Part of the debate – in the House of Commons am 12:00 am ar 12 Rhagfyr 1973.
I shall confine my remarks to manpower and expenditure, but I share the anxieties expressed by the hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Mr. Maclennan) about the alarming growth of the Soviet forces.
In a recent debate in another place my right hon. and noble Friend the Secretary of State pointed out that the target for Army recruiting this year was 26,000 but that it had been estimated that the result would be 13,000—a shortfall of 50 per cent. The other two Services are not so hard hit. The reasons for the shortfall vary from repeated tours in Northern Ireland, which are highly unpopular with mothers and wives, to the state of full employment which now exists. The problem is further aggravated by the raising of the school leaving age and the fact that 15-year-old entry, which last year formed 20 per cent. of the total entry, is now denied us. Of course, the most important reason, which has already been stressed, is that the military salary has not kept pace with civilian earnings.
I have two minor suggestions for dealing with the problem. On Northern Ireland, I suggest that an adjustment might be made to the X factor in the pay code. It is an integral part of the pay code and I realise the difficulties that that would entail. The people there are working unsocial hours—not necessarily every day but certainly a great deal—and there is surely scope for improvement of the X factor. We know that the pay review will not appear until next April and will be bound by phase 3. I hope, too, that an attempt will be made to persuade my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education to have second thoughts about the younger entry.
We must be prepared. If we do not make preparations we may well be caught short, but if we make preparations the chances are that we shall be in the clear. The obvious solution is an unpopular one—the reintroduction of conscription. In the past it has taught us valuable lessons. I believe—and I hope and trust—that we shall never have to entertain it again. I say that particularly because the success and contentment of the three Services stems from the fact that they are manned by volunteers, and that success and contentment is shown by what is happening in Northern Ireland. However, we must be ready.
Just over 20 years ago I was commanding my regiment, which at that time was a mixture of Regulars and National Service men. In those days National Service was a way of life and everybody accepted it. The forces were big enough and had sufficient worldwide commitments to support the whole intake. The National Service man was paid at a lower rate than his Regular counterpart, even though he might be doing exactly the same jobs. The call-out was total, which meant that the Services were obliged to accept people whose character was not without blemish. The term of service was two years but the initial training was normally done in this country and was expensive in terms of regular instructors, because of the constant turnover.
My regiment was armed with tanks. Initial training took between four and five months, and by the time a recruit had finished that and had leave he had probably completed six months' service before ever reaching his unit.
The lessons we learn from that are fourfold. First, if we had to reintroduce conscription under present conditions, people would not accept different scales of pay. Therefore, there must be one pay code. We would be aiming not to expand the forces but merely to keep them up to establishment, and if men were to be asked to do similar jobs they would have to receive similar pay. We must maintain the two-year tour. Equipment has become more and more sophisticated and initial training is almost certain to take six months. To obtain the full benefit of training men would have to serve at least 18 months.
We must insist that the current character standards applying in the forces are maintained. Experience shows that a rotten apple in the barrel usually takes one good one, if not more, with it. Finally, the call-out must be a total call-out. If we have a selective call-out we are asking for trouble. Taking into consideration the size of the forces as they exist at the moment, there is no hope of the total National Service intake being absorbed. Therefore, there will have to be alternative forms of service. There are glaring gaps. One can put people on the land or in jobs where there are manpower gaps, such as hospitals and institutions. Other places where I can see men being well employed are the coal mines, as in the Bevin Boys' days. I hope that this will not come 1o pass, but let us be prepared.
I understand that we are meant to be living in a period of détente, but while we have the MBFR and SALT talks we read of alarming increases in tanks, missiles and aircraft in the Warsaw Pact countries. We hear rumours of possible American European ground force reductions. One point emerges strongly: there can be no possible reduction in the defence budget's share of the GNP. One has only to glance at the defence budget to see that over half goes on pay. We have already heard about the increase in sophisticated modern weapons and their greater expense. I was amazed and appalled that responsible hon. Members on the Opposition Front Bench should recently have suggested that the defence budget should be decreased by sums varying from £50 million to £100 million.