WE really need to be far more discerning about what we hear from politicians at all times, but especially during campaigns.
Now we’d need to be maths teachers to make the numbers add up on any policy initiative, but even the most cursory glance at the new “national service” initiative shows both how cynical politicians can be and how gullible we are to swallow what is said. Frankly I’m no longer sure who to be most disappointed with, the politicians, the journalists who provide the oxygen for this nonsense or the public who don’t consign this stuff for cat litter use.
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If it really was a plan, there would be some 750,000 18-year-olds across the whole UK – EVERY YEAR – to accommodate in this new national service. This is significantly more than twice as large as the total number of ALL three services AND the combine police services AND fire brigades of the whole UK added together, which is a little over 331,000.
The 30,000 who are supposedly going to the military EACH YEAR is three times the annual training entry of an already stretched military and is actually bigger than the entire RAF, which is currently a little over 28,000.
Just thinking of these 30,000 “volunteers” for military support – where exactly are they going to go and how will they be equipped and who will train them??
WATCH: The people of Glasgow react to Tory plans for national service
Even if you could do anything useful with a group of 30,000 EACH YEAR, what will you do USEFULLY with the other 720,000 – each and every year?
The £2.5 billion budget considered wouldn’t touch the sides.
In practice this is just like Humza’s promise to take the the block of the Gender Recognition Reform Act to the Supreme Court or Labour promising to reform the Lords over decades. It will be consigned to the “too difficult or too expensive” bin immediately after the election.
All he has actually promised is a Royal Commission to examine whether it’s a practical proposition. The numbers above already show that its not. If there is still doubt, let’s get a class of 18-years-olds to run a class discussion for a couple of hours, and their group presentation will nail this nonsense in a heartbeat.
Gus McSkimming
North Ayrshire
THE announcement by the Conservatives that they would, if re-elected, reintroduce conscription is another sign of the pathetic state of political discourse at Westminster.
The British Army, already much diminished in numbers, is not geared up to train the numbers involved; nor are the over-stretched public services ready to accommodate the weekend “volunteers” who opt for the community work option. It is impractical.
READ MORE: Tory minister rejected plans for national service days before pledge
So is the Rwanda scheme, which, despite not actually being implemented yet, has already cost millions of pounds from the public purse. It is fantasy, but so was the Conservative 2019 manifesto commitment to build 40 new hospitals and recruit thousand of GPs – which no-one speaks about these days.
Oh, and perhaps Sunak might want to explain why it was a Conservative government that ended national service previously.
Gavin Brown
Linlithgow
IT seems to me that Boris Johnson has left more than a legacy of lies and more lies. It is the fact that some of the Westminster government appear to totally ignore the old-fashioned way of traditional parliamentary behaviour.
The apparent “sudden discovery” of the lack of any written Westminster government constitution whatsoever allowed Johnson to behave in the way we have all come to recognise, and we are now very familiar with.
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We also have Prime Minister Rishi Sunak making decisions and policies without reference to the rest of the House of Commons, making all those MPs outwith the governing body virtually obsolete.
Now we have the unelected Foreign Secretary, Lord David Cameron, flying to Albania and back in a private jet costing us taxpayers £60,000. Apparently, his visit was to the Albanian capital Tirana. What for remains a question.
His visit lasted for 89 minutes, probably still on the Albanian tarmac, as a result of Sunak’s order for his Cabinet to make themselves available, immediately, to inform them of his decision to call the election for July 4 – before he told the world’s press of the information while standing in front of his plinth in the pouring rain.
Why on earth he chose to stand in the rain, even without any aid of a brolly carrier, instead of using the No10 press room, is a mystery of the greatest proportions of stupidity. But then, that’s what the Tories do without any written constitution.
Alan Magnus-Bennett
Fife
IT’S Back To The Future with the Tories! National Service and nuclear power! Forward to the 1950s!
Drew Macleod
Wick
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