130. Although a period of stand-down was ordered, the Corps was not completely disbanded because it was considered that the ROC must continue as an essential component of the defence system. Cabinet approval was given for the Corps to be re-formed in January 1947 and Air Commodore the Earl of Bandon CB DSO who had been appointed Commandant of the Corps in November 1945, drew upon a considerable number of wartime observers to form the nucleus around which the Corps was re-formed. During the next two years the ROC was reorganised on geographical lines similar to those existing at the end of the war.

131. On 1 February 1949 Air Commodore R B Jordan CB DFC ADC was appointed Commandant ROC on relinquishment of the appointment by Air Commodore the Earl of Bandon.

132. On 1 March 1950 the Air Officer Commanding in Chief, Fighter Command assumed administrative control of the Corps. Under this change Headquarters Royal Observer Corps continued to operate in its existing form and assumed a status comparable with that of a fighter group headquarters.

133. On 11 April 1950 in recognition of the Corps' record of service during the twenty-five years of its existence, His Majesty King George VI honoured the Corps by becoming its first Air Commodore in Chief.

134. On 20 March 1951 Air Commodore G H Vasse CBE was appointed to succeed Air Commodore Jordan as Commandant of the Corps.

135. Early in 1953 it was decided that the area covered by the Corps should be extended to include Northern Ireland and, as a result of this decision, a new group was formed with headquarters at Belfast.

136. On 1 June 1953 it was announced that Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, on the occasion of her Coronation, had assumed the appointment of Air Commodore in Chief, Royal Observer Corps.

137. For some years it had been appreciated that the ever-increasing operating speeds of service aircraft would necessitate a revision of the operational layout of the Corps in order to maintain efficiency. Accordingly, a reorganisation of the Corps was brought into effect on 1 November 1953.

138. The main purposes of this reorganisation were to:

a. Rearrange group and area boundaries to conform with the revised boundaries of Fighter Command sectors.

b. Improve the handover of tracks from group to group by increasing the size of groups and providing additional facilities.

139. The rearrangement of area boundaries necessitated the splitting of Midland Area into two; namely Northern and Eastern Areas. At the same time Southern Area was renamed Metropolitan Area, Western became Southern and North-Western became Western; thus the names of these areas became the same as those of the Fighter Command sectors to which they were affiliated. Scottish Area, however, retained its original name although its boundaries coincided with those of Caledonian Sector.

140. The increase in size of groups could only be effected by reducing the number from 40 (including the new Northern Ireland Group) to 31. The operations rooms at Maidstone, Lincoln, Bury St Edmunds, Cambridge, Gloucester, Cardiff, Wrexham and Dunfermline were therefore declared redundant and became secondary operations rooms with facilities for training a reserve of personnel who, in the event of emergency, could operate at the parent operations room. In addition the wartime operations rooms of York 9 and York 10 were combined and the premises used by York 10 become the headquarters of the new Northern Area.

141. Concurrently with these alterations, new facilities were introduced to improve track handover. These took the form of post clusters arranged to straddle group boundaries, whose reports could be received simultaneously by the two or more groups concerned, or of open liaison lines between groups so that fast-flying aircraft could be "talked over" the group boundary.

142. On 29 March 1954 Air Commodore J H T Simpson DSO AFC was appointed to succeed Air Commodore Vasse as Commandant of the Corps.