‘Constant battle’ for British Navy

The captain of Britain’s biggest and most powerful warship has said it would be lovely if the Royal Navy had an extra 10,000 personnel.

With more than 32,000 people making up the fulltime force of the Royal Navy and Royal Marines, Captain Jerry Kyd said retention and recruitment is a “constant battle”.

As aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth was anchored off the island of Manhattan for a week-long New York visit, Captain Kyd said he would like to grow the size of the Navy over the coming years.

“This again is why we are looking at innovative manning,” he said.

“It is a constant battle – you have to have a strategy which balances your ends, ways and means.

“It would be lovely if we had another 10,000 people in the Navy... we are OK, we are balanced, we are getting back into balance.

“What is probably the most challenging is making sure there is balance across the different branches of the Navy.”

Commodore Mike Utley, the commander of the UK Carrier Strike Group, said the armed forces need highly qualified, highly motivated people – and they are also usually attractive to industry.

“We are in competition, it is a marketplace,” he said, but added that the global deployments on offer, as well as new ships, aircraft carriers and F-35 jets, are a draw.