Saturday, 2nd March 2013
UK ARMED FORCES LIKELY TO BE HIT WITH MORE CUTS – The Chancellor, George Osborne, wants to slash public spending in order to save money and for most this appears to be a prudent and financially sound move.
Unfortunately one area that he wants to further cut spending is within our Armed Forces. The Defence Secretary Philip Hammond has warned the Chancellor that any further cuts could seriously undermine the UK’s ability to defend itself and will certainly put more of our Armed Forces personnel at high levels of risk due to the sub-standard equipment that would be available with any further cuts to the defence budget.
There are those in government that feel that the government should focus on reducing the massive Welfare Bill by heavily restricting and reassessing benefit payments to foreign immigrants and those who have been living on benefits for over a year.
We have already seen the Chancellor take the knife to military spending on a number of occasions in the past few years. These cuts have inevitably reduced the number of serving personnel and more worrying reduced the level of equipment used to protect and defend our military personnel.
George Osborne is another liberal minded pen push who simply feels that a nanny state is the way forward to social harmony and that the UK should give more to those on benefits and provide greater assistance for the immigrant masses – even if they do have criminal records.
I have a suggestion for George Osborne, or any other Cabinet Minister, who feels that our Armed Forces are adequately paid and protected with the equipment issued. Why do not a stint in the Army? Each of them should be put through 6 weeks of training, given the sub-standard equipment issued to all our armed forces personnel and then shipped off to Afghanistan for a year. Maybe then they will be able to see just how dangerous and difficult the job is of protecting the UK.
It was only a few days ago that I penned the article about Wing Commander Burbridge, a World War II Fighter Pilot, who is now having to sell his medals in order to pay for medical expenses. This is a man who fought for our liberty and freedom and yet the government treats him with contempt, as they do with the rest of our armed forces personnel.
Read
British War Hero Discarded by the Government
I often find the government to be completely obtuse to those who really deserve to be paid and equipped while others, such as Sir David Nicholson, the head of the NHS Scandal that caused the death of over 1,200 patients, is lauded as doing an excellent job and paid 10 times what an average armed forces personnel receives annually. Indeed most Ministers, if you paid them their worth, wouldn’t earn more than a couple of thousand pounds annually at best.
Read
Patient and Care Group Call for Prime Minister to Sack Sir David Nicholson
There is no doubt that the government needs to cut public spending but it appears George Osborne is more interested in saving money where the most votes are – and that’s among the lazy and foreign immigrants.
Reducing the spending on our Armed Forces is not the way to go – these men and women are vital to the protection of our liberties and freedoms. As Philip Hammond pointed out, the Chancellor should cut deep at the welfare system, which if done correctly, would even allow for our armed forces personnel to see an increase in pay that they so rightly deserve.
