Soldato
Are you implying there is something wrong with that?Bit rich coming from the Navy!
Don't you share beds and call yourselves Seamen?
RAF recruitment, has it gone a bit too far...
- Thread starter Uther
- Start date
RAF recruitment head refused 'unlawful' order to 'prioritise women and ethnic minorities over white men', leaked email reveals
The group captain - whose subsequent resignation was revealed by Sky News - told her boss in the email earlier this month that she was not willing to allocate slots on RAF training courses based purely on a specific gender or ethnicity, according to a copy of the message, seen by Sky News.
Soldato
The language the Group Captain used when refusing to carry out what could be seen as an illegal order (sent by the COS Pers - Air Vice-Marshal Maria Byford - the person who gave the "I'm unashamed" interview) is very telling and a very rare thing to see, to paraphase she told the Air Vice-Marshal "I won't order my people to follow your illegal order" and then when push came to shove she stuck to her guns and quit her role rather than carry out the order given, something which, again, is very rare to see. It's a shame she'll be leaving as she sounds exactly the type of Officer the RAF needs right now, someone with a high moral standard who won't pass the buck down to her subordinates at the risk to her own career.
Here's a screen-grab of her e-mail -
Here's a screen-grab of her e-mail -
Permabanned
Selfless and principled, a rare thing today, sadly.
The language the Group Captain used when refusing to carry out what could be seen as an illegal order (sent by the COS Pers - Air Vice-Marshal Maria Byford - the person who gave the "I'm unashamed" interview) is very telling and a very rare thing to see, to paraphase she told the Air Vice-Marshal "I won't order my people to follow your illegal order" and then when push came to shove she stuck to her guns and quit her role rather than carry out the order given, something which, again, is very rare to see. It's a shame she'll be leaving as she sounds exactly the type of Officer the RAF needs right now, someone with a high moral standard who won't pass the buck down to her subordinates at the risk to her own career.
Here's a screen-grab of her e-mail -
Ooooooooof!!!! You got a link to where the leaked email came from?
I'm no expert so I could be wrong. But I think this can only be used as a "tie breaker" for equally qualified candidates. In other words it has to be on a case by case basis and not blanket discrimination.
What the law says - Using protected characteristics to make decisions - Acas
How employers might use protected characteristics to make work decisions, including positive action and objective justification.www.acas.org.uk
Statistically this is biasing. Although I suspect that the applicant has no visibility on applying as the job description has no mention of this.
If the there is a 1v1 decision and physical characteristics are taken into account then the decision to reject an individual should have been made at the start. There is no difference other than simply biasing the recruitment process at the start or end. To that end they should then state the bias requirement on the job advertisement. If this was a a buyer they could be taken to court over discrimination or a product feature - sued for failing to advertise the feature properly.
I can understand the concept of biasing and advertising a role is subject to bias would simply stop applicants from applying that may be selected outright due to skill rather than enter a tie-break. The question for me is - the hidden process is up to the organisation where it may elect for a tiebreak, for example one individual has 10 points based on skill and the other has 9 points for skill + points for satisfying the bias requirements. However the organisation's priority is being diverse and hence selects the lesser skilled individual.
It appears being older, white and British is actually a disadvantage. It's making a large portion of voters employers are looking for. Unfortunately that results in backlash as disgruntled old timers going nationalistic by voting for tories and UKIP. In reality I think this blown out of proportion by the press and could easily shown if the diversity figures for a company are public knowledge at companies house alongside companies financial fillings. The same goes with public sector.
Companies already need to keep good recruitment records to ensure they're not being sue and for risk management that there is evidence in case the hiring manager has been hiring their mates.
I assume the same rules for diversity also apply to promotions and to redundancy.
Soldato
Sadly no, just the screen-grab from Sky News amongst a few other e-mails they had which kicked this all off.
Yeah, can't find it now. Wonder if the Gp Capt leaked it herself!
I don't know TBH. Having worked in the educational/academic sector many leaders there are very pro-equity and quite comfortable with the idea of reverse discrimation quotas against people in order to achieve "equality"!
