UK Election!

A random policy that has completely distracted people from the more important subjects

I don’t think that distracting people by coming up with nonsense policies, which everyone endlessly ridicules, is the way to claw back all that support which the Tories have lost in the last two years.

sure it’ll get a load of support from the boomers who harp on about WW2 even though they were likely not born then.

That’s bollocks. We know directly from our dads how shit being shot at is.

Eh?

People will have heard from their dads who served in WW2, how bad it was.

Same goes for National Service really. Details of the years and ages it applied to are complex, but people aged roughly 85-95 today would have done it, and would have told their children about their experience of it. If we assume they had kids at the age of 25, those kids would today be 60-70.

So between war and NS, mostly all boomers should have had a parent who could have told them about what being conscripted was like.

mostly all boomers should have had a parent who could have told them about what being conscripted was like.

My boomer parent never got told by their dad what the army was like, but that was because of the PTSD (undiagnosed, obvs). The most we ever got out of him was a light hearted story about the day after he signed up and then a brief mention of being in hospital with dengue fever. The other 4 years never got discussed.

@bikesandboots like I said up there, my Dad did national service for 3 years out in the middle-east and said it was the best thing that could have happened to a young lad with no direction or chance of getting out of his working-class destiny otherwise.

My grandad resolutely refused to ever talk about his time in the medical core in WW2. He was there when Belsen was liberated or very shortly after, apart from confirming this was true he never talked of it

People will have heard from their dads who served in WW2, how bad it was.

Does show the age in here. There’s much younger generations that have a pretty intimate relationship with two way ranges.

I’m the bulk of my 24 year career was Iraq & Afghanistan with a smattering of the Balkans.

Anyhoo, this policy has been the source of much mirth and memes within military circles, so if nothing else he’s boosted the morale of the troops.

I can  kind of see some civil service volunteering not the bullshit idea of national service. But volunteering for reduction of uni fees I could imagine

I used to work with a guy who had been some kind of officer in the Israeli Defence Force (this was a long time ago). His job was looking after conscripts. He said it was completely hateful and awful as they really did not want to be there and spent their time trying to be as unpleasant as possible. He quit.

He said it was completely hateful and awful as they really did not want to be there and spent their time trying to be as unpleasant as possible.

Sometimes that’s regular recruit training. It’s hard **** work training & mentoring volunteers sometimes. I can’t begin to fathom the hellscape that conscription would be.

shit like this is Ok if your ahead in the polls  not when you 20 pts behind just makes you look stupid and desperate.

I can  kind of see some civil service volunteering

It’s not volunteering if you have to do it! And if you don’t have to do it we already have a million ways for anyone to volunteer.

It’s not volunteering if you have to do it!

Voluntold. 😂

What if the national service that might be volunteering leads to folk volunteering to help asylum seekers?

Beware what you start Fishi Rishi.

If we assume they had kids at the age of 25, those kids would today be 60-70.

Yes I’m one of those kids. I’m 70. Actually my dad joined up voluntarily before WW2 as soon as he was eligible in order to get out of the pit where he had been since leaving school at 13. He was a pretty good musician, got into the regimental dance band and was well on the way to a great career as a bandsman when some mad bugger started a war.

After Egypt he found himself part of the ill fated attempt to control the Corinth Canal in Greece where his entire regiment were taken prisoner (well apart from a few senior officers who managed to get away). At least during the next 4 years as a PoW he was no longer being shot at though USAF managed to drop a bomb on the latrine block in the camp.

After the war he was part of the occupying forces in Northern Germany where he met my mum. She had her own tales of being a telephonist with the German army on the Eastern front and evacuated in goods wagons in the face of the Russian advance. Her home town ended up being only a couple of kilometres west of the East/West border.

I was made fully aware of the impact of the war on the ordinary people on both opposing sides. I have the utmost respect for all those caught up the horror of war including those like relapsed_mandalorian who volunteer to serve in the forces and utter contempt for the politicians who cause it.

So my Dad is 70, he avoided national service by a decent chunk. His dad did a ‘career change’ in 1936 from a plasterer to an engineer in the army……he was severely wounded at Arnhem in 1944 and was disabled for the rest of his life.  Apparently I was the first relative he ever spoke to in any depth about his service…..even then he didn’t say much.  ‘The first time you ever get shot at will stay with you for the rest of your life’ was about as extensive as it got.  Given that he was shot at in the 40’s and was telling me this in the early noughties speaks volumes I suppose.

I think of the conversations that I had with my grandad, and wonder how exactly people conflate his experience with some weird Trumpian nationalism, as so often happens these days.  His own dad was gassed in WW1 and died in 1921 as a result of his injuries when my grandad would’ve been 2.  Very little was ever known of his childhood, but I’m assuming that growing up in poverty, pre welfare state, as one of 7 kids to a single mum in Stoke was pretty tough.  I see that the MP for his childhood constituency Jonathan Gullis is espousing the virtues of national service today.  He likes to pedal out his faux support of servicemen at any given opportunity.  It’s that type of Tory/nationalist which I find most distasteful.  The stories and life experiences of the countless others like my grandad will never be understood by the ruling classes, however it really really pushes all the wrong buttons with me when I see what they went through being misrepresented in the ways that are all over social media today.

telegraph seem to have removed their earlier claim that polling showed that the majority of Britons want the return of national service

I moved to Spain right when NS was going through its death throes, and the opinion of all my colleagues – many of whom had been stretching out their legal exemptions for one reason or another – was that NS was a complete and utter waste of time. Community Service was marginally better, but even then how much useful work are you going to get out of a resentful, unskilled 18 year old, and wouldn’t society be better off hiring someone on the dole to sweep the streets?

