I have no time for this diversity ballcocks but there has to be more than just skewed recruitment policy for this plan to work. I can only relate to the non-commissioned route to becoming an effective member of the RAF. The first process was Basic Recruit Training consisting of 6 weeks at Swinderby and now is a 10 week training course at Halton. I don’t recall the bar being set very high for this element of training, it just weeded out the ones who didn’t really want to be there or the RAF didn’t want to invest in. There followed a Technical Training phase, which in my case was 18 months at Cosford. From an initial class of 18, I think 6 of us got through without being CT’d or back classed due to illness, injury or needing to resit an exam. I reckon about 10 of the original 18 eventually passed out of Cosford with their newly sown on J/T badges.
For the RAF diversity plan to work, has the training bar been lowered? Is it lowered across the board or is there special dispensation for some individuals? If so, this is an equally worrying trend as the overall capability of the RAF is being reduced to cater for its diversity goals.
I’ve been out of the game for a long time so I’m looking from afar but it concerns me greatly that the training I received at Cosford, which became the foundation of my career in aerospace, is somehow being compromised and diluted by this ill conceived strategy.