Non Serving Family Responses As a spouse/partner, what’s the


19% hardest aspect of life with the RAF? 11% 10% 10% 9% 6% 2%


Managing your own career


Finding


employment that matches


your skills and aspirations


Wanting to work and not being able to


Constantly having to


move about following your


spouse/ partner


Living


away from each other during the week for family stability


Finding the right childcare


Not


having enough money


2% Having


your own house but not being able to live in it


for Service reasons


Again, there was palpable annoyance that the MoD appeared unable or resistant to move with the times and that flexibility and inclusiveness were key to retain the best people within the RAF. Many also commented on what they felt is a lack of communication between the RAF and themselves. For those in SFA there was a degree of nervousness surrounding FAM and what was seen by families as another dilution and cost saving measure at their expense, without due recognition of the real challenges of ‘mobility’. Again, this perhaps indicates that the messages about new initiatives within the MoD People Programme are not reaching all families in a timely way.


The


children’s education


The


quality of your service accom- modation


Other 6% 12% 11%


uOverseas service


• 65% are interested in an overseas assignment • With 34% recommending a 3-5 year tour length


The results were very similar to those of serving personnel, with 2/3 rds of respondents remaining open to the idea of an overseas posting. However, there was again significant negative comment from those who had already served overseas.


The lack of spouse/partner employment opportunities in many overseas locations, house


ownership and not wishing to ‘rent out’ the family home while serving overseas and the loss of joint income not being matched by allowances etc were common ‘deciders’ against an overseas posting. The opportunity for a new experience and more family time together were mentioned regularly as the main reasons for volunteering.


16


www.raf-ff.org.uk


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