News - Armed Forces LGBT Conferences

The report below is a write-up of the wide-ranging discussion which took place amongst British Army participants at the Jan 07 Armed Forces LGBT Conference.

SOME NOTES ON THE TOPICS DISCUSSED IN THE ARMY BREAK OUT SESSION AT THE 2007 FORCES LGB CONFERENCE

During the Jan 2007 Tri Service LGB conference separate single service break out sessions took place. This note summarises the topics discussed in the Army session.

Please note it is my views of what was discussed and contributions from others who were there and those who couldn’t attend would be welcome.

Representation

Army representation at the conference was pretty low compared with the other two services. We had a total of four people plus the SO2 E&D from DM (A) at Upavon, Maj Liz Nelson. That said, those who did attend had spoken as widely as they could with friends and colleagues and were able to put forward a range of views.

One of the key areas we talked about was how to encourage more people from all parts of the Army to participate and put their point of view forward.

We noted that the Navy had had the basis of a representational group for some time now. Much of the work had been done by Lt Cdr Craig Jones but there were a significant number of other people involved at a range of rank levels. This was evident at the conference which was very well attended and where there was a particularly good representation by junior ranks.

The RAF have recently set up the basis of a similar representational group, and the conference was well attended by RAF personnel of all ranks.

The Army has no such group and conference attendance was poor.

Monitoring and Continuous Attitude Survey

The RN are keen to pursue the topic of monitoring of the number of LGB personnel in the Service by use of a new field they would like to set up on JPA. The information would only be accessible by a very few staff in the E&D team.

The considered Army view was that in principle this might be a good idea but that in the Army there would have to be a serious buy-in by senior commanders, significant reassurances that the information would be securely held and could only be accessed by a very few staff in the E&D team (not the RSM!) and there were issues relating to access to JPA terminals by junior ranks.

We generally considered the proposal to put some questions relating to sexual orientation into the Continuous Attitude Survey to be more of a short term benefit. These questions would allow the stats people to cross refer data about bullying, career fulfilment, retention etc to the numbers of LBG personnel.

Marching in Uniform at Pride

This was a hot topic. Last year the Navy were the only one of the three services to march in uniform. It seems the Navy have decided they will again be marching at Pride in uniform.

I was initially a sceptic about this but was very impressed by the case put forward by the Navy E&D team, that this had been wholly positive for the Navy as it had:

• Been good for recruiting (they have real recruiting office enquiry stats to prove this) .

• Sent out a positive message about E& D for gay people in the forces to the outside world and

• Had sent a very important message to the rest of the Navy that they were serious about this stuff and that very senior commanders were on side.

For this year it looks like the RAF will be reconsidering their position and it could change. Importantly they now have a team ready to take on the organisation of an RAF contingent and I feel would be able to pull it off well.

The Army will reconsider but the outcome is uncertain. Currently we would be hampered because we do not really have enough senior people willing to take on the organising. Another interesting point is that for the RAF and Navy it is not really possible to easily tell which unit a person in uniform is from. If the Army was marching in best kit, individual regimental identity of those involved would be very obvious (cue pictures of the first gay Para etc).

Personally I was convinced we should march in uniform (although to be honest don’t feel I would do it) as the worst situation is for the other two services to do it and the Army not. There would however be quite a bit of work for someone to take on to organise it and buy-in from the Army Board would be critical.

Stonewall Diversity Champions

The Navy has been signed up with Stonewall for some time and spoke of positive results. The RAF have recently done so (at a cost of £1600 per year – somewhat less than the figures reported in the press.)

The Navy reported a real positive effect on recruitment. In particular advertising in sections of the gay press and in the Stonewall diversity employers’ handbook.
In general we thought that the Army would suffer on the recruitment side (especially in the area where it competes head to head with the other services for recruits such as qualified medical personnel and technicians) and generally in terms of its E&D image if the other two services were committed to the Stonewall diversity programme and it was not.

Incidentally I found the presentation by Stonewall excellent – they put forward a real economic business case for employers to get involved.
Maj Nelson undertook to invite Stonewall over to Upavon to present to senior officers in DM(A).

Conference

It was generally agreed it would be a positive step forward if the Conference next year was to be truly tri-service and that a senior Army officer (one or two star level) was invited to speak at the opening session.

Publicity

One of the key issues everyone was concerned about was publicity.

In Army specific terms we highlighted that many Junior Army personnel have difficulty getting access to the internet in a private environment and so have difficulty getting access to advice on LGB issues such as through the P2S web site.

Bullying and Harassment

Maj Nelson noted that the Army had no stats to suggest that homophobic bullying or harassment was a big issue, although all agreed it was undoubtedly going on at some level.

We later heard from two members of the service medical services who were able to talk about a number of cases of bullying and stress involving junior soldiers they had been involved with which were generally homophobic and which in several cases had resulted in individuals harming themselves
Note – The RAF Gp Capt is taking forward action to discus this with the Service medical authorities and try and get some more background on the scale of the problem.

Next Steps

It was agreed we need to do more to encourage representation from all areas of the Army LGB community.

We will try and hold a feedback session as part of social functions.

you can contact the author of this report via the proud2serve.net public forum as SimonB