Better accommodation for Service personnel should be a key priority
Accommodation for Service personnel and their families should not be in the state it currently is. The Defence Committee report into Service Family Accommodation (SFA) shows that urgent action is needed to ensure decent accommodation for Service personnel.
It is morally objectionable that those who are serving this country are having to live in damp and mouldy conditions.
The Defence Infrastructure Organisation (DIO), which is responsible for maintaining and servicing accommodation, must do more to resolve problems with damp and mould. It should be a matter of high priority.
Understandably some Service families will have lost trust in the DIO with the Defence Committee report calling the standards of accommodation “shocking”. Improvements in the Defence estate need to be noticeable to the families. There also needs to be a timeline for remediation work to be completed.
As the report highlights, families need better communication about maintenance work.
Money is obviously tight now with every Government department facing constraints. However, it is clear that if accommodation is to be brought up to scratch, then it will require investment. Current levels of funding are evidently not sufficient.
Doing so now would be better than waiting for the estate to deteriorate beyond repair.
Labour cannot just shift the blame onto the Tories with the report noting that since the change of Government there has been no new announcement on Service accommodation allocation, leaving some families in limbo.
Brave servicemen and women do not deserve this. Little wonder that morale is so low and recruitment low.