In fact just the other day the rector gave a speech saying it was important that the staff ethnic make-up should relect the student ethnic make-up. The implication being that there aren't enough non-white lecturers/teachers and they'll be taking steps to change that! Somewhat ironic given they themselves are white. Apparently they're an "Ally" though and it's only the jobs/promotion prospect of other staff below them which have to be sacrificed for their ideology and beliefs! Safe to say there's no chance of them quitting their job to allow someone more "diverse" to take the role!
IMO it's nothing more than an attempt by them to entrench their own power and authority whilst pretending to be virtuous. When in reality all they're doing is in their own self interest.It's a very distubing mindset IMO which appears to be the norm throughout our educational establishments and it's spreading into other sectors....
Soldato
The Daily Mail has had an "exclusive" interview with the 40 women alleging sexual problems within the Red Arrows following the sacking of one pilot for 2 alleged sexual assaults (should have been a civilian Police matter to me not an internal RAF one) and the group is calling for the Red Arrows to be Stood Down for a period, which means effectively scrapping if for a few years whilst they remove all of the Officers involved (not just pilots) and send them either back to frontline service or kick out of the RAF and then rebuild it from scratch to kill off the "boys club" culture which has allowed this to become a toxic workplace where compaints of things as severe as sexual abuse were hidden rather than dealt with, a concept completely alien to me as ex-groundcrew.
www.dailymail.co.uk
I'm not sure what level this has hit the enlisted (non-officer) groundcrew as well but from what I've read its seems to be entirely within the Officer branch so far, but once investigators start picking at stuff I'm sure more things will pop-out. Sadly I'm complete unsurprised, I sat in with a bunch of RAF/Navy enlisted men/women aged between 20-40yo for an online 30min Unwanted Sexual Behaviours lecture a few days ago and even after all this media frenzy, after all the many briefs they had before, there was still plenty of eye-rolling & muttering amongst some of the folks there.
Victims of Red Arrows sex scandal call for squadron to be disbanded
In exclusive interviews with the Daily Mail, the women - among more than 40 personnel to raise serious misconduct issues - said the jets should be grounded due to the Red Arrows' toxic culture.
I'm not sure what level this has hit the enlisted (non-officer) groundcrew as well but from what I've read its seems to be entirely within the Officer branch so far, but once investigators start picking at stuff I'm sure more things will pop-out. Sadly I'm complete unsurprised, I sat in with a bunch of RAF/Navy enlisted men/women aged between 20-40yo for an online 30min Unwanted Sexual Behaviours lecture a few days ago and even after all this media frenzy, after all the many briefs they had before, there was still plenty of eye-rolling & muttering amongst some of the folks there.
Soldato
6 months later and in the week that the ex-Head of the RAF - Mike Wigston - leaves, it all starts to come out and I expect even more will come out now Wigston is gone and all the blame gets (rightly) dropped on him. His leadership directly ended up with decisions like this one below being carried out -
Sky are also reporting that "31 white men are to receive £5,000 each to compensate them for being unfairly disadvantaged by the approach" which shows that the RAF knows it was in the wrong but upper RAF management from COS Wigston down to Air Commodore level (a 5* General down to 1* General is the Army equivalent) still pushed a knowingly illegal order down (as an "aspirational goal") until finally Group Captain Lizzy Nicholl (one level below a 1* General) stood her ground and said "No" and resigned in protest.
Wigston has never once apologised to either Nicholls (he said it was regrettable she quit) or any of the men affected, he is an abject failure and his disgraceful attitude has heavily damaged the RAF he leaves behind. I hope Rich Knighton, who is his replacement, will have the ability to gut out all the dead-wood from the RAF's upper management and start afresh, conentrating more on threats like Russia than the threat of too many "useless White Male pilots".
www.telegraph.co.uk
news.sky.com
www.dailymail.co.uk
Squadron Leader Andrew Harwin said:
Sky are also reporting that "31 white men are to receive £5,000 each to compensate them for being unfairly disadvantaged by the approach" which shows that the RAF knows it was in the wrong but upper RAF management from COS Wigston down to Air Commodore level (a 5* General down to 1* General is the Army equivalent) still pushed a knowingly illegal order down (as an "aspirational goal") until finally Group Captain Lizzy Nicholl (one level below a 1* General) stood her ground and said "No" and resigned in protest.
