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Aviation History
1954
1954 - 0760.PDF
344 FLIGHT, 19 March 1954 MANPOWER and MACHINES Points from the Air Estimates Debate: New "Reserve Flights'''1 Scheme Announced SOME disturbing references to the manpower situation in the Royal Air Force were made during the Air Estimates debate, a brief summary of which was given in last week's issue. Mr. George Ward, Under-Secretary for Air, said that by the end of the present financial year 2,800 pilots, navigators and air signallers would have been trained, compared with 2,900 during the previous year. Of this total, 260 pilots and 600 navigators would have been trained in Canada. Great difficulty, however, was being experienced in finding enough aircrew of the required high quality. The rate at which candidates had been coming forward during the past year had dropped from 14,000 in 1952 to 7,000 in 1953. Unless there was a considerable improvement, there would not be sufficient numbers of trained aircrew in two years' time. The main reason for this decline was, perhaps, that the Air Force was in keen competition with industry, commerce, and the professions for the young men of the very high quality needed today. Several definite steps had been taken to reverse die present trend. Firsdy, there was the Cranwell Scholarship Scheme, announced last November; response had been good, but it was too early to make a final judgment. For the first competition there had been over 300 applications from 216 different schools of all types and from all over Great Britain. It was expected that 40 per cent of future vacancies at Cranwell each year would be filled by these boys. Secondly, the old short-service commissioning policy had been revised. For a start it was intended to change the name "short- service commission," which was now a misnomer. In future, all officers entering the G.D. Branch would come in initially on a 12-year "direct-entry commission." Air. Ward then reviewed the principal points of the new scheme; these we summarized on p. 283 of our last week's issue. In regard to ground personnel, continued Mr. Ward, total num bers were just about equal to establishment, but there was still an unbalance between the various trades and a general lack of experience among die advanced tradesmen. Under the measures recendy announced in the White Paper on Service Emoluments, it was hoped to restore the balance by offering N.C.O.s and tech nicians greater inducements to prolong their service, and to give greater recognition to long service, skill and experience. For ground reservists it had been decided to introduce a scheme of Reserve Flights under which officers and airmen would be allotted to specific RA.F. stations at home, which would generally be their war-time stations and at which they would do their train ing in peace-time. Each of these Reserve Flights would include all classes of reserve, volunteers, ex-Regulars and National Service men. It was expected that 70 per cent more Class H and 30 per cent more Class E reservists would be affected by the scheme, which, together with the decision to call-up reservists for Civil Defence training, represented the first two phases of a four-phase operation for the call-up of all reservists. Points made in the debate that followed are summarized below. MR. ARTHUR HENDERSON (Lab., Rowley Regis and Tipton) referred to the fact that it was three years since the new fighter types were ordered. It was evident that the policy of super-priority had not been as effective as the Government expected. He made a spirited plea on behalf of the light fighter as a component part of a mixed fighter force. He welcomed the direct-entry commission proposal, but thought it had been a mistake to stop training National Servicemen as pilots and navigators. G/C. C. A. B. WILCOCK (Lab., Derby North) suggested that the most important factor of the defence problem was the provision of the right kind of manpower for the R.A.F. He thought improvements could be made in the conditions of overseas service, and suggested that the policy of providing overseas married quarters should be discontinued, and a rotation system substituted whereby every married man was sent back to the United Kingdom within 12 months of leaving it. He thought the entire policy of the Air Ministry and the Government on Reserves had been "tragically wrong." A well-trained organization had been broken up, including 30 flying training schools which could have provided 500 or 1,000 trained pilots in one year, as opposed to the 200 trained in Canada this year. W/C. N. J. HULBERT (Con., Stockport North) suggested, however, that it might well be that, as a result of the technical advance in training and the complexity of modern aircraft, such schools could not now fulfil a useful purpose. He hoped the Service staffs would very shortly crystallize their ideas about helicopters and raise their operational requirements so that those firms which were interested in helicopter development would be able to forge ahead and count on the co-operation and the real willingness of the R.A.F. and thus ensure that Great Britain took the lead in this new and latest development in airmanship. MR. CHARLES IAN ORR-EWING (Con., Hendon North) wondered why the Ministry of Supply order for 20 Beverleys had not been placed more quickly. If it was the case that no particular Service was anxious to carry the order on its_ Vote, perhaps the Ministry of Defence could carry the financial responsibility for transport aircraft. W/C. ERIC BULLUS (Con., Wembley North) stressed that the standards of pilot training should not be relaxed, and was reassured that the high standard of selection had resulted in a lessening of the aircraft wastage rates. W/C. P. B. LUCAS (Con., Brentford and Chiswick) suggested that, in noting the establishment of a strategic bomber force, it was appro priate to remember the foresight of Lord Trenchard, who had never ceased to advance and advocate the principle of such a force. DR. REGINALD BENNETT (Con., Gosport and Fareham) said that some arrangement should be made between the Air Ministry, the other Ministries concerned, and the civil airline operators, by which a fleet of commercial aircraft could be kept in full operation, hired from the Ministry if necessary, but available on call when required for the use of Transport Command. He could see no other economical way in which the R.A.F. could be equipped with a sufficiency of transport aircraft for the Jobs it had to do, not only for itself but for the other fighting Services. MR. EDWARD SHACKLETON (Lab., Preston South), referring to the recruitment of aircrew through Cranwell and other channels, said that quite a number of young men were persuaded to give up their career prospects in civil life by the hopes of a good career in the Air Force without even being told that a fairly high proportion of them were going to be failed on the way. So far it had not been considered in the Dublic interest to give the numbers who had failed, but he thought it only fair for a prospective employer to indicate to a prospective employee that the prospects of attaining the job for which he was training were not as rosy as appeared at first sight. MR. DUDLEY WILLIAMS (Con., Exeter) commended the Folland Gnat, and said it might well be in the same position as the Mosquito, which was produced originally as a private venture. The real difficulty was that the Air Staff was absolutely obsessed with the importance of the inter- cepter, whereas the United States saw the fighter problem as requiring two different types of aeroplane—an intercepter, and a type called the "air-superiority fighter," for tactical ground support and other duties. Great interest had been displayed in the Folland project, and there was a grave danger that a similar machine might be built and developed in America. As a result, it might well be that, instead of a British fighter being built under licence on the Continent—with all the advantages that it had as an additional export—the Continental factories might take over the American fighter. MR. TOHN STRACHEY (Lab., Dundee West) whose remarks about the need for a strategic bomber force were subject to frequent interruption by some of his more politically minded colleagues, also stressed the import ance of Army co-operation aircraft for use in "limited" wars. MR. GEOFFREY DE FREITAS (Lab., Lincoln) hoped the same mistake would not be made with the V-class bombers as with the Lancaster, Stirling and Halifax, and asked for an assurance that the Air Ministry and Ministry of Supply would go into production immediately with the type known to be the best. He said he had been really shocked to learn what had haoo-ned during an exercise held six months ago under the auspices of NATO. The allegation had been made that the Sabres were nearly all grounded because there were no helmets for their pilots, and that communications broke down comoletely so that pilots sat at the end of the runways, in many cases waiting'for "scramble" orders which never came at all. | In winding up this part of the debate—which later continued until just before 7 a.m.—Mr. George Ward said that, in deciding the make-up of a fighter force, the question of versatility was extremely important both for Fighter Command and for the R.A.F. squadrons in 2nd T.A.F. In this connection, the light fighter was bound, if it remained really light, to be less versatile than the current types and its adoption would mean the sacrifice of such qualities as range and hitting power. Further, it was a fact that the light fighter could not be put into service until the equipment with current swept-wing types had been completed. It might be, however, that some NATO countries would feel that their needs were different from ours. Dealing with the Reserve position, he said that certain pro posals were under consideration for forming Class H reservists into reserve units of the R.A.F. Reeiment and training them as such. He estimated that about 70,000 Class H reservists would be called up each year when all the various schemes were in operation. Mr. Ward then dealt with the problem of under-spending and forecast that his Department would be underspent on the 1953-54 Estimate by a little less than £20,000,000. Apart from various accelerated deliveries and economies, this had been due to various set-backs during the year, mainly on aircraft, bombs and ammuni tion, and radio and radar. To a limited extent this had set back our rearmament programme for the front line, and had had some slight effect on the provision of reserves.
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