One-fifth of Britain’s Armed Forces aren’t totally match to battle a warfare as Ministry of Defence reveals ‘alarming’ figures

On Dec 24, 2024

By GREG HEFFER, POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT FOR MAILONLINE

Published: 09:00, 24 December 2024 | Updated: 14:11, 24 December 2024

One-fifth of Britain’s Armed Forces are not fully medically fit to fight a war, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) has admitted.

In total, 13,522 personnel across the Royal Navy, Army and Royal Air Force are deemed to be ‘medically not deployable’.

There are also 14,350 people across the various branches of the Armed Forces who are ‘medically limited deployable’.

This compares to 99,560 who are ‘medically fully deployable’, according to figures given by defence minister Al Carns in response to a written parliamentary question.

Lord Dannatt, the former head of the Army, described the situation as ‘alarming’ and said it highlighted the ‘absurdly small size of the British Army’.

Mark Francois, the Tory shadow Armed Forces minister who submitted the parliamentary question, put fresh pressure on Labour to put a firm date on when it plans to meet its target to spend 2.5 per cent of GDP on the military.

Those deemed to be medically not deployable are those medically fit for duty but with major employment limitations.

They are not fit to deploy on operations but may be deployable on UK-based exercises and should be able to work effectively for at least 32.5 hours per week.

In the case of the Army, 16,335 soldiers are either medically not deployable or medically limited deployable, out of a total of 71,340 personnel, amounting to 23 per cent of all troops

Lord Dannatt, the former head of the Army, described the situation as ‘alarming’ and said it highlighted the ‘absurdly small size of the British Army’

The figures were given by defence minister Al Carns in response to a written parliamentary question

Lack of dental check-ups ‘partly behind undeployable troops numbers’

A lack of dental check-ups are responsible for a number of the more than 10,000 members of the Armed Forces who are unable to be deployed due to being deemed medically unfit, according to a former defence minister.

James Heappey, who served as Armed Forces minister under three Conservative prime ministers, said the personnel are automatically categorised as unfit if they have not had the appointment in the last six months.

Speaking to Times Radio this morning, Mr Heappey said: ‘I’ll bet you that a big chunk of the non-deployable, medically downgraded people are downgraded for dental reasons.

‘And what that tends to mean is that they’ve not had a dental check-up in the last six months, and so they are automatically declared dentally unfit, and therefore not fully deployable.’

He added: ‘There is a reality about the nature of some of these injuries that mean that they couldn’t deploy to go on a discretionary operation today in peacetime, but if war was to come, then they would be absolutely able to go and fight because the needs of the nation would rather trump that rather discretionary take on their medical capacity.’

Those deemed to be medically limited deployable have minor employment limitations – such as a medical condition or functional limitation – that prevents the meeting of all deployability requirements.

Some 27,872 personnel across the Armed Forces are deemed either medically limited deployable or medically not deployable out of a total of 127,432, which represents 22 per cent.

In the case of the Army, 16,335 soldiers are either medically not deployable or medically limited deployable, out of a total of 71,340 personnel, amounting to 23 per cent of all troops.

Lord Dannatt told The Times: ‘There are two issues here: the size of our armed forces, especially the Army, which are numerically too small due to the underfunding of defence since the end of the Cold War.

‘And secondly the limited deployability of serving military personnel.’

Mr Francois said the figures were ‘deeply worrying, especially within the Army’.

‘Not only has the army now shrunk to just over 71,000 soldiers, almost 2,000 below its established strength [but] of those, almost a quarter are not medically fully deployable,’ he told the newspaper.

‘This requires urgent action, not just regarding recruitment and retention but also remedial action, especially physiotherapy, to ensure our remaining soldiers are truly fighting fit.’

MoD statistics from April showed the Army fell below its target size for the first time since it was set, meaning all three service branches are currently below target: the Army by 1 per cent, the Royal Navy by 5 per cent and the RAF by 10 per cent.

Overall, the UK Armed Forces were 5,440 personnel (1 per cent) below target.

An MoD spokesperson said: ‘The vast majority of our service personnel – around 90 per cent – are deployable at any point, with most of the remaining members of our Armed Forces employed in wider military roles.

‘We are committed to providing world-class medical treatment to ensure personnel can return to duty where possible, or to support their transition to civilian life.’