National Service

Captain Grover said:

I've never understood this notion that putting teenagers into the military builds character, or gives you 'real world skills'.

I have family who are career military and they found it was a great way to learn a lot of skills that would be difficult to get in civilian life without money or access.

There were things like getting a driving license (my nephew gained up to the HGV license which has obvious use outside the military), training on vehicle maintenance, sapper skills (civil engineering in a very hands on way), electronics (admittedly a bit niche now) and IT skills.

There are typically lots of other avenues this opens up if you want to develop skills while being paid although this needs more than the part time conscription model to access, but it is now open to you.

Captain Grover said:

Even worse, the idea of sending troubled or anti-social teenagers into the military.

I often wonder if this would be a good way for so many of our snowflake generation to learn the importance of discipline, whether self or imposed and that there are a lot of positives in spite of the negatives.

Captain Grover said:

Sure, let's teach them how to kill people. 

There is almost an unheard of thing in the military these days, certainly for any European army.

If push comes to shove and we get into a conventional war then we need to send someone off to do this horrible job and who better than those who society has invested least in so far. This is how politicians will view it.

Who should we send? They need to be fit, maleable and dispensible. Can you think of any other group who would be fit for purpose here?

Iain said:

the government don't have any money (they never do) so they need to use ours

Well indeed. 

And that's why we currently have the highest tax burden in 70 years - it's about 37% I believe. 

The kind of regressive thinking that seems to define conservative thinkers. I've never understood this notion that putting teenagers into the military builds character, or gives you 'real world skills'. Even worse, the idea of sending troubled or anti-social teenagers into the military. Sure, let's teach them how to kill people. 

It's just another attempt to use vacuous nostalgia for 'our lost Britain' as a vote-harvester. 

Pegg said:

A National Service tax would be levied on parents to pay for it. 

That is exactly how it works - the government don't have any money (they never do) so they need to use ours.

Caelus said:

because its bait for votes.

Exactly what it is.

If enacted, it would be unrecognizable from the votes catching rhetoric. 

We'd have 30k (probably less in reality) of 'the brightest and the best' placed in non-combat training. We could expect these 18 year olds to be privately educated.

The rest would work for free in the care sector.

A National Service tax would be levied on parents to pay for it. 

because its bait for votes.....  the rwanda stuff too only will happen when you vote in the tories.

see? .... have all these ideas and plans, hey, if you want them, you have to first vote us in and ensure were gonna stay in power.... if not... labour wont do any of this... basically... its all just vote nonsense... then theres a chance they wont do any of it when you vote them in anyway lol 

I think it’s a good idea but why does it have to take so long. It will help people find employment and could possibly help tackle anti social behaviour. What I want to know is why do these things take so long if someone says they want to do something then do it.

i dunno, i think when chav culture was at its peak i think we all likely thought national service would whip the unruly troublesome kids into shape and discipline them lol

which was the basis of the tv programme "bad lads army"

Old person here. I think the idea is an absolute travesty.

To be fair, Brussels imposing straight cucumbes on us was sorted out a few years back now with a thing called Brexit.

Our cultural destruction and demographic replacement are now so "baked in" that "right wing" (or even centrist!)  fear has long since been replaced with despair and disengagement. 

We already have reasonable levels of public services, the problem is the "quality" of those services has been allowed to plummet across the board.

Buying more rubbish quality people and kit led by self serving and ineffectvive "management" ain't going to cut it either. 

This country neither "produces" nor "steals" effectively any more, and has been effectively selling all it's assets since 1980. The "reckoning" (I believe) won't be long now...  

its definately a attempt to get the older vote as every old person i ever met always says "they should bring back national service" lol my parents said that too.

ME, I'd like to do 2 days in service to my nation, for a pro-rata univeral basic income based on what a current 60 year old government service worker doing similar work gets on average.

I could live on that, and would have a sense of being involved in a positive way. 

We have to be careful with the concept of "National service". The military concept of "basic training", involves heavy psychological manipulation and conditiioning, that makes good order followers but that will not work for all types and do we really want a nation of order followers? 

It only takes the wrong person to give the wrong order and teh devoted "rder followers" are all suddenly doing bad or stupid things...

Heck, just a couple of years ago the "order followers" wanted people like me herded off to special camps... 

My not quite old enough to vote son has stated who he would not vote for based on this alone.

If people volunteer down the non military route, will there be enough places for them and won't the training and skills needed take longer than a year to acquire? It's being proposed that the RNLI and search and rescue teams should take these conscripts, oh, sorry volunteers, how many will live by the sea or the Thames? How many will live near mountains or moorland? How many will have the equipment such as decent boots, waterproofs etc to be able to even start on such tasks? How many will be casualties themselves and need rescuing?

In support of National Service, David Cameron said it would be good for people to put something back into their communities. I doubt he even understands what 'community' means. Rich people trying to convince poor people to vote against their own interests. The same old tale.

The Tories already had problems with their almost zero appeal to younger voters. They have obviously given up any hope in reversing this situation and are scrabbling to wrest the Little Englander, geriatric vote from the hands of [ insert current name of fascist-light party - UKIP, Brexit, Falange, Reform - whatever ]. I didn't think the Tory Party could drop any lower in my estimation, and yet they managed it. Hopefully, they have made themselves unelectable for a generation - we need a PR electoral system.

The far right demagogues only work through fear, they play on fears of foreigners in little boats, of people 'talking foreign' on the bus, the fear that Brussels will impose straight cucumbers on us, the fear that reasonable levels of public services will mean more taxation etc., etc. I much prefer hope, hope that things will improve, if only a little.

This is less a 'plan' than an off-the-cuff gimmick aimed at Reform voters. It's damage limitation. 

That said, a future Tory government may well introduce a form of 'National Service'- but what they'd really be interested in here is less the 30k joining the armed forces every year than the c.700k forced to work for free. 

Procuring cheap or free labour to further bolster the profits of the private sector is a government plan. 

I fully expect that it won't actually be implemented. Especially if they're basically saying that they'll force people to do it.

I think we should make a rule that anyone calling for National Service should do it themselves first.

Do you believe everything you read in celeb collums? Like I said you do make me laugh.