2,600 Navy and Army posts to go

2011-04-05 00:19:12

4 April 2011 Last updated at 17:51 Share this page Delicious Digg Facebook reddit StumbleUpon Twitter Email Print 2,600 to lose jobs in first round of Navy and Army cuts Some 7,000 jobs will be lost from the Army over the next four years Continue reading the main story Related Stories Ex-forces chief warns over Libya Fox defends RAF cuts announcement Cameron unveils armed forces cuts

Some 1,600 Navy personnel and 1,000 soldiers are to be laid off in the first tranche of redundancies from the Armed Forces, the government says.

Personnel, including 150 Gurkhas, will be told in September, but no-one on operations or pre or post-operations will face compulsory redundancy.

Defence Minister Andrew Robathan said the move - part of £5bn defence review cuts - would help reduce the deficit.

The RAF earlier announced plans to lay off an initial 1,000 staff.

In total, 11,000 serving personnel will lose their jobs over four years.

Under the Strategic Defence and Security Review announced in October, the Ministry of Defence is to cut 17,000 jobs across all three Services - 7,000 in the Army, 5,000 in the Navy and 5,000 from the RAF. But it is expected 6,000 of these will be achieved through a decrease in recruitment and by not replacing those who leave.

Mr Robathan said UK military operations in Libya and Afghanistan will not be impacted "adversely" by the redundancies from the armed forces.

He told the Commons that voluntary redundancies were being sought, which could include personnel currently on operations.

The initial Navy redundancies will include 121 officers up to the rank of captain from the warfare, engineering, medical and logistics branches while about 25% of the first Army job losses will come from officers up to the rank of brigadier.

Continue reading the main story JOB LOSSES 5,000 RAF personnel axed over five years 5,000 Navy personnel cut 7,000 army personnel cut 25,000 civilian MoD staff axed Defence review at-a-glance Q&A: strategic defence and security review

The 3,500-strong Brigade of Gurkhas - championed by the actress Joanna Lumley in a battle over their rights to settle in the UK - would lose soldiers including infantry, engineers, signallers, and logisticians.

Royal Marines, Special Forces, Army bomb disposal experts, the Intelligence Corps and the Royal Army Medical Corps are all exempt from the current round of redundancies.

Under the RAF plans, the first tranche of 1,020 jobs includes up to 170 trainee pilots.

The announcement comes on the day the RAF's chief said the service would need "genuine increases" in its budget to run the range of operations which ministers demand.

'Shabby' treatment

In the Commons, shadow defence minister Jim Murphy said details of the latest redundancies were leaked to the media over the weekend and this showed the military had been subject to more "shabby" treatment.

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