Wigston has never once apologised to either Nicholls (he said it was regrettable she quit) or any of the men affected, he is an abject failure and his disgraceful attitude has heavily damaged the RAF he leaves behind. I hope Rich Knighton, who is his replacement, will have the ability to gut out all the dead-wood from the RAF's upper management and start afresh, conentrating more on threats like Russia than the threat of too many "useless White Male pilots".
RAF told to ‘stop choosing useless white male pilots’, leak reveals
Leaked email emerges after claims service had been put under ‘intolerable pressure’ to hit diversity targets
www.telegraph.co.uk
Applicants seeking to join RAF described as 'useless white male pilots' in bid to hit 'impossible' diversity targets
Leaked emails show the pressure apparently being applied to filter out white male recruits and fast-track women and ethnic minorities. It can also be revealed 31 white men are to receive £5,000 each to compensate them for being unfairly disadvantaged by the approach.
news.sky.com
White men trying to join RAF branded 'useless' by recruitment officers
The emails, which are set to renew a row over diversity quotas, were sent by a squadron leader in the air force's recruitment division in January 2021. Above: Air Chief Marshall Sir Mike Wigston.
Funny to read the first page of the thread again to see the comments...
Associate
I hadn’t realised so many here were ex-RAF or still serving. I’m at 23 years later this year in the engineering world, and it does make me wonder if I’d get in if I tried joining today. It was a new intake of 100 odd people every week when I was in basic training, and there were hundreds of us in trade training after that. Cosford seems to be a ghost town any time I visit…
Harsh penalty and shame is only way people will get their act together, just covering it up will mean it just gets worse before it comes out anyway with much bigger consequences.The Daily Mail has had an "exclusive" interview with the 40 women alleging sexual problems within the Red Arrows following the sacking of one pilot for 2 alleged sexual assaults (should have been a civilian Police matter to me not an internal RAF one) and the group is calling for the Red Arrows to be Stood Down for a period, which means effectively scrapping if for a few years whilst they remove all of the Officers involved (not just pilots) and send them either back to frontline service or kick out of the RAF and then rebuild it from scratch to kill off the "boys club" culture which has allowed this to become a toxic workplace where compaints of things as severe as sexual abuse were hidden rather than dealt with, a concept completely alien to me as ex-groundcrew.
Victims of Red Arrows sex scandal call for squadron to be disbanded
In exclusive interviews with the Daily Mail, the women - among more than 40 personnel to raise serious misconduct issues - said the jets should be grounded due to the Red Arrows' toxic culture.
I'm not sure what level this has hit the enlisted (non-officer) groundcrew as well but from what I've read its seems to be entirely within the Officer branch so far, but once investigators start picking at stuff I'm sure more things will pop-out. Sadly I'm complete unsurprised, I sat in with a bunch of RAF/Navy enlisted men/women aged between 20-40yo for an online 30min Unwanted Sexual Behaviours lecture a few days ago and even after all this media frenzy, after all the many briefs they had before, there was still plenty of eye-rolling & muttering amongst some of the folks there.
So this forum also seems to attract a lot of useless white males then?
Associate
So this forum also seems to attract a lot of useless white males then?When I joined in 85, we were told that only 25% of applicants were taken on, as there was mahoosive unemployment at the time. 22 years was enough though, and 8 months down the Falkland Islands box ticked.
Guilty as charged!
I’d have left last year and taken the pension but I’ve got a small return of service to do for a qualification. Done plenty of time away, sandy and not so sandy, but only 12 hours in the Falklands…
Man of Honour
What's most shocking about this leak is the fact that it isn't at all shocking. Still only the tip of the iceberg I fear.
Talking of Falklands, did any of you boys get to a mountain site, or "camp"?
Talking of Falklands, did any of you boys get to a mountain site, or "camp"?
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Been in nearly 15 years myself. I wouldn't join up nowadays if i was in the position to do so. We're in an absolute mess because too many people are career focused rather than mission focused. I enjoy my job, like the location, though starting to dislike the current organisation.