Sunday 26th May 2024
Only a few days into the General Election campaign, the Tory party is on tv and online proposing National Service for 18 year olds.
Journalist Victoria Derbyshire, broadcasting about the General Election, has tweeted:
“The Conservative Party says [it] would bring back mandatory national service if it wins the election. 18 yr olds will join the military for 12 months (paid) OR volunteer one weekend every month in the community (unpaid). The Home Secretary James Cleverly said it would get young people “out of their bubble’. What if an 18 yr old refuses? They wouldn’t be criminalised he said – a Royal Commission is proposed to work through that kind of detail.”
Bizarrely, Dr. Andrew Murrison, MP (Conservative), MP for South West Wiltshire (since 2001) and the Parliamentary Under Secretary For Defence, in an answer to a parliamentary question (only three days ago) stated:
“The Government has no current plans to re-introduce National Service. Since 1963, when the last National Servicemen were discharged, it has been the policy of successive Governments that the best way of providing for the defence of our country is by maintaining professional Armed Forces staffed by volunteers. The demanding, increasingly technical nature of defence today is such that we require highly trained, professional men and women in our Regular and Reserve Armed Forces, fully committed to giving their best in defending our country and its allies.”
“If potentially unwilling National Service recruits were to be obliged to serve alongside the professional men and women of our Armed Forces, it could damage morale, recruitment and retention, and would consume professional military and naval resources. If, on the other hand, National Service recruits were kept in separate units, it would be difficult to find a proper and meaningful role for them, potentially harming motivation and discipline. For all these reasons, there are no current plans for the restoration of any form of National Service.”