Examination of Witnesses (Questions 380-399)
DEREK TWIGG
MP AND VICE
ADMIRAL PETER
WILKINSON CVO
20 MAY 2008
Q380 Linda Gilroy: There are particular
points relating to retirement age. Again, in your written submissions
you obviously acknowledge that consideration to raising the retirement
age perhaps has a role to play and gives us some indications of
what is happening in each of the Armed Services. You say it will
remain under scrutiny for both officers in the Navy on full-time
commissions and other ranks on second open engagements to increase
one or both to a retirement age of 55. In the Army you are talking
about the compulsory retirement age for officers commissioning
into the Army no longer 55, but 60, and for soldiers the versatile
engagement which has been introduced means that some can kept
on beyond the age of 55, even as far as an upper age limit of
65. In the RAF continuance beyond 55 is offered on a case by case
basis, relating, of course, to service issues, out of service
dates for aircraft, et cetera. It is all a bit of a mish-mash
as far as the different ages are concerned. Are there specific
reasons for that which I have not been able to spot?
Derek Twigg: Obviously, there
is a degree of autonomy that single Services have in terms of
their manning and recruitment; historically it has been that way.
In terms of the Ministry of Defence, we are keen to examine initiatives
around this. You have seen specifically what the Army does. Our
view is that you should not explore this further and look to what
should be done because there are lots of issues around it, things
that we have exposed here today in terms of how each Service might
be affected in terms of career development, promotion opportunities,
whether people of that age are appropriate for any particular
types of job that might become available, whether there is the
right turnover in people. There are a number of areas which need
to be taken into account in terms of establishing a distinct policy
saying, "Yes, you will be allowed to continue until you are
65 or 60". I do not think it is an exact science.
Q381 Linda Gilroy: But there are
some equality issues there, although I believe I am right in saying
that the Armed Services are exempt from European Union legal requirements
on that. Would you, Minister, acknowledge that, whether you are
exempt or not, if that too is giving rise to irritations and tensions
and people feeling under-valued it is something that you should
be looking at as an equality issue apart from a straightforward
recruitment and retention issue? Is this something that again
we can ask you to look at to see that you are maximising the kind
of culture that you want to achieve in valuing the Armed Services,
that there are not rules and regulations in the different Armed
Services which rub up against each other and cause problems?
Vice Admiral Wilkinson: I think
we have come a considerable way on this over the years, where
they were absolutely categorical that at the age of 40, if you
were another rank, you got thrown out, at the age of 55 as a senior
officer you got thrown out, and we were losing a lot of talent.
If it looks rather disjointed and unco-ordinated, as you lay it
out, Ms Gilroy, then certainly we will look to see if we can make
it more co-ordinated. It has been done very much thus far on a
case-by-case basis and let us be in no doubt that at the operational
end it is still very much a young person's business. It is physically
tiring. Being in a ship at sea in an operational unit at the age
of 40-plus is exhausting, so we are talking here, I think, in
very small numbers in headquarters or administrative posts rather
than the ability to plug big gaps in operational front-line units,
but certainly we will look to see if we can be better co-ordinated.
Chairman: We will almost certainly include
something in our report about this.
Linda Gilroy: Before we move on, Chairman,
could I on an officer issue particularly highlight what can happen
in terms of recruitment and retention? The retirement age for
Royal Marines is 50, for the Royal Navy I think it is 53 going
on 55 because there is some alignment going on over quite a long
timescale, and for the Army it is 55. If they are all competing
inter-Service for promotion then by the time you get to your early
to mid forties you are beginning to think about exit. If you want
to go on and have a successful career the only way is out, basically,
whereas if you are in the RAF and the Royal Navy you have an extra
three to five years. Apart from the equality issues that are there,
that must mean that we are losing really good people from the
Royal Marines, which is just ridiculous because of what they are
contributing.
Q382 Chairman: Perhaps you could
consider that too.
Vice Admiral Wilkinson: We will.
Q383 Mr Holloway: This is for Vice
Admiral Wilkinson. When I did my pathetic bit of military service
and one of the top brass over there did a huge amount of military
service the expectation of lots of bang-bang was really very small.
