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Reuters AlertNet - UK may have to cut 30,000 from armed forces-think tank
Something I expect we will see announced by more and more European countries struggling to balance their budgets. Good or bad the military is probably the easiest government program to cut to any significant degree for politicians to make (US excepted)
Something I expect we will see announced by more and more European countries struggling to balance their budgets. Good or bad the military is probably the easiest government program to cut to any significant degree for politicians to make (US excepted)
Britain may have to reduce its military personnel by 30,000 to achieve estimated defence budget cuts of 15 percent over the next four years, an influential think tank said on Friday.
Defence is a prime candidate for cuts as the new Conservative-Liberal Democrat government searches for savings to reduce a budget deficit of around 11 percent of economic output.
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All non-protected departments have to find savings of 25 percent in real terms over the next four years. Details of cuts will be set out in a spending review on October 20.
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"Even so, given the high proportion of unprotected expenditure that they consume, neither education nor defence will be able to avoid severe reductions over the next four years."
Chalmers estimated personnel numbers would need to fall by about 15 percent, to 240,000 from 283,000, to meet the necessary reduction in spending. If spread proportionately this would mean a 30,000 cut in military personnel and a reduction in civilian personnel numbers of around 13,000, he said