The Government are being very short sighted about the TA. They bring valuable experience and skills to the army. I was in the Intelligence Corps where there was a brain surgeon, accountant, solicitor along with people from many different backgrounds bringing important skills into the regular army. It is a very cost effective way of bringing in outside talent and we worked alongside the regulars doing the same job but only get paid for the days worked plus a small bounty. For instance, a TA Private gets £40.95 a day, a Captain £91.25, the Annual Bounty depends on how many years service, ranging from £405 in the first year to the maximum of £1596 after 5 years. The minimum amount of training days are 27 for a Regional unit and 19 for National Units so you can see how cost effective is when there are no pensions provided and TA soldiers still have to pay tax and national insurance. They are also expected to be deployed to areas of operation including Afghanistan where they work alongside regular soldiers, in many cases doing the same job, there are 500 reservists at the moment.

Training is extremely important and needs to be consistent to keep up military skills, and the commitment of any TA individual to being a soldier is huge, it dominates their lives and they are happy to train extra hard in their own time to make sure that they are physically fit but they do need continual well structured training to make sure that they are battle fit too.

This Government must recognise the contribution of the TA and pay for their training accordingly if they are to be perform their valuable role in backing up our armed forces.