Today it is completely different. We have kids that are now firing
10,000 rounds in a day, we have this incredible work regime for
the Apache crews and so on, and you have got people not just being
there but with build-up training and lack of time for their families
and probably the feeling that you have been absolutely terrified
and you have done lots and lots of fighting and you kind of do
not need to do it any more. Does that not point to, in certain
types of units, particularly the infantry and perhaps the engineers
now and certainly the Apaches, the fact that we need to not just
pay certain skills more but we also need more people if we are
going to match commitments with resources?
Derek Twigg: That is a really
important point. This is one of the things I discuss with soldiers
and airmen and sailors in terms of their commitments. There are
all the issues here about Harmony, about the manning, the work
they are doing and all that in terms of the number of times people
go on operations and how all that affects them, but you are right:
what do you say to the married soldier who has been two or three
times to Afghanistan, has been in all sorts of hard fighting and
thinks, "I have done it now. I do not want any more of this.
I have done what I joined up for"? That is a difficult question
to answer and I do not think there is one answer to that problem.
It is a range of issues in terms of the amount of times they go
out, the Harmony guidelines, the support they get back home, the
welfare for their family, the accommodation. All these things
come together. You will never stop someone who feels at the end
of the day, "I have done that. I want to move on and do something
else". On the other hand, as you know from your experience,
there are other people who want to go out there and do it on a
number of occasions and people have stayed in for that reason,
so there is a mix of reasons for that. What I am trying to come
round to is that I do not think there is one answer to that; it
is a mix of the whole debate we have already been having today
but there is no doubt, as you rightly point out, that some of
the things we are asking our people to do are extremely demanding.
Q384 Mr Holloway: But does the Admiral
think that in those sorts of areas we need to have more people?
Vice Admiral Wilkinson: We do
the best we can with the resources we have, Sir, at the moment.
Mr Holloway: Forgive me, but that is
a politician's answer. Do we need more people?
Q385 Chairman: The Minister has agreed
that we need more people.
Derek Twigg: In terms of the fact
that here we are talking about recruitment and retention and do
we need more people, we do need more people; that is why we need
to recruit and retain more people, because we are not at manning
balance at the moment, so we accept that.
Q386 Chairman: I think we have covered
that.
Derek Twigg: Whether you want
to increase it over and above what our current target is another
issue, of course.
Q387 Mr Jones: Can I turn to Service
welfare now? There are a large number of organisations—I
have just counted what we have here, I think it is 33, and there
are perhaps more—but we are still being told that there
are gaps in welfare. What are your views in terms of how welfare
is being delivered by these organisations and also the MoD, and
when is the Command Paper, which I understand is going to address
this issue, going to come out? We were promised it in the spring
but we did not think it was the southern hemisphere spring that
you were indicating. Is there a day that we can announce it?
Derek Twigg: In terms of the Command
Paper, the Secretary of State has been on record as saying that
we expected it to be around June time. The key thing is to make
sure we get it right. We have done extensive consultations with
a whole range of bodies and we are taking comments and views.
There are many different views about that. I am not going to pre-empt
what that will say at the moment but clearly it is going to be
a very important paper in terms of defining where we are in terms
of support, what we can do further and what is possible. Coming
back to the first part of your question in terms of welfare, I
came to this job about 20 months ago. If you want my honest opinion,
I think there are an awful lot of people doing an awful lot of
good work. Whether it was truly joined up, whether it was ensuring
that gaps were being plugged, the honest answer to that is that
it was not. If you look at the range of people who are involved,
from the Ministry of Defence, the single Services, the regimental
associations, the many ex-Service charities, not just the big
three or four, and lots of other organisations, I suspect they
are in the hundreds, I asked the question of myself, "Why
should there be anyone falling through the gaps, given that there
are lots of resources around, whether it is within government
or outside government? There are lots of people who want to do
good. What can we do about this?", so last year, along with
the Chief of General Staff, we organised a welfare conference
which brought all these bodies together to look at how we could
improve that, and I will give you two examples of how that has
improved. Selly Oak, for instance, which we discussed in terms
of the welfare support and accommodation which you yourselves
recognised in your previous report, was a significant improvement.
In terms of the Pathway of Care we have now put in place, because
basically we could not understand why we did not have a pathway
which was monitored from the time and point of wounding through
to, if necessary, leaving the Service (although many people do
not leave the Service today), we will make sure we have that monitored
and looked after all the way through. That is in place and the
database is now up and running but further work needs to be done
to enhance that. In terms of case where you get somebody who has
been wounded, has to leave the Service and we find Defence Estates
issue him with a 93-day notice that he had got to quit, we suddenly
find there is a story there when actually the story was that you
go through a legal process and no-one is going to chuck you out
anyway, but we have to make sure things like that are joined up.
