As the size of the armed forces steadily shrinks, the number of Whitehall officials is on the increase, according to “extraordinary” new figures that show there are now more civil servants in the Ministry of Defence than there are service personnel in the Royal Navy and RAF combined.
Figures released by the MoD show that in April there were 63,702 civilians working in the department, an increase of 6 per cent from 2020 when there were 60,256.
The size of the full-time, trained army has shrunk to 72,510 — the smallest since the Napoleonic era — and John Healey, the defence secretary, has warned it will be even slimmer by next year, when it is projected to dip below 70,000.
There are 28,840 trained members of the Royal Navy and Royal Marines, and 28,420 trained members of the RAF, taking the combined total to 57,260, fewer than the number of civil servants, according to the latest statistics from April this year.
The Conservatives had planned last year to slash the numbers of civil servants in the MoD by as many as 3,000 to save money. However, Lord Coaker, Labour’s defence minister in the Lords, said the figures had increased since then.
Lord Lee of Trafford, a defence minister in the 1980s and Liberal Democrat peer who uncovered the figures, pointed out there were now nearly as many civil servants in the MoD as there were soldiers and officers in the army.
He said: “We have ended up in a situation where there are 63,000 civil servants employed when the army itself is only 72,000 strong. I can’t think of a large private sector firm that hasn’t, through efficiencies and modern telecommunication, reduced their headcount and yet in the MoD, it has actually increased.
“The whole thing is extraordinarily lopsided and surely it’s time to take a really hard look at these [figures].”
He said that if the number of civilians were reduced then the department would have “more money to spend on the sharper end in terms of equipment and accommodation for the forces, which is in a pretty deplorable state”.
The figure for MoD civilians excludes short-term employees, contractors and those individuals working for non-departmental public bodies. The number included part-time employees, and the figure for MoD civilian personnel working full-time hours was lower at 61,616, more than the number of trained RAF and Royal Navy personnel combined.
A defence source pointed out that if the figures included untrained RAF and Royal Navy personnel then there would be 62,229 personnel in total, 563 more than the number of full-time civil servants.
Mike Clancy, general secretary of the Prospect trade union, which represents civil servants, said: “These numbers do not tell the full story. Civil servants working in defence have never been asked to do more, whether that is working on our assistance to Ukraine or delivering the replacement of our nuclear deterrent.
“It is painfully clear our armed forces are too small. It doesn’t, though, automatically follow that we have too many people supporting them in the civil service.”
Overall, civil servant numbers have increased from 384,230 in 2016 to 510,665 full-time equivalent staff in March this year. The Conservatives had pledged last October to reduce the service to pre-pandemic levels.
However, Treasury officials confirmed in August that the “headcount cap will be lifted” to cut the reliance on consultants.
Labour has not yet announced whether it plans to increase the size of the armed forces because of the continuing defence review.
Ministers have not ruled out boosting army numbers at the end of the process, which will conclude by June next year. Yet the steady decrease in troop numbers has been by default in recent years, rather than design. Militaries across the world are struggling to recruit youngsters, although the UK also has a problem with persuading military personnel to stay.
The Times revealed on Monday how troops were threatening to quit the armed forces as a result of Labour’s plans to impose VAT on private school fees, a policy change that will affect more than 4,000 children of military personnel.
