General Chat

There are apprentiships,

my son left school and did a 5 year apprentiship on day release to be an electrician.

Skills what a word .Yes they need them and other things besides but that can be done without National service

My OH says it was good, he reckons, it made them appreciate their homes. Tough boys crying at night for their homes.

He also says apprenticeships should again be available, and day release classes from jobs.

These so called Universities, they only have lectures twice a week, and the rest of the time, they are lazing about, so we are told by our friends whose children are away in them, no wonder there is binge drinking, if they had to get up and go to work in the mornings, they would not be able to do this.

As we live in a University city, we see the youngsters walking from one building to another during the day. My OH says they spend more time doing this. Subjects could be done in shorter time, if they did not have all the tooing and frooing.

The some you mention is the point isn't it ,for some it is all they have know and it is a cycle that needs braking but I don't see National Service as the way to go .

If you mean the old form of all men age 18 to 40 being forced into the services then no it's not national service, but a way of getting the work shy off benefits.

At least they will be earning their money and and learning skills to enable them to get work.

Actually, tory had just put into words what I was thinking. Maybe what really needs to be done - assuming anything needs to be done - is get people away from the "benefits culture". So often I am reading on these boards of people (or their relatives) who are in genuine need of disability allowances etc which they cannot get because they aren't ticking the "right" boxes and some clerk somewhere doesn't consider their need genuine enough.

And yet on the flip side is the terrible image of teenagers having babies and then not going to work (because they have no intention to) because by having the baby at, say, 16, they are guaranteed whatever benefits - child allowance, that sort of stuff. Maybe what we need - obviously new parents etc do need support, maternity pay, etc - is to get away from this idea of "if I have a baby, they'll have to give me a council flat" and similar thinking.

When I was at college I did fill out a form for free prescriptions as I was at college full-time and working 13 hours a week but it proved pointless because they say you have to pay the first £18 of an eye test yourself, and so on. (And an eye test only costs about £22 - I didn't think it was worth it so when I went to uni I never filled out another form. The first only lasted till the July as that was when my college course ended.)

well that is hardly national service though, or am I missing something....?

I don't think the unemployed are a class,

but some have been brought up to think it is ok never to work, they know how to work the system this cycle has to be broken, national service as it was I agree will not work, but offering them of choice of finding a job or military training could work.

Ah, so we are talking about selective national service....you mean conscripting a certain class of people......based on the fact that they are unemployed and claiming benefit......

do you really need me to point out the problems of doing that....?

Does the concept of national service not include taking all youngsters and putting them in the military?

Including my sons and daughters? To pay for the sins of the unwashed?

If you are just going to target the yob culture, then that isnt national service, its something else.

Frankly, you could drown them all for me - i wouldnt give a damn! I don't I see the need to tarnish or taint our still professional services with scum from street corners.

And whats the point of making them non combatants? Minefield clearing parties would be my preference if we are talking about the hoodies and chav gangs.

You might as well make them delivery boys for interflora if they are non combatants.

I dont believe NS is the answer for a moment. Damn good thrashings is my prefered method, handed out on a regular basis.

I have my own ideas on how yob culture can be tackled but that is not the issue in this discussion :-)

I think you all need to think outside the box .Why is it that it comes down to National Service most of these kids come across as confident when in actual fact they have low self esteem and no selfrespect and I don't see how putting them in to do National Service would help. even if we could afford to do it .We have service personal at this very time that haven't got the equipment to do the job they were sent to do let alone setting up to put aload of kids in for National Service that the funds aren't there for .

Thankyou Lorraine

Over to you Eldrick

It's not just the unemployment benefit they recieve, they also get housing benefit, council tax benefit and free prescriptions.

If they are aged 18 and over and not in education, have no physical or mental disabilities and have no dependents then why should they be paid to sit on their arses all day.

Yes bring back national service for the work shy.

So what would you prefer Eldrick - youngsters on the streets being payed to be on the streets (by your taxes)... Or being given some kind of trade. (They are not going to get it in Civvy St)..
And as I said, if these youngsters are not included in any combatant theatre, no harm. Surely a bit discipline wouldn't go astray and no one really 'suffers'.
If on the other hand, God forbid, that this country is attacked/invaded then most of these young people would have had some kind of military training to help 'bail' us out..
If you wouldn't vote for any government who would take this country to war, guess you wouldn't be voting, period..

Point Taken Eldrick, will try and consult with the oracle and try to come up with another answer

pablo, that wouldn't even begin to cover the cost.

think it through and think what percentage of the claimants that you are branding as all being the same are teenagers who would be eligible. WHat do they get in benefits...?

I dont know - less than £100 a week...?

multiply that by maybe 10 and you will get something like the cost of training and equipping a soldier, sailor or airman. A guess, but I would suggest that is on the side of caution.....

the argument doesnt stand up Im afraid,

John
There are lots of reasons why there are so many (not all) kids going off the rails and to me it's all these wishy washy rights.
Schools went from Victorian standards to the point that teachers cant even comfort a child who is crying.
Parents can't let kids out in the streets because they are accused of not knowing where they are or what they are doing but on the other hand if we keep them in we are wrapping them in cotton wool and stopping them from essential street know how.
What we actually need it something inbetween Victorian standards and 2008 and giving back some rights to parents and teachers would solve a lot of problems.

Good point, Eldrick. As I mentioned before, I'm nearly 24 now and have spent six of the past 7 years (it will be 7 in June) since finishing compulsory education ie. secondary school in further educational courses.

Also, regarding the military, the first thing I thought of when reading your post were the anti-Iraq war protestors. Do they (or their children) get put in a situation where they would be compelled to go to war when it conflicts with their idea of right and wrong? I don't often hold with people bringing up "human rights" left, right and centre but I think they would have something to say about that.

I do feel sometimes that the young are blamed for things that aren't their fault - we didn't ask exam boards to manipulate grade boundaries so that more people would appear to have passed 5 or more GCSEs, for instance, but yet we seem to get blamed for "not working hard enough" to achieve truly good grades. Surely if exam results are "massaged" that is down to moderators and examiners. I remember when I got my GCSEs, all I could think of was that I'd got an A*, 3 As and 6 Bs - it never occurred to me that my "A"s were not A standard etc. I just accepted what I'd got.

It could come out of the benefits that the government would no longer be paying to the workshy and lazy!!

But who would pay for it John....I pay enough tax now as it is!