In terms of welfare support, in terms of the compensation package,
despite the criticism there is a major step forward from what
was there previously.
Q388 Mr Jones: Can I be controversial?
Is there not a need, frankly, to cull some of these organisations
and is it not the fact that some of these have grown up over time
and might, as you say, be very worthy causes but possibly in some
cases are employment agents for ex-servicemen or serving senior
servicemen's wives rather than providing the joined-up service
that you want? Is there not also a debate about what Government
should do?
Derek Twigg: In terms of the number
of organisations, that was something I recognised when I came
to this job and I think part of the reason for having the Welfare
Conference was to try and get people thinking about how these
organisation work together and the amount of organisation there
are now. COBSEO are doing a really good job in this line and they
are working very well with the organisations, and I think it is
a much more joined-up approach than there was previously. It is
not for me as a minister to say an organisation or a charity should
not exist or that it should join up with X other charity, but
clearly COBSEO have recognised the work they do and they are taking
this forward along with the big four in particular but also the
rest of the organisations, so I think that is recognised, is the
short answer to your question. In terms of this interesting debate
about the dividing line between charities and the MoD and the
Help for Heroes Fund and the swimming pool at Headley Court, I
would answer it this way. There has always been a history of the
ex-Service organisations and charities working with the Ministry
of Defence and the Armed Forces to provide support for our Service
personnel, families and veterans, and that has been for ever,
frankly, so there is nothing new in that. Some people decided,
because of the health fears, which I praised because they did
an amazing job there, to use it for political purposes to attack
the Government, that suddenly we were accepting charity. The fact
is that at Headley Court, which is owned by a charitable trust
and we pay for the staff and the facilities, there are already
four or five gyms there, they already had a hydrotherapy pool,
but we welcome this support from Help for Heroes; it has enhanced
the facilities, so that is a good thing. It also brings in members
of the public. I think it gives people a much more tangible way
of expressing their support to the Armed Forces, so I welcome
it. Part of the Command Service paper will look at this dividing
line, but you know as well as I do, Mr Jones, that if you look
at the Health Service it is in terms of hospices and Macmillan
nurses and research or in education it is educational foundations;
it is throughout public services. Maybe there is an argument about
where that dividing line should be but I certainly do not think
it is the case that the MoD is using charities to do things it
should be doing as a matter of course.
Q389 Mr Jones: One of the issues
that has come up is frequent postings and access to care services,
not for serving men and women but for families. For example, it
came out in the medical report and also the educational report
we did in terms of how families get access to priority services
when they move. What can be done better there, do you think, to
provide families, when they move and certainly when loved ones
are on operations, with that support, not just in terms of practical
things but also things like medical services or the right school
to go to?
Derek Twigg: This is one of the
things that the Command Paper is looking at in some detail in
terms of support. I have had a number of meetings with my counterpart
in different government departments, not least in terms of health.
We want to see a position where anybody who is a family member
is not discriminated against by the fact that they move into a
different area in terms of the waiting list, and those discussions
are going on as part of the Command Paper and the discussion that
we have had with ministers. In terms of schooling, again, discussions
have been taking place with education. As you know, as part of
the Missions policy that has to be looked at now, and a marker
has now been put on education to try and find out whether there
are any issues around educational attainment, so a number of things
have happened there. You rightly point out some of the concerns
of Service personnel, issues around basing strategy in terms of
super garrisons, ensuring that people do not move around as much
so that they have a better, more stable future. There are a number
of issues taking place but we certainly do recognise that as a
major concern and that is being looked at in some detail as well
by the Command Paper.
Vice Admiral Wilkinson: We risk
running into the realms of speculation as to what the Command
Paper is going to say, but I will support the Minister in that
certainly those areas that he has mentioned—super garrisons
for the Army, base porting for the Navy and a reduction in airfields
for the RAF so that people are more stable than they were 20 years
ago—have all been recognised as helping to reduce the difficulties
of military mobility.
Q390 Richard Younger-Ross: First
of all, my apologies: I have to go fairly shortly, but perhaps
I may ask you about housing. Housing has repeatedly come up as
an area of dissatisfaction in more recent surveys and reports
and has a bearing on retention. Bob Ainsworth announced a £5
billion plan. How long is it going to take and what impact do
you think that will have on retention?
