Secret Sooty
Fifteen years ago, I might have had some sympathy for your position, though I have never claimed this allowance. However:
Rant On
That most excellent chap Michael Portillo screwed the housing stock years ago by selling the whole lot off for peanuts and having us lease them back. I stand to be corrected, but we have to release a percentage of these houses (5%? 10%?) each year to be sold to the general public at an obscene profit to the original purchaser. In a few years, there will be next to no FQs left, and the Service/Govt will either have to build new FQs or, pretty soon, buy back some of of the FQs sold by Mr Portillo. Can anyone see that happening?
As a result, the Service/Govt wants people to buy their own houses, and I can see a situation soon where those joining the Services lose the right to FQ accommodation completely as a means of reducing the demand in line with reducing availability. Another element of this is the increase in FQ rates to bring them more into line with commercial rents. I have no objection to this, except that I see no increase in pay to offset this, yet the availability of Service accommodation is oft cited as one reason our pay is not similar to civil equivalents.
With the current state of the housing market, many of our people have no option but to live in FQs, or else accept whatever accommodation they can get away from the unit at which they are serving. Anyone below Air Cdre rank thought of buying something decent in the High Wycombe area recently? I have a good friend who lives with his family over an hour away from his Unit - because it was all he could get - and I bet there are worse examples of daily commutes! Oh, and when you take into account the Service's abandonment (over many years I accept) of meaningful support for families (Medical, Dental, Local Education), these too become factors that mean, through no fault of their own, people may have to live further away from their units than previously THROUGH NO FAULT OF THEIR OWN! After 2 years at my current Unit (in FQs) wife has been given an appointment at a dentist - in Oct 07 - about a month after we are posted - back to the bottom of the list she goes! HEEEEEELP!
Incidentally, ISTR the DHEDHDEDEDH()()()()( - rearrange letters and brackets to make their current name - is allowed to accommodate us up to 45 mins(?) away from work, which is fine if you can drive (have a (second) car, licence etc). IMHO, they should only be able to house you where there is Service transport to work.
Sorry, but I feel better for that.
Rant Off
So yes the Service does contribute to the cost of getting to work, though the rates don't even begin to approach those the MPs get
.
STH
PS. This post was runner-up in the National Forums Championships for imaginative use of brackets and the letters D, H and E in a single sentence!