a small though statistically significant mental health effect among reserve personnel, however, and changes in the provision of mental healthcare for reservists have been made to address this issue.
An independent charity, the Health and Social Care Advisory Service (HASCAS), was commissioned by the MOD to review the mental healthcare available to UK veterans and further work is now underway to take forward the HASCAS recommendations.
The Department is funding a one-year study bythe Centre for Suicide Prevention and National Confidential Inquiry into Suicide and Homicide by People with Mental Illness at the University of
Manchester. The purpose of this work is to determine the rates of suicide among UK veterans and to compare them with rates among serving personnel and in the general population. The study began in June 2006.
A compendium of Defence medical research has been maintained since 2004. The following table shows
those mental health studies that have appeared within the compendium. Where an item has appeared more than once in different versions, only the most up-to-date entry has been included. The compendium includes personal degree research as well as studies commissioned departmentally.
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