Mr. Chair, it depends really on the occupation in which the individual is enrolled, but basic recruit training is standard. It's 13 weeks for a private and I think about 11 or 12 weeks for an officer candidate.
After that, there are a number of factors that determine how long it takes to get qualified. First is the length of occupational training. Normally it's about six months or so, but in some occupations, highly technical ones, the training can last as much as a year or more. In certain officer occupations, for example, to become fully qualified as a maritime surface officer, it will take several years. Essentially you have to be capable of running the ship on the watch.
The other factor that determines how long it takes to complete training is training capacity and scheduling. To give you an example, at present the air force has a small shortage in its pilot occupation, trained pilots--about 300 or so, 250 approximately. But there are over 500 pilot trainees in the training pipeline. We can't just push them through any faster. There's a training capacity constraint there.
So it is variable, but in many cases people are fully qualified about a year after they've joined, usually, or a year and a half after they've joined.