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Armed Forces: Manpower

Volume 486: debated on Thursday 22 January 2009

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many and what percentage of armed forces personnel were fit for task in each year since 2001. (249718)

The MOD collates, on a quarterly basis, management information on the number of Service personnel ‘fit for task’, which provides a measure of the medical fitness of all trained armed forces personnel. These figures are broken down into three categories: Medically Fully Fit, Medically Not Fully Fit and Medically Unfit. It should be noted that the majority of those personnel who fall under the category of Medically Not Fully Fit remain fit enough to work in some capacity and therefore continue to make a contribution to operational effectiveness, often within theatres of operation.

Prior to 1 April 2006 information was collected by the single services for internal management purposes, but was not required to be reported centrally in a standardised format. It would therefore incur disproportionate cost to retrieve this information and collate it into comparable figures.

Medically fit for task figures from the first quarter of 2006-07 through to the second quarter of 2007-08 can be found in the following table. Personnel numbers are rounded to the nearest 10, and percentages rounded to one decimal point. For information on the period covering the third quarter of 2007-08 through to the second quarter of 2008-09 I refer the hon. Member to my answer of 20 January 2009, Official Report, columns 1262-64W.

Naval ServiceArmyRAF

Numbers

Percentage of Trained Strength

Numbers

Percentage of Trained Strength

Numbers

Percentage of Trained Strength

2006-07

Quarter 1

Fully Fit for Task

33,450

94.5

80,920

83.7

42,440

90.2

Not Fully Fit for Task

1,790

5.1

15,250

15.8

4,390

9.3

Unfit for Task

160

0.5

480

220

0.5

Quarter 2

Fully Fit for Task

33,540

94.8

80,190

83.4

42,440

90.2

Not Fully Fit for Task

1,720

4.9

15,470

16.1

4,390

9.3

Unfit for Task

130

0.4

540

0.6

220

0.5

Quarter 31

Fully Fit for Task

79,810

83.2

39,230

89.4

Not Fully Fit for Task

15,530

16.1

4,460

10.2

Unfit for Task

560

0.6

200

0.5

Quarter 4

Fully Fit for Task

31,330

90.4

79,040

82.7

38,730

89.7

Not Fully Fit for Task

3,170

9.2

16,080

16.8

4,450

10.3

Unfit for Task

120

0.4

480

0.5

190

0.4

2007-08

Quarter 12

Fully Fit for Task

31,330

90.5

38,730

89.3

Not Fully Fit for Task

3,170

9.2

4,450

10.3

Unfit for Task

120

0.4

190

0.4

Quarter 22

Fully Fit for Task

31,279

90.1

37,250

89.1

Not Fully Fit for Task

3,315

9.6

4,360

10.4

Unfit for Task

120

0.4

190

0.5

1Figures for the Naval Service not available due to change over from legacy systems to the Joint Personnel Administration system.

2Since 2007 the Army have collated figures for their deployable elements only not their total trained strength.

Since 1 April 2007 the Army has collated quarterly figures for its deployable elements only, rather than for its total trained strength. For this reason the figures are not comparable to those provided by the Navy and RAF in the same period. The Army's deployability returns provide a snapshot, on a specific day, of the deployability of Army personnel broken down into the following categories: fully deployable; limited deployability (LD); personnel unable to deploy (PUD). Many of those personnel classed as LD can and will deploy to operational theatres, likewise PUDs will be able to undertake non-deployed duties.

The following table provides the figures for calendar years 2007-08, personnel numbers are rounded to the nearest 10, and percentages rounded to one decimal point. It should be noted that since September 2008 the deployability return has extended the categories it collects against with the intention of providing greater granularity to limited deployability and PUD data. As result the September and December returns report against different metrics which may account for the increase in numbers.

Fully Deployable

LD for Medical Reason

PUD for Medical Reasons

2007

1 March

Numbers

54,960

7,390

3,630

Percentage of Deployable Strength

78.4

10.5

5.2

1 June

Numbers

55,030

7,340

3,700

Percentage of Deployable Strength

78.5

10.5

5.3

1 September

Numbers

53,860

6,980

3,640

Percentage of Deployable Strength

78.7

10.2

5.4

1 December

Numbers

53,390

6,550

3,650

Percentage of Deployable Strength

79.2

9.7

5.4

2008

1 March

Numbers

56,050

7,020

3,810

Percentage of Deployable Strength

79.8

10.0

5.4

1 June

Numbers

55,980

6,910

3,610

Percentage of Deployable Strength

80.3

9.9

5.2

1 September

Numbers

56,570

8,690

3,790

Percentage of Deployable Strength

77.7

11.9

5.2

1 December

Numbers

57,700

7,910

3,910

Percentage of Deployable Strength

78.8

10.8

5.3