LONDON (AP) — British army reservists will get military pensions and other benefits as part of a government bid to boost reserve numbers, the U.K. defense secretary said.

The proposals unveiled by Philip Hammond — which include rebranding the Territorial Army as the Army Reserve — come as Britain cuts its regular army from 100,000 to just over 80,000 soldiers and increases its fullytrained army reservists to 30,000 from around 19,000 by 2018.

Hammond told lawmakers that the government will invest about 1.8 billion pounds ($2.7 billion) during the next 10 years in the reserves.

“The job we are asking our reservists to do is changing,” he said, calling such moves key to ensuring Britain’s future military capabilities, and noting that organization and training must evolve as well.

Some lawmakers questioned whether the plans were realistic. Conservative Party lawmaker Bob Stewart said he was “slightly pessimistic” about the reserves increasing since recruitment “has not been great” over the last year.

Hammond acknowledged that the plans were not without risk, but said the government did not have the “luxury” to maintain current numbers.

“We have no plan B,” he said. “We will deliver these reserve numbers.”

Hammond announced further training and plans to bring forward some 40 million pounds of investment in new equipment for reservists.

New incentives will be offered to small- and mediumsized businesses to support their reservist employees, along with upgraded vacation and pension entitlements to improve overall reservists’ compensation.