The government has no current plans to reintroduce national service in any form, and ministers have restated the position held since 1963 that professional volunteer forces are the best way to provide for the defence of the country, according to an answer given in Parliament.
Gregory Campbell, the Democratic Unionist member for East Londonderry, asked whether consideration is being given to any form of national service to support the armed forces in the lifetime of this Parliament.
Calvin Bailey, Parliamentary Under-Secretary and Minister for Veterans and People, said: “The Government has no current plans to reintroduce National Service. Since 1963, 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 recruited from volunteers. The Armed Forces today consists of highly trained, professional men and women in both our Regular and Reserve Armed Forces. We can also call on the Strategic Reserve to provide niche skills and additional mass.”
National service in Britain ended with the last conscripts leaving in 1963, and the question has returned to political debate as European states have moved the other way. Sweden reintroduced conscription in 2017, Lithuania in 2015, Latvia in 2023, and Germany has been debating a form of selective service, while the Conservative Party proposed a national service scheme at the 2024 general election.
The Strategic Reserve the minister refers to is the pool of former regulars who retain a liability to be recalled, numbering tens of thousands on paper, and it has not been used at scale in modern times. Ministers have been examining how to make that liability meaningful, since a recall mechanism that has never been exercised offers limited confidence.
Why would you even consider it? Putin is now committed to building his forces back up on a scale not seen since the Cold War and he’s not to be taken lightly, as he is out for our blood. So fire what, fire? Let’s just carry on as if nothing is afoot.
Would probably be a good idea to get more of those who do volunteer through the door first as the rejection rate appears to be very very high and whilst national fitness is probably not what it once was I do not believe that it is really as bad is the acceptance figures would suggest.
Something just doesn’t add up. May be the new rules will make a difference…
Cheers CR