Derek Twigg: If I can just say
this before I go into the detail of it, there is a clear issue
that there have been decades of under-investment in housing and
we accept our responsibility in that but it is going to take us
some time. Even the previous Government after 18 years could not
solve the problems of Service housing. Having said that, what
are we doing about it? We have got responsibility now. We intend
to spend on housing over the next ten years over £8 billion.
If you look that, it will involve lots of improvement of single
living accommodation. There have already been since 2003 26,000
new or improved single living bed spaces and we intend to have
another 30,000 by 2013. Since 2001 I think nearly 13,000 Service
family homes have been put to the top standard for condition.
There is also a programme of replacing boilers which was a major
problem the winter before last. There is replacing kitchens and
bathrooms, and if you go round, while there is some accommodation
which is clearly not up to the standards that we want our people
to have, there are significant building programmes taking place
at many bases around the country which I have visited. There have
been major improvements but it is going to take some time and,
as I say, a spend of £8 billion over the next ten years is
a major step forward but we have a lot to do.
Q391 Richard Younger-Ross: Those
figures you gave were 13,000 family units, of which there are
71,000—
Derek Twigg: Worldwide. We are
currently looking at the whole commission of our stock at the
moment because a lot of it is already at the top condition but
obviously a number are not at the moment. The only other thing
I can say to you is that the standards we are asking for our people
are well above the Decent Homes standard. I just thought I would
make that point. That never quite gets brought on. The Decent
Homes standard is something that we exceed in terms of aspiring
to for the condition of our houses.
Q392 Richard Younger-Ross: Of those
remaining 71,000, how many need to be upgraded or knocked down
and replaced?
Derek Twigg: In terms of "knocked
down", there is a whole programme taking place around the
country in terms of refurbishing houses but also in terms of giving
houses that we do not need any more back to Addington Homes or
demolishing houses which we own and which we do not need any more,
but it is also important to stress on this that we have a void
level at the moment which we are trying to get down but we need
to take account of any future basing strategy, housing needs and
moves, etc, so it is not quite as simple and straightforward as
that.
Q393 Richard Younger-Ross: In terms
of maintenance, on our website there were a number of complaints
regarding maintenance. One person wrote that it took 15 years
to change a carpet. The same person complained that the plumber
was called after a water leak because there was water running
down the light fitting. The plumber came, went to the wrong house
and, despite having a contact number, went away again and did
not come back. The person went on to complain that everyone blames
everyone else. What are you doing in terms of day-to-day maintenance
to make sure that what is there, even if inadequate, is maintained
to a reasonable standard?
Derek Twigg: After the initial
problems with MODern Housing Solutions, not least in terms of
the response times, I think you will see that response times now
are significantly improved for repairs. We are working very closely
with the MoD. Admiral Lawrence, who runs Defence Estates, has
a very close relationship with them and he has been in the job
over six months now, I think.
Vice Admiral Wilkinson: Just over
12 months.
Derek Twigg: He has set out a
plan and target to improve the maintenance and to keep pressure
on MODern House Solutions, so a lot of work is taking place at
the moment.
Q394 Richard Younger-Ross: I know
if something goes wrong in my house and it is not fixed it will
cause friction between myself and my wife, and the import of this
cannot be stressed enough in terms of keeping a family background
or two partners happy with each other.
Derek Twigg: There is no argument
here. If repairs are not done on time it is not acceptable, full
stop. There have been problems, as you rightly point out, but
we are continuing to improve the responsiveness and ensure that
these repairs get done. There will always be cases. What we need
to make sure is that we learn from any of those to make sure that
we put the solution in place first time. I think you will find
that our response times now are significantly improved, so at
a ministerial level I can assure you—and I ask some very
serious and searching questions and I get the regular monthly
reports about repairs—that we continually want to drive
up the responsiveness for them.
Q395 Mr Jones: Can I just ask, in
terms of MODern Housing Solutions, is the problem that what you
did—and I understand why the contract was let in the way
it was done—was that, unlike any other housing provider,
be it housing association or social provider, you took away the
person at local level whose job it was to ensure that things were
done? We went to Pirbright, for example. The Commanding Officer
there was saying that he had no say. At one woman's house we went
to, for example, her ceiling had been collapsed for four or five
weeks. You were a local councillor, Mr Twigg, and I was. You just
would not put up with that, but he did not have any ability to
action anything. Is not the problem that there is nothing wrong
with the system being set up but what we need is somebody responsible
at a base or an area to drive those things forward in terms of
when those unacceptable delays come forward?
