Migrant Dad’s Army can replace Rwanda scheme

I advance the fol­low­ing sug­ges­tion as a solu­tion to the UK’s chronic immig­ra­tion prob­lem if it works — or as a solu­tion to the mil­it­ary recruit­ment prob­lem if it does not work (Report, Feb­ru­ary 6).

Scrap the egre­gious and divis­ive Rwanda scheme and instead con­script all male immig­rants between the age of 18 and 35 into a mil­it­ary hold­ing force for six to nine months, dur­ing which period they are sub­ject to mil­it­ary dis­cip­line and wear uni­form.

They would still be pro­cessed by the Home Office, would learn to speak Eng­lish and to assim­il­ate Brit­ish his­tory. Although tech­nic­ally in the armed forces they can elect to con­duct use­ful social work if they can demon­strate genu­ine con­scien­tious objec­tion. If this does not deter immig­ra­tion (which I am con­fid­ent it will) the prob­lem of fall­ing mil­it­ary recruit­ment would be solved!

Algy Cluff
St Mar­garet’s Bay, Kent, UK