Month: September 2015

Fears over Army targeting deprived schools debated by AMs

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Concerns over how many visits army officers make to schools in deprived areas will be debated by assembly members on Wednesday.

In June, a cross-party committee suggested visits to schools in poorer areas were “disproportionate”.

Plaid AM Bethan Jenkins said young people should have “fair access to all different career opportunities”.

The Ministry of Defence said the Armed Forces did not “recruit” in schools, but did visit if they were invited.

Ms Jenkins, a member of the assembly’s Petitions Committee, told BBC Wales: “I think it’s a concern because we have to allow for young people to be given the opportunity to have fair access to all different career opportunities.

“I think that focusing on one particular employment should be worrying for anybody, because we should be encouraging our young people to aspire to the best they can do, and not everybody will suit a career in the army.”

Not binding

The committee held an inquiry after receiving a petition from a group promoting peace. Cymdeithas y Cymod, the Fellowship of Reconciliation, called for the practice of army officers visiting schools to end.

The committee’s report recommended that the Welsh government “considers whether further research is needed into the reasons for the apparently disproportionate number of visits to schools in areas of relatively high deprivation”.… Read more

Visits to schools by BAE Systems and the RAF

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Evidence suggests that the BAE Systems-RAF team that visits primary and secondary schools ostensibly to encourage students to take an interest in Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths, gives students a sanitised, glamourised image of both BAE and the RAF.

A video suggests that the arms company BAE Systems’ team that, in partnership with RAF Careers, visits primary and secondary schools, ostensibly to encourage students to take an interest in Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths, gives students a sanitised, glamourised image of both employers during their visits to schools.

The repeated mentions on the team’s Twitter feed of ‘@RAF_Recruitment’ further undermine the military’s assertions that their ‘schools engagement’ is not ‘recruitment’.… Read more

ForcesWatch welcomes Welsh Government stance over military visits to schools

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The Welsh Government has been praised by ForcesWatch over a “groundbreaking” decision to support in principle more research into how the armed forces operate in secondary schools in Wales.

The Welsh Government has been praised by ForcesWatch over a “groundbreaking” decision to support in principle more research into how the armed forces operate in secondary schools in Wales.

The formal response in Cardiff was the result of an investigation and report by the Assembly’s Petition’s Committee which called for further scrutiny ‘into the reasons for the unevenness of the armed forces visits to schools in Wales’ (2)(3).

The Welsh Government acknowledges ‘the unique nature of the armed forces as a career’. Other recommendations – also accepted by the Government – called for:

  • Ensuring ‘guidance in relation to inviting the armed forces into schools take account of their unique nature as a career and the need to encourage an open and honest exchange of views with pupils about their role’.
  • ‘That a diverse range of business and employers visits schools to provide pupils with information about the career opportunities they offer’.

Submissions to the Petitions Committee came from a wide range of individuals and organisations including a number raising concerns about the nature and purpose of armed forces visits to schools in Wales such as the former Children’s Commissioner for Wales, Keith Towler.… Read more

Government Cadet Programme Cynically Targeting the Poor

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“The Tory Government are preying on school children in some of our most deprived areas by setting up more and more military cadet units as a step to recruiting them into the armed forces.”

Labour MP, Alex Cunningham, a longstanding and vocal critic of the recruitment of children into the British army, is worried that young people may be pressured into joining such units and find themselves on a career path they never really wanted.

He has described as cynical the recent announcement that the Cadet Expansion Programme is to focus primarily on state schools in less affluent areas where, through no fault of their own, young people may not have the opportunities those in other areas enjoy as a right.

Britain continues to actively recruit 16-year-olds into its armed forces, and Alex has warned that measures in the Government’s recent Budget aimed at expanding this outdated practice risk not only further isolation on the international stage but betraying the best interests of our young people while misallocating resources in the process.

The UK is the only EU state that recruits from age 16, and is similarly alone amongst the five permanent members of the UN Security Council. Yet, while such a policy has been criticised in parliamentary committees, as well as at the UN and by human rights groups, churches and unions alike, the Chancellor recently pledged £50 million to expand the Combined Cadet Force programme into 500 state schools.… Read more