Focus on accommodation in drive to prevent Armed Forces personnel from leaving

Some military personnel are still living in unsatisfactory accommodation and that has to change if they are to stay serving in the Armed Forces, the Defence Procurement Minister has warned.

James Cartlidge told Forces News: "We ask a lot of our Armed Forces. Ultimately they are there ready to risk their lives for this country.

"We have to offer them accommodation to the appropriate standard - and we have too often not had the appropriate standard."

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"In Our Command Paper Refresh we announced another £400m of investment in service family accommodation - and what we've announced today is the detail of how that money is going to be spent.

"So what it means for individual families - investment into their homes to bring them up to a better standard."

He added: "When I have visited [military housing], officers have been very open in showing me the best and the worst and that is SFA [Service Family Accommodation] and SLA [Single Living Accommodation]."

Mr Cartlidge said there was no "silver bullet to fix the whole estate at once", but pointed out how repairs and maintenance were now a priority.

He explained: "I'm committed to improving all our accommodation as a top priority because as we said in the Command Paper, we have really got to focus on our people.

"We've  got to focus on retention ensuring that yes ... we want to have good quality equipment, we want to have the platforms, whether it's ships, whether it's tanks et cetera.

"But actually what we want to focus on is our people - and that means the accommodation that they live in." 

He was speaking as Defence Secretary Grant Shapps announced that service families would see thousands of military homes modernised over the next two years, with much of the contract work already allocated ahead of the winter period.