Derek Twigg: I could not disagree
with you. That is an issue and it has been raised with me on a
number of occasions. I will just say two things, first on whether
the old system was perfect. When you talk to people, there were
lots of issues around the old system. One of the things that strikes
me is that sometimes it is not just about whether they are doing
the repairs. It is about someone keeping on top of the maintenance,
which is basic stuff in some cases and it has just been allowed
to drift. In terms of someone locally doing that, I think there
are a lot of interesting questions about, despite that change,
whether some people should intervene to stop things like the problems
happening that we saw at Pirbright. In terms of the local connection,
that is one of the things that is being brought to our attention.
We are looking at it as part of the Service Command Paper. We
should not detract from the fact that having this centralised
system gives us much better focus and overall control on the issues
which we did not have before. It was left often to single Services.
Q396 Mr Jones: I do not disagree
with that, but if you talk to any housing professional about the
way in which management of housing stock has gone over the last
20 or 30 years, even with some of the big social landlords now,
the one thing they do is that they have someone locally responsible
for it, but, as I say, everybody seems to have forgotten that
they are looking after the housing here and somehow have done
it completely differently.
Derek Twigg: As you know, MODern
Housing Solutions has managers responsible for particular areas.
Having someone on every base is another issue but I certainly
think that you are right, that there is scope to improve that.
It is something that the family federations have raised with me
on a number of occasions and, as I say, I know it has been raised
as part of the Service Command Paper, so yes, we need to do better
on that.
Q397 Chairman: Minister, we drew
attention in our report on the Defence Estates to these issues
and we suggested a number of ways in which there could be some
sort of local ownership of the problems so that local Service
men and women did not feel that everybody was saying it was somebody
else's fault. I am afraid we thought that the response from the
Ministry of Defence that we got to that report was pretty defensive.
I wonder if you could revisit that and look again at that response
and see whether that could be done better in response to Mr Jones'
question.
Derek Twigg: I accept the point
that has been raised. It raised with me regularly. Whether it
means someone on every base is another issue but we do need to
look at how we can improve that situation. You rightly did highlight
that and I have seen it myself when I have been on to bases and
talked to families and people, and it is an issue that has been
raised as part of the Service Command Paper, so I do not want
to pre-empt what we might decide there but we are keen to improve
that situation. I cannot give you a definitive answer at the moment
because otherwise it will pre-empt what we might say later in
the year but yes, I accept the point you make.
Q398 Richard Younger-Ross: Service
personnel report difficulties in accessing allowances and understanding
them. What impact does the system have on retention?
Derek Twigg: We have just introduced
a ready-reckoner which I think 26,000 Service people have accessed.
We have put on the website a ready-reckoner and you can go through
a series of screens telling you what allowances you will be entitled
to, depending on what you are doing at a particular time, so that
is a major step forward. We can always do more on that. As you
rightly said, there are a lot of allowances that people qualify
for. I will give you an example. We have just introduced the council
tax refund which came into place on 1 April. There was some uncertainty
about where you would claim for that. Some people thought you
would go to the local authority and others thought you asked someone
in the units or the Ministry of Defence. There has been some uncertainty
and confusion about this but I think the ready-reckoner has been
an innovative step forward to try and improve that and we do need
to do more work on that. In terms of recruitment and retention,
I do not have any figures to suggest that that has been a major
problem. I am sure it has affected some people's judgment in what
they want to do but I do not think we are sitting back and saying
we are not doing anything about it. We have taken steps to try
and improve that.
Q399 Richard Younger-Ross: So the
ready-reckoner is in response to the round-Europe criticisms of
the current system where they say there is a disconnect somewhere
between policy and execution and that this may be because of the
complexity of the allowances, the way in which they are communicated
within each Service or both?
Vice Admiral Wilkinson: Like the
Minister, I do not really recognise that as a major issue that
our people are raising with us. It may well be a by-product of
the introduction of JPA that people have become more aware, as
we have introduced a much more self-service culture, of allowances
that are available to them. I certainly do not recognise a gap
between the policy and delivery around those allowances, but I
can investigate further if you wish, sir.
|
