As a Tory politician’s call to reintroduce national service prompts 30,000 signatures against it, Jack McKeown asks if we should force our young people to serve their country.
Could national service be making a comeback? Probably not, but it is briefly back in the public eye after a Conservative MP called for its return. Philip Hollobone has sponsored a bill that would reinstate compulsory national service for 18 to 26-year-olds.
The MP for Kettering is convinced youngsters would benefit from being forced to carry out charity work, care for the elderly, help out in the NHS or complete military service.
“I believe that the introduction of a modern form of national service would prove popular with the public and be of immense benefit to the young people who take part,” he explained.
The National Service Bill is due to be debated in Parliament next February.
Mr Hollobone’s claim that it would prove popular with the public has already been cast into doubt, however, with 30,000 people signing a petition condemning it.
Those signing state they do not support the “mandatory conscription or service in to any system that requires them by law to submit to training or residential activity”.
It adds: “It is unacceptable to force any person to engage in training that has mandatory residential elements, military training and/or actual service in the military without the ability to refuse, without placing themselves in a position of having to break the law and gaining a criminal record.”
In spite of being keen for young people to have some discipline instilled in them through national service, Mr Hollobone is himself something of a maverick. He is the most rebellious MP in the House of Commons, going against his party’s line on one in every five votes.
He is also one of three MPs from the Conservatives’ right wing the others are Peter Bone and Christopher Chope who teamed up to produce an “alternative Queen’s Speech”.
Among 40 laws they proposed were the banning of the burqa, the reintroduction of capital punishment, the privatisation of the BBC, a referendum on equal marriage, withdrawal from the EU and the renaming of the August bank holiday as Margaret Thatcher Day.
All of these bills have been given space on the parliamentary timetable.
National Service was abolished in the UK in 1960, meaning 48-year-old Mr Hollobone didn’t have to undertake it himself.
Student leaders in The Courier’s area roundly condemned the plan.
Dundee University student president Iain MacKinnon said: “National service is an outdated and unworkable idea. Young people should be free to explore exactly what it is that they want to do with their lives, be that through further and higher education or through employment.
“They should not be expected to give up 12 months of their life and forced into something they do not support, with the threat of punishment hanging over their heads should they instead decide to live their lives as they choose.”
St Andrews University student president Chloe Hill said: “My first issue with this is the proposal that it is compulsory. I don’t think it is appropriate to force young people in to something they don’t necessarily want to do and won’t necessarily benefit them.
“Once people leave compulsory education we should be giving them more options of what to do next, not fewer. My concern with national service is that it normalises war when surely we should be moving away from war as the go-to reaction to conflict. This proposal is backwards facing when we should be taking society forwards.”
Abertay’s student president Richard Cook also opposed the idea, saying national service “remains stuck in a bygone era”.
He added: “My view rests on the idea that people be given their own choices in life. Within that is the choice of how we should learn and who we should learn from.
“Many people may undoubtedly want to enter into National Service, whether it is with the military or more community-based, and that is their decision. Yet to make this compulsory is wrong in its very essence.”
Even Mr Hollobone’s own party gave his bill a lukewarm reception. Scottish Conservative young people spokeswoman Liz Smith said: “While we wouldn’t want this to be compulsory, there is certainly a place for some kind of national service in communities who want it.
“Times have changed somewhat, and there are different ways for young people to serve their country and their community.
“Initiatives from the Duke of Edinburgh and the John Muir Trust are just two examples of organisations that have expanded in recent years.
“It is extremely important for young people to find sustained and meaningful ways of serving their country and community.”
North East MSP Alex Johnstone said he did not want young people’s lives to be “disrupted” by national service.
He said: “The armed forces no longer want national service. They need skilled people. And most young people have ambitions and plans that should not be put on hold for a year.
“That said, there is merit in the idea for the minority of young people who lack motivation. They could be placed with volunteers and benefit from being set a good example.”
The 30,000 people who’ve signed a petition against Mr Hollobone’s motion could see their opposition backfire, however. If they reach 100,000 signatures their motion has to be considered for debate in parliament guaranteeing further coverage of a bill that otherwise looks set to die quietly.
Across the world, the trend has been towards countries abolishing national service. Austria, Cyprus, Denmark, Estonia, Finland and Greece still have national service. However, Sweden abolished it in 2010 and Germany followed suit the next year.
Belgium, the Netherlands, France, Spain, Italy, Slovenia, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Portugal, Poland and Bulgaria are just some of the other European states to have scrapped national service.
Nor is national service a guarantee that delinquent tendencies will be eradicated. South Korean songwriter Psy was enlisted in his country’s mandatory military service. He still went on to give the world Gangnam Style.