Page:Hansard (UK) - Vol 566 No. 40 August 29th 2013.pdf/97

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Mr Francois: In 2007, the Ministry of Defence (MOD), excluding its Trading Funds, began to operate centrally administered manpower substitution contracts which provide MOD business units with access to short-term staff known as agency workers. These arrangements provide placements at agreed fixed rates on a national basis, thereby offering benefits to the entire Department. The first centralised contracts provided clerical/ administrative and secretarial agency workers. This has expanded over time to a centralised Manpower Substitution Service (MSS) owned by Defence Business Services (DBS) which also encompasses the provision of interim professionals (including HR, finance and audit, project and programme management and procurement), specialist IT workers, health care and dental grades and Skill Zone workers, drivers and security guards.

The information held centrally on the MOD’s MSS database reflects this broadening of scope. It records the number of centrally-held individual manpower substitution contracts rather than the number of different agency staff who may have worked within MOD. The database used to capture this information was set up in late 2007 and therefore full data from financial year 2007-08 is unavailable. These data do not capture pre-existing locally arranged contracts, which business units may have had with recruitment agencies prior to the introduction of the new mandatory centralised arrangements, nor locally organised manpower substitution arrangements for temporary staff outside of the groups mentioned.

A calculation of the number of days worked could be provided only at disproportionate cost.

Mr Francois: The information is not held in the format requested. However, we do hold information on the number of veterans who are in receipt of a war pension under the War Pension Scheme (WPS) or have since April 2005 been awarded compensation under the Armed Forces Compensation Scheme (AFCS) for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) that has been attributed to service.

As at 31 March 2013 (the latest date for which WPS and AFCS data are available) 6,200 ex-service personnel were in receipt of a war pension for PTSD and 185 ex-service personnel had been awarded compensation as a result of a post-service claim under the AFCS for PTSD, The term “medical auxiliary” does not correspond to any category for which data are available.

In accordance with the Defence Statistics rounding policy the WPS and AFCS figures have been rounded to the nearest five.

Mr Francois: The Ministry of Defence (MOD) does not currently have specific information on the number of suicide and open verdict deaths among veterans who served in Afghanistan.

The MOD has commissioned a study on veterans of Operations Telic (Iraq) and Herrick (Afghanistan). This will monitor the causes of death (including suicide) of all members of the armed forces who served in the period from 2003 (the start of operations in Iraq) until the end of operations in Afghanistan. The intention is to run the study for the lifetime of the cohort; therefore the population will include both serving personnel and veterans. It is hoped that the initial results of this study will be published next year.

In 2006 the MOD commissioned research from Manchester university to investigate the level of suicide amongst those leaving the UK armed forces over the period 1996 to 2005, and to make comparisons with matched personnel remaining in-service and the general population. This work was published in March 2009. The study found that, taking all age groups together, the risk of suicide was no higher than in the general community.

Matthew Hancock: The Department does not hold this information.

Elizabeth Truss: The information requested is not held centrally and could be provided only at disproportionate cost. In common with other Government Departments, the annual report and accounts for the Department for Education, which are available in the Libraries of both Houses, contain information on supplier payment performance.