I caught the last minute of Any Questions this evening. BBC stalwart Billy Bragg was on the panel (Naturally) and they were discussing how the UK treats our military. Billy, the patriot, informed us he spend a lot of time working with our military…… during his prison visits. He informed us that large numbers of former soldiers end up in jail. On that assertion the programme finished. I KNOW that some former servicemen do end up in prison but the idea that vast numbers of our military are jailbirds is a lie although I think I can see why the BBC salivate at that idea.
NO BRAGGING..
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Lets talk figures here;
Roughly 14000 people join the army every year and 14000 leave.
While I don’t have the figures for the Navy and RAF as they combined add up to around 70,000 a 10% figure (less than the 14% for the army) should equate to their personal turnaround.
Now the question to be asked is where do we draw the line at saying somebody is ex military. After 1 day,1week, 1 month, (Here’s a story of an ex soldier locked up who only served 8 months) Personally I would say after the recruit has finished his basic training and joined his unit. Roughly a year. However for some strange reason people who have failed to complete their basic training and thus never have joined the forces have been deemed by the media (but consistently by the bBC) to be ex forces.
Then there is the otherside of the coin, when we stop referring to somebody as ex forces, after 1year,10years 20Years? How do we refer to somebody who was in the forces for 10 years, but left 30 years ago. Why the media is full of stories of ex soldiers who served during the Second World War.
So with a rough figure of 21000 people leaving the forces every year after 40 years that adds up to almost 1 million. Add in the much larger numbers we had in uniform during the cold war. And that figure is a cert.
Then there’s the additional problem of the reserve forces. Can somebody who undertakes 29 days a year in uniform and is arrested and jailed for an offence in be promoted as a problem caused by serving in uniform. Seeing as for 336 days of the year he is a civy he spends more time out of uniform than he does in.
Now if we add in the people who served prior to 1970 we can soon achieve the 2 million mark for people who served in the British armed forces. While the media (and pricks like Bragg) like to harp on about the number of ex military locked away inside prison. What percentage of them have spent more time out of uniform than in it. I refer to the bloke who left during the 70s after 6 years service and kept his nose clean for over 20-30 years. Is he an example of the military letting him down? Or is he a product of our broken society?
Maybe the bBC should be banging its drum about why their favourite lobby group has more people banged away than ex forces personal. But you have to admit doing so would expose the fact that actually Islam isn’t a religion of peace but a religion of criminality.
Something the likes of Bragg and his ideological soul mate would never do. So instead they shed crocodile tears over the number of ex servicemen serving time. In which to chip away at the only establishment which they feel reminds them of Imperialism and Empire.
Bugger that should read ‘Personnel’ and not personal
How many ex-BBC employees end up in prison ?
Oh I didn’t cut and paste the figures for locked up folks
Ex Military’ 8% of the prison population
Muslims 14% of the prison population
What special qualifications does Billy Bragg have to appear on Any Questions ? Isn’t he just a third rate has-been musician ?
Third rate anything, that’s all that’s required…
He’s a political activist, apparently.
(At least he had the decency to say Laws was wrong to fiddle the public purse. That’s more creditable than the current political class who called him a man of integrity, an honourable man etc.)
Billy gave the game away when he said that he may yet fly an England flag from his balcony. No doubt he lives in a suitably grand home well away from the Essex he says is the multicultural dream. Billy is the ultimate socialist…exhortations from safe and smug enclaves…in short the BBC dream of a weekend rebel with an accent they can only practice for “yoof TV”. He will be Prescotts bagman in the Lords before too long. All this and not one song we know!
Didn’t hear the show but lets face it a lot of them end up in jail, and it is down to aftercare being scarce. When I first heard of the events in Cumbria I thought bet its someone from the forces back from Afghanistan or Iraq. Fact is those guys have been in the theatre of war and have had no psych aftercare before rejoining civvy street….
Thanks for the link must try to listen to it when I can get a change on listen again, sounds interesting.
i know Billy Bragg is a paid up socialist and i don’t agree with much of what he says.
but in fairness to him i know his concern about ex squaddie’s ending up in prision is not to make an anti military remark – but to complain about the after care that some guys get when they leave the services – often damaged psychologically as well as physically.
i would add that Bragg’s type of socialist is not really the kind the BBC likes anyway. i mean he is an English nationalist – something that REALLY uspets those west london media lefties that do sing from the BBC hym sheet. I know bragg particuarly upsets jeremy hardy and david mitchell. (good !)
so yes – Bragg can talk cack – but in this case i suspect what is said was picked up and run with by the BBC Producers of Any Questions to turn what he said it into an anti-military gesture.