National Service? It was aimless and boring

02/08/2007

Your readers who recall National Service as a time of character building and being taught a useful trade mystify me.

 

No doubt a lucky few had this experience but for thousands like me they were two years of aimless boredom. We hitch-hiked home on Friday nights for decent meals at home and fretted because two years on paltry army pay left you penniless at a time when most young men planned marriage.

 

Girls were conscripted in the war and served their country well but this ceased after 1945. Wasn't this blatant sexual discrimination ?

 

Richard Blackwell