Melantha Chittenden, Author at Red Brick

Not just in November

Remembrance Day gives us pause to reflect on the contributions made by those who have served or currently serve in our armed forces. It is more than anything, an opportunity to remember those who sacrificed everything for our freedom.

It is important we also think about how we, as a country, want to support our veterans not just in November, but all year round.

The Coronavirus pandemic has shown that our armed forces keep us safe in so many more ways than we can even imagine. It was the armed forces that were deployed to test people at the start of the crisis and who ensured that vital supply chains kept running. Even more recently, the army will be drafted in to help support with deliveries during the fuel crisis.

Given how each of us benefits from the safety our armed forces community provides, it should be seen as a responsibility and a duty of all of us to support the armed forces in any way that we can.

In the UK today, there are around 320,000 people without a home. Of those without a home, the Royal British Legion claim that 6,000 are men and women who served this country as a member of our armed forces.

Earlier this year, we hosted a fringe event at Labour Party Conference with SME4Labour on how we can tackle homelessness amongst veterans. At that event, the Labour Housing Group highlighted that the pandemic has shown us exactly what is wrong with our housing market.

At the same event, Sarah Church, former armed forces personnel, spoke about how many veterans feel a shock to the system when leaving the army after serving for decades. What is needed, she said, is support to help with the military to civilian transition. It is because of this that Community is committed to campaigning year-round to support our armed forces.

As part of our campaigning, Community has ran, walked and cycled to raise money for a local charity to help end veteran homelessness and between us we raised over £6,000.

We have created a bespoke learning and training offer for veterans and have been setting up bespoke learning plans, and our members up and down the country have been collecting warm winter clothes, toiletries and other necessities to support veterans. We offer skills courses such as CV writing exclusively to veterans, to support them in the military/civilian transition and equip them with skills needed for everyday life.

Earlier this year, Community resigned the Armed Forces Covenant to reaffirm our commitment to the armed forces community.

We want to ensure that those members of the armed forces community who are currently employed by us or will be in the future have the conditions and working environment that suits their needs and their service.

Another one of our renewed commitments is to encourage those employers where Community is the recognised union to also take the step to sign the Armed Forces Covenant.

As a first proactive step to standing true to that commitment, we have written to every employer we have a good relationship with and asked them to sign up to the Armed Forces Covenant.

Community also intend, as part of our campaign to end veteran homelessness, to continue to work alongside the armed forces to secure better protections and extended rights for those currently serving or who have served.

As part of a broad coalition of organisations and individuals working together, we will ensure that no one who has served our country ends up on our streets, and instead is offered safety and protection and for those who want it – good quality, highly skilled employment and the safety net that provides in every aspect of life.

Community will be continuing to work with a wide range of organisations and will make supporting our veterans part of the core of our campaigning work. We pledge to support our veterans, not just in November, but all year round.

Melantha Chittenden

Head of Communications and Media at Community Union.

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It is time to end the national scandal of veterans without homes

In the UK today, there are around 320,000 people without a home.

Homelessness comes in many different forms; some people are sleeping rough on the streets while others may be staying on friends’ sofas or staying in a hostel long-term.

Of those without a home, 6000 are men and women who served this country as a member of our armed forces, only to find themselves experiencing some form of homelessness.

The reasons for this are complex, often stemming in a difficulty in adapting to civilian life after years spent with a strict regimented lifestyle.

We know that veterans are disproportionately likely to be impacted by a wide range of challenging and often intersecting issues such as post-traumatic stress disorder, drug and/or alcohol misuse, depression and other mental health problems.

These, coupled a difficulty in entering the civilian jobs market are major factors that go some way to explaining veteran homelessness.

Even before the pandemic struck, many veterans were slipping through the net or finding themselves without any form of support. They are often unable to be supported by mainstream homelessness charities not equipped to meet their needs, thus turn to often cash-strapped local councils.

We often think of our armed forces as protecting us from external threats, keeping us safe and secure from those who wish to harm us or our way of life.

Yet as if we needed reminding any more, the Coronavirus pandemic has shown that our armed forces keep us safe in so many more ways than we can even imagine.

It was the armed forces that were deployed to test people at the start of the crisis, who ensured that vital supply chains kept running and who are helping to secure the effective roll-out of the vaccine.

At Community’s biennial delegate conference in 2019, members of the union came together to decide our priorities for the year ahead. Delegates took the decision that ending veteran homelessness should be a priority campaign for us going forward.

We wanted to support those who have given so much to us as a country. We ran, walked and cycled to raise money for a local charity to help end veteran homelessness and between us we raised over £6,000.

We created a bespoke learning and training offer for veterans to improve their employability, and we successfully managed to change Labour Party policy. Our members up and down the country have been collecting warm winter clothes, toiletries and other necessities to support veterans.

We will never be able to thank the servicemen and women who have served us at home and overseas fully. However, the very least we can do is ensure that they have a roof over their head and a bed to sleep in at night.

One way we can all work to end veteran homelessness is to encourage more organisations to sign up to the Armed Forces Covenant. The Covenant is a promise by the employers to ensure that those who serve or who have served in the armed forces, and their families, have equal opportunities including at work, and when applying for jobs.

The government have a key role to play too and they must not miss the opportunity presented by the Armed Forces Bill. They should use the Bill to set measurable, national standards and empower local authorities to deliver including by providing ring fenced funding to councils for specialised mental health and substance misuse support services.

Every government and every political party talk a big game when it comes to supporting our armed forces. Now is the time to deliver, and the time to end this national scandal once and for all.

Melantha Chittenden

Melantha Chittenden is Head of Communications and Media at Community trade union and leads on the unions priority campaign on ending veteran homelessness.

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