Examination of Witnesses (Question Numbers
120-139)
RT HON
BOB AINSWORTH
MP, ADMIRAL LORD
WEST OF
SPITHEAD GCB DSC, MR
JON DAY
CBE, BRIGADIER CHIP
CHAPMAN, MS
GILLIAN MCGREGOR
AND MS
CHLOE SQUIRES
21 OCTOBER 2008
Q120 Mr Holloway: Are there people
who play that scenario at a very practical, technical sort of
level?
Lord West of Spithead: We have
people at very practical levels who are looking at the details
of how these things are done. I have got to be quite careful in
what I say actually.
Q121 Chairman: Would you like more?
The answer to that is always yes.
Lord West of Spithead: Like more?
Q122 Chairman: Would you like more
people doing this horizon-scanning?
Lord West of Spithead: I think
probably we need just to tweak out how the people there are doing
it. Clearly, when I go back and they say, "My God, you were
offered more by somebody and you didn't take them", but I
think actually we can do it within our structures and it is a
question of just making sure it is done in exactly the right way,
so, for example, JTAC, I think, needs just a little bit more of
that and they are doing some really good work, but it just needs
some slight tweaking.
Q123 Mr Jenkin: Can I ask about the
CCRFs, the Civil Contingency Reaction Forces, which, I think,
were mobilised in 2004. Brigadier, you said that in Gloucestershire,
for example, some Reserves were deployed in Gloucestershire?
Brigadier Chapman: That is correct.
Q124 Mr Jenkin: But were they the
CCRFs?
Brigadier Chapman: No, they were
not. The reason the CCRFs were not there, it is a sign of success
because we can force-generate quickly from the Regular Force structure.
Now, the difference between them in a sense is that the CCRFs
are something which you might need to mobilise for Mr Holloway's
high-end 10,000 people consequence management scenario. We have
used Reserves under sections 22 and 27 of the Reserve Forces Act
1996. The CCRFs, if there were a high-end disaster, would need
to be mobilised, and obviously it is not for me to say, but that
is quite a high-end political decision to take, so the CCRFs have
not been used as formed units since they were formed under the
SDR new chapter, and that is because we have never met the threshold
where we needed to use them because of the increasing civil resilience
brought about by the Civil Contingencies Act and the other range
of initiatives which have gone on since 2002.
Q125 Mr Jenkin: Well, that is an
extremely good answer and one which you might have been thinking
of before you came here because, speaking to members of the TA
at the 100th Anniversary of the Essex TA celebrations earlier
this month, they would like to be deployed in civil emergencies,
they would like to wear their uniforms on their home patch and
know that they were going to be deployed. Are these CCRFs really
deployable?
Mr Ainsworth: You cannot mobilise
them unnecessarily.
Q126 Mr Jenkin: I appreciate that.
Mr Ainsworth: They are there and
we can mobilise them. In every region there is a CCRF, around
about 500-strong from the Reserves, that can be mobilised. In
the Gloucestershire case that you talk about, we were asked for
specific capability, we were asked for it very quickly and we
were not asked for large numbers. We were asked for helicopter
lift, we were asked for bodies to build protection around some
of the flood infrastructure and we were asked for some logistics
to get water distributed. Now, we had Regular Forces and Reserve
Forces available to us in order to be able to do that.
Q127 Mr Jenkin: But is it actually
more expensive to deploy the CCRFs from Regular Forces and is
that why you still draw on the Regular Forces, despite all the
other commitments and cancelled leave and cancelled training and
all the other things they have to put up with under the present
circumstances?
Mr Ainsworth: Yes, there was no
request. There was a very urgent requirement to make sure that
the initial planning and water distribution was done and the Army
did that and had the capability available and did that and then
handed over to other people fairly quickly, so it was not an ongoing
necessity for us to carry on distributing the water, but we had
other people that were happy to do it, but who just did not have
that ability to react quickly.
Mr Day: I do not think this is
an issue of cost. I think that, if the contingency were large
enough, then these would be the people that we would mobilise.
Q128 Mr Jenkin: Do the CCRFs ever
exercise as formed units or are too many of them deployed on operations
to exercise as formed units?
