Recruiting can best be described as the steps taken to attract sufficient men and women of the right quality to meet the Army's personnel requirements. Selection is the process that is carried out to ensure that those who are accepted into the Army have the potential to be good soldiers and are capable of being trained to carry out their chosen trade. Training is the process of preparing those men and women for their careers in the Army. Training is progressive and continues all the way through a soldier's career.

Overview of Army Training

Since the end of the Cold War, the British Army has been cut in size by around a third, and there have been significant changes in the organisation and structure of army training �?and the process of reform continues in 2005. The Adjutant General (Personnel and Training Command) has overall responsibility for army training, and had a budget of over £1.7bn in 2004. Since 1997, the Army Training and Recruiting Agency (ATRA) has been responsible within the Adjutant General (Personnel and Training Command) HQ for the delivery of army recruiting and training.

In 2001, the Defence Training Review (DTR) conducted by the MoD identified possibilities for the rationalisation of defence training on a joint service basis. As one consequence of the review, the Directorate General Training and Education organisation (DG T&E) was launched in September 2002 to provide a much needed central strategy and policy focus to continue the drive for more effective and better value training. Another result was the Defence Training Review Rationalisation Programme. This programme has led to the creation of joint service Federated Defence Training Establishments (DTE), which has already impacted ATRA provision of Phase 2 and Phase 3 army training, and further changes are expected by the end of 2005.

Army Training and Recruiting Agency

The Army Training and Recruiting Agency (ATRA) is responsible for each stage of a potential recruit's progress from the recruiting office, through a Recruit Selection Centre, into recruit training, through specialist courses before they are finally posted to their regiment in the Field Army. The ATRA is headed by the Director General Army Training and Recruiting (DGATR), a Major General who is responsible for ensuring that sufficient men and women of the right quality are recruited to meet the needs of the service.

The ATRA Headquarters is based at Upavon, close to many of the training units. Recruiting is carried out from 123 sites in towns and cities throughout the country and individual training is conducted at some 40 schools. With a permanent staff of about 12,000, the Agency is responsible for Ministry of Defence land, buildings and field assets valued at more than one and a quarter billion pounds.

The annual ATRA budget is between £600-700m from which ATRA is required to enlist about 13,000 recruits and to train a total of about 100,000 officers and soldiers. ATRA conduct almost 1,500 different types of courses, with over 6,000 actual courses run each year. There are an average of 12,000 officers and soldiers under training at any time. Across all training phases, the average annual unit cost of training a soldier or officer was over £16,000 in 2001.

ATRA operations are divided into four inter-related functions: Recruiting, Recruit training (Phase 1), Specialist training (Phase 2), and Career training (Phase 3).

Recruiting

An MoD committee called the Standing Committee Army Manpower Forecasts (SCAMF) calculates the numbers that need to be enlisted to maintain the Army's personnel at the correct level. The Committee needs to take account of changing unit establishments, wastage caused by servicemen and women leaving the service at the end of their engagements, and those who might choose to leave before their engagements come to an end (PVR - Premature Voluntary Release). The number required in each trade in the Army is assessed and figures are published at six monthly intervals so that adjustments may be made during the year.

Within ATRA, the Recruiting Group runs all Army Recruiting from the headquarters in Upavon. Recruiting activities take place all over the country, using the network of 125 Careers Offices, 61 Schools Advisers, 26 Army Youth Teams and 93 Regimental Recruiting Teams, as of 2003. The Commander Recruiting Group (CRG), a Brigadier serving in ATRA, and his staff located throughout the United Kingdom are responsible for the recruiting and selection to meet the personnel targets.

Potential recruits are attracted into the Army in a number of ways including advertisements on the television, on the internet and in the press. Permanently established recruiting teams from many Regiments and Corps tour the country and staff from the Armed Forces Careers Offices (AFCO) and Army Career Information Offices (ACIO) visit schools, youth clubs and job centres. AFCOs and ACIOs are located throughout the UK . There are also Army Careers Advisers who access schools and universities throughout the country. Young, recently trained soldiers are also sent back to their home towns and schools to talk to their friends about life in the Army and are regularly interviewed by the local press.

Annual Army recruiting figures during the recent past are as follows: