Question to the Cabinet Office:

To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what steps have been taken to bring together all service leaver and veteran life chances schemes in the civil service under the central management of Going Forward Into Employment.

The Going Forward into Employment (GFiE) Life Chance scheme provides opportunities for those who face barriers to employment, and who would struggle to compete on the basis of fair and open competition without further training and support. Through the use of an exception (2) in the Recruitment Principles 2018, we are able to use innovative approaches to recruit individuals on Fixed Term Appointments, which may lead to the option of being made permanent.

The Veterans scheme, launched by GFiE in 2019, provides all departments with the ability to employ Veterans or Military Partners & Spouses into real roles. In addition, a single departmental scheme (run out of HMRC) was developed to support Service Leavers and in December 2021, this was brought into the GFiE delivery model, allowing it to be delivered centrally, but more importantly, it has now been made available for all departments to utilise.

We continue to grow the scheme and do more, with the introduction of GFiE targets announced in the Office for Veteran Affairs Strategic Action Plan from April 2022. This will help provide an increasing number of Life Chance opportunities and help to make the Civil Service a great place to work for Veterans.