Army increases recruitment of minors
More than twenty-four per cent of non-officer rank intake to the army are under-eighteen
New figures show that twenty-four per cent of British army recruits are child soldiers.
The Ministry of Defence has just released the UK Armed Forces Biannual Statistics for 2016. They reveal that the proportion of the army’s non-officer rank intake aged under-eighteen increased from 22.2 per cent to 24.2 per cent.
This increase has happened despite public opposition from Quakers and many others who are campaigning to raise the age of enlistment.
The armed forces as a whole recruited 1,140 sixteen year-olds and 1,250 seventeen-year-olds, from a total of 12,300 new recruits of non-officer-rank intake.
Child Soldiers International say army recruitment policies place minors in the riskiest roles in the infantry and force them to serve longer minimum service periods.
Recruits aged sixteen have a total minimum service period of six years, while seventeen-year-olds must serve for five. Adults can be discharged after four years’ service.
The UK is the only permanent member of the UN Security Council that still recruits sixteen-year-olds.
Meanwhile, the Scottish Parliament’s Public Petitions Committee agreed to discuss further a proposal to increase the regulation of armed forces’ visits to schools.
The Committee received evidence from public bodies on the joint petition. These included ForcesWatch and Quakers in Scotland. The Committee has now agreed to consult with a range of other organisations, including young people’s organisations, children’s rights groups, veterans organisations and those responsible for careers provision.
Quakers in Scotland and ForcesWatch made a joint submission to the Scottish Parliament’s Public Petitions Committee. They referred to the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC) 2016, which recently reviewed the UK’s position on implementing the Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC). The UNCRC expressed concern that the armed forces carry out pre-recruitment activities at a young age in schools, with an emphasis on areas of disadvantage and use marketing practices that fail to give a balanced view of life in the armed forces.
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