Mr Day: Because they are based
on infantry battalions, they exercise within the framework of
being a disciplined body of men with a coherent C3 structure that
can be used to execute instructions most likely in an unarmed
manner. So again, if you go to Mr Holloway's example, you would
probably want them to do a consequence management task as generalists
where they do not need any specialist training, for other tasks,
we would bring in specialists, like we did, for example, with
engineers on the Gloucestershire floods.
Q129 Mr Jenkin: But one gets a bit
depressed to hear, for example, that Two UK Signals Brigade may
be the next bit of the TA to be axed in the general run-down of
our TA and Reserves when that is a crucial link between the blue-light
services and the Armed Forces. One senses that these are not really
a priority area of present defence policy.
Mr Day: Two Signals Brigade were
used. Elements were used on the Gloucestershire floods; they were
the reservist element I was largely referring to.
Q130 Mr Jenkin: Can we have an assurance
that they are not going to be disbanded?
Mr Ainsworth: We have a Reserve
Review which is being conducted currently.
Q131 Mr Jenkin: Exactly.
Mr Ainsworth: Well, you know and
other Members of Parliament know that that is ongoing and we will
be reporting to Parliament in due course. There is no suggestion
that a particular unit is going to be axed, nor has there been
any suggestion that that review is in any way finance-led. It
is about making our Reserves more appropriate to our needs today,
and that is being conducted with that in mind.
Q132 Mr Jenkin: But is it not the
problem that the National Security Strategy said that the Government
was determined to shift the overall balance of defence procurement
towards the support of current operations, and of course that
means away from longer-term capabilities? We know that is happening
on training and we know that is happening on manpower. Is it not
the case that really these Reserve Forces for civil contingencies
are quite far down the list of priorities because of the pressures
on the Armed Forces elsewhere?
Mr Ainsworth: We have to give
appropriate priority to our current operations and any government
would do that. We have got to make sure that we are giving them
that appropriate priority, but that is not to say that we can
forget about tomorrow's threat and all of these other issues,
and we have no intentions of doing so.
Mr Jenkin: So overstretch is not affecting—
Q133 Chairman: Before we get on to
that issue, can I come back to the Civil Contingency Reserve Force.
You are drawing a distinction, are you not, between mobilisation
and deployment?
Brigadier Chapman: Yes.
Q134 Chairman: How long does it take
to mobilise the Civil Contingency Reserve Force?
Brigadier Chapman: Within this
forum, all I can say is that they are extremely high-readiness
forces. I would not like to go into specifics.
Mr Day: Again we can write to
you with the details.
Q135 Chairman: Could you?
Mr Day: Yes.
Q136 Chairman: Is that something
that is sensitive?
Mr Day: Yes, it is.
Q137 Mr Jenkin: We know that the
Armed Forces are stretched in the infantry departments, but you
are able to give me and the Committee an assurance that the degree
of stretch in the Armed Forces, which we know is very intense
at the moment, is not affecting the readiness of Civil Contingency
Reaction Forces, even though many of those personnel are actually
deployed themselves on operations?
Mr Ainsworth: The fact that the
Army is working hard and, yes, is stretched has had no bearing
on any decision not to mobilise the Civil Contingency Reaction
Forces.
Mr Jenkin: Well, you cannot put it more
starkly than that.
Mr Hancock: In our predecessor Committee
in 2002, we were discussing, in our report then, the ability of
the Royal Air Force to respond to a rogue aircraft coming into
the UK and we were given assurances at that time that the MoD
were satisfied on the legal basis for shooting down an aircraft,
and we were told that there was a procedure in place where the
final decision would be taken by a minister, not necessarily the
Prime Minister, but by a minister. Has that policy changed over
those five or six years and, if so, in what way?
Q138 Chairman: This is one of those
areas where you might feel it difficult to answer some of the
questions.
Mr Ainsworth: All I can say, Chairman,
is that since the Committee's report we did look at the issues
that were raised by it about the capability of our people and
we satisfied ourselves that we had the appropriate systems in
place and appropriate protections in place. I cannot go into the
detail of who gives approval, but we have satisfied ourselves
as well as to the legal basis of that capability.
Q139 Mr Hancock: But the decision
presumably would still be taken by a minister as opposed to a
civil servant in the Cabinet Office?
Mr Ainsworth: Yes, the decision
would be taken by an elected minister, yes.
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