FEDERATION NEWS The RAF Families Federation Working hard on your behalf R
AF Families Federation activity continues apace. We are running three surveys this year: The first ran in
February and March and was entitled ‘The Armed Forces Covenant – is it all it’s cracked up to be?’. We asked for views on a number of Covenant- related issues, including children’s education, spouse employment and awareness of the Covenant itself. As well as putting the survey online, we also took the survey to RAF’s Brize Norton, Benson and St Mawgan to collect data and meet face-to-face with personnel and their families. The survey report showing the results is now on our website.
Our second survey on pay, allowances and quality of RAF life runs until early July and we have visited Marham, Halton and Lossiemouth to run workshops with RAF personnel and their families, in July we go to Cyprus. The third survey will focus on the response to the New Employment Model (NEM) consultation process taking place over the summer, to
which we have been invited to contribute by the MoD. The New Employment Model will see huge changes in many areas across the three Services, representing probably the most ambitious review the MoD has undertaken for at least 40 years, so our involvement in communicating future arrangements is both important and welcome.
Of course, we continue to gather evidence from families across the RAF who have raised concerns on issues affecting them. There have been too many housing-related cases in the past. However these are beginning to diminish as the web-based system allowing families to indicate a preference for a house becomes more effective in its operation and improvements in others areas, especially in maintenance of the houses, begin to bite. This is, of course, very welcome but we are also seeing a rise in the number of more complex cases, where the housing issue is the cause of a series of other, related welfare problems.
The Armed Forces Covenant LIBOR funding the Federation has received from the
Chancellor, (created from the £35million of fines paid by banks after some employees were found to have attempted to fix the banking LIBOR system) has provided us with additional funds over a two year period to help assess implementation and report back on progress. The additional task complements our core business and our support to the RAF.
In other business, the Director RAF Families Federation has appeared before the House of Commons Defence Committee to submit evidence on Service Children’s Education; attended the Cabinet Office Armed Forces Covenant Reference Group; met with the Minister of State for Defence Personnel, Welfare and Veterans, Mr Mark Francois MP, briefed the new Chief of Defence Personnel, Lt Gen Gregory, on key issues, briefed at the RAF Station Warrant Officers’ Conference and attended numerous meetings with RAF, MoD and DIO staffs. It’s been an especially busy period for the whole team!
Finally, the competitive renewal process for our contract (due May 14) has begun.
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