I was chatting to my Dad this morning. He was in the TA in the 1950’s and got sent to Aden (now Yeman) but only because he needed the money. The full time army lot lived in fear of any of the TA getting hurt due to the paperwork and the headlines back home. Funny how little things change.

my Dad did national service for 3 years out in the middle-east and said it was the best thing that could have happened to a young lad

National service was 18 months, two years during the Korean War for some men ( like my dad, and boy did he resent the extra months ) They were then on the reserve list for four years, doing up to two or three weeks training three times in that period.

If he did three years some must have been as a volunteer I would imagine.

My mum’s cousin was of an age when he dropped out of uni, he became liable. He told me there was a choice between 18 months of being paid a pittance to sit in Catterick or NW Germany, or sign on as a volunteer for three years, be paid properly but risk being sent somewhere spicy. He chose the latter and ended up in Cyprus when things got exciting.

my Dad did national service for 3 years out in the middle-east and said it was the best thing that could have happened to a young lad

I can see that making sense when we had a far more rural, isolated society, but that’s not the case here. Before Spain I lived in Egypt for a couple of years, and there was far more support for NS there – it got 18 year old men out of their villages, taught them to read and write, and showed them a world beyond the narrow frontiers of Hicksville, Egypt. C21 UK is close to 100% literate, there aren’t that many obstacles to moving elsewhere to find a job, and foreign travel is not something only the rich do. What are we actually expecting to gain from this?

“So between war and NS, mostly all boomers should have had a parent who could have told them about what being conscripted was like.”

Probably shite enough for it to be a pretty bad idea unless really necessary?

Don’t panic Captain Mainwaring!!

My father spent his NS, I guess in the very early 1950s, teaching other National Servicemen to read and write…… In the UK of 70 years ago, that was probably not a bad use of time for all involved.

National Service will be forgotten by Monday. It was only ever going to be an announcement, nothing more.

So, in a game of Tory Desperation Bingo…

What’s their next announcement?

Guesses, funny or otherwise?😉

I don’t agree with the Tory dreamer policy at all just to be clear.

It’s just desperate news fodder for the election and if they have opened with the big guns then God help them

I left school in 86 in the north of England with 3 million+ unemployed. Of my immediate mates I was the only one who didn’t go into the forces. It was pretty much the only job available. I was lucky enough to get an apprenticeship.

Of the ones who are still alive I could get my mates to advise the new national service lot on the best therapists to deal with the PTSD which keeps them awake all night and ****s up their lives

After what I’ve seen my mates go through I find it incredible the casual manner in which a vile little **** like Sunak feels he has the right to force everyone into this life.

I’m sure it’s safe to assume that, as with all forms of conscription, the offspring of the moneyed class will have numerous ways to make sure it doesn’t apply to them. It’s only the little people who get conscripted

What’s their next announcement?

Limit on total benefits in a lifetime.

https://archive.li/2024.05.26-161848/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/05/26/national-service-tories-rejected-last-week-reverse-election/

Defence minister ruled out return of National Service day after election called

Andrew Murrison told a Tory MP it would not be introduced ‘in any form’ as it would damage morale and discipline

Which is precisely why the idea does have a certain vague appeal to me (and I speak as a former conscript)

So what’s going on? Yesterday an editorial in the Daily Telegraph was telling its readers what a great idea Rishi Sunak’s national service policy was, today the the Daily Telegraph is reporting that a Tory defence minister has dismissed it as a crap idea which would negatively affect morale and discipline.

We might only be 4 days into this general election campaign but so far at least I don’t recall ever enjoying a GE campaign this much before.

I lived in Egypt for a couple of years, and there was far more support for NS there – it got 18 year old men out of their villages, taught them to read and write, and showed them a world beyond the narrow frontiers of Hicksville, Egypt.

Yeeeesss…it also has the advantage of seeming to reduce  unemployment, isolating and dispersing uppity youths (because you split them up from their friends and family) and providing cheap labour for the huge slice of the economy that is controlled by the military (and construction of generals’ holiday houses).

All of these things are good for the state but not necessarily a great use of the youths’ time. And that’s before you get into the conscript-on-conscript torture and abuse…

I should point out that, as per Wikipedia, Andrew Murrison is a retired Royal Navy and then RNR officer. He’s probably got a good handle on what the armed forces think about the return of national service…

I should point out that, as per Wikipedia, Andrew Murrison has been a Conservative MP for 23 years. He’s probably got a good handle on just how big a walloping his party is in for, with this policy merely the cherry on top of the shit-cake we’re going to be served over the next 6 weeks.

He is standing for re-election, but I suppose even knowing that he’s got a 20000 majority…

Limit on total benefits in a lifetime.

Ooh that’s a good/very depressing shout.  I’m still tending to agree with other posters a few pages back that they’ll suggest the return of capital punishment.

In my experience Navy officers have little handle on anything other than their own importance…….

Limit on total benefits in a lifetime.

Including state pensions?

We might only be 4 days into this general election campaign but so far at least I don’t recall ever enjoying a GE campaign this much before

And they said it was going to be boring.

Ooh that’s a good/very depressing shout. I’m still tending to agree with other posters a few pages back that they’ll suggest the return of capital punishment.

Could be a little like the movie, In Time. An embedded display on your arm that ticks down to zero if you need to claim benefits.

Also ticks down if you use the NHS or social services etc.👍

Can go up if you vote for the “right” party or are a party donor obvs.

Including state pensions?

Don’t be silly. Pensioners who vote Tory aren’t on a benefit, they’ve earned it and deserve more than young people.

Well its been a productive evening….