Territorial Army tng binned "temporarily" to save £ - Could We Save Money Other Ways?

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"One of the problems with the TA is when you look at their annual budget (£350-£400m 'ish) against the actual numbers who deploy each year (~2000) in support of ongoing operations it gives the impression of being a very expensive organisation (all things are relative I guess). "

Wrathmonk - I can't find a breakdown of the TA budget, but I'm sure a large proportion of it is to pay the salaries of the Regular staff and NRPS. The paragraph below is from an (unclassified) Army Briefing Note dated 13th October. Stopping all training not in support of operations saves £63-86m, depending on how you do the sum, but only a small proportion of the £400m 'ish quoted.

Great timing, too, as with less than six months to go to the end of the fiscal year, you'll pretty much guarantee that no-one will qualify for the training bounty - which is tax-free and worth up to £1,600 for those on the top level.

AA - I share your cynicism, but in this case it appears misplaced. Bounty requirements are down to Level 3 MATTS, so should be able to knock those off in a morning. A great welcome back for my unit early next year - "Thanks for your tour, now p**s off until we need you in Afghan again"

"Territorial Army (TA): In addition to the £23 million reduction previously made in the in-year budget for TA activity, savings of £20 million have been taken. As a result, activities not directly in support of operations will stop or be severely curtailed. This will mean that TA soldiers who have not been warned to go on operations will suspend all training until Apr 10. However, Phase 1 training will continue and those who have not already qualified for their Annual Bounty will have the opportunity to do so. "

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