Thanks to N who sent us an email this morning with the comment, ‘This beggars belief!’
The women in question have fully recovered from their injuries, yet will still be receiving £100,000 each, more than the maximum compensation for someone who receives injuries expected to reduce life expectancy by five years (£90,000). The taxpayer will also be paying the associated legal costs, which are expected to be similar.
This case related to the RAF, but with respect to the Army it really is about time we had (in the interests of gender equality) all-female military units, and sent them to fight in the front line. After all they get the same salaries as men of the same ranks, so why should they not be expected to take the same risks? When they’ve been wiped out, then we can send in male soldiers and expect a reasonable chance of successful engagement with the enemy.
What we have is the same old story for women in many lines of work across the public sector – equal pay for unequal work, risk, unsocial hours etc. Why are the vast majority of bomb disposal experts men? Is the evil patriarchy preventing women from going into this line of work? Ha.
The Navy isn’t immune from this madness. It was reported last year that Britain’s nuclear submarines are being modified at a cost of over £5 million each to accommodate a small number of female crew. What’s the betting that within a year of two we’ll have the first case of underwater immaculate conception, and a nuclear submarine will have to dock to offload the woman in question?