Daft, Damaging and Demoralising

Addressing the Royal United Services Institute in London, Mr Hammond said in future there would be greater use of part-time reserves and private contractors.

The British Army is being cut from 102,000 soldiers to 82,000 under SDSR and today Mr Hammond said: "A regular Army of 82,000 will have a different structure to one of 102,000. And some units inevitably will be lost or will merge."

He said in future there would be greater use of part-time reserves and private contractors and it would mean "thinking innovatively about how combat service support is provided" and "using more systematically the skills available in the reserves and from our contractors".

As we continue to see on a daily basis the demands on our armed forces do not diminish and they deserve support that is capable of supporting them on the front line.

Our armed forces are the best of the best, yet this announcement smacks of being the cheapest of the cheap.

Our armed forces put their lives on the line and the government should be supporting them with dedicated resources that retain delivery and risk management within the Ministry of Defence.

If the government is serious about supporting the front line it should review how many non deployable personnel posts could be filled by civil servants which on average could reduce costs by a third. End the use of expensive private sector contracts that deliver nothing above or beyond what can be delivered in-house and finally stop political based cuts that are decimating our defence capability as well as jobs in some of the most remote and economically poor areas of this country.

We want our armed forces to be the best of best and this can be achieved by them being supported by military and civilian staff.

Daft, Damaging and Demoralising sums up the latest announcement.