Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what support his Department gives to spouses of service personnel to help them find employment following their spouse's relocation.

The Ministry of Defence (MOD) recognises that the mobile nature of Service life can create difficulties for spouses and partners of Service personnel wishing to maintain active employment and a career, especially when posted overseas. The MOD continues to work on a number of initiatives to provide job readiness and tailored employability support that focus on removing barriers that hinder spouses and partners finding employment. The Armed Forces Families Strategy, launched in January 2016, places partner employment as a priority and will look to how the MOD can influence the relationship between partner employment and the retention of Service personnel.

The MOD’s Partner Employment Programme has three pillars:

The Spousal Employment Support Trial – this provides tailored employment and employability support, on a two year trial basis from October 2015, and is administered by Right Management Limited as part of the wider Career Transition Partnership (CTP) Contract. The trial is currently taking place overseas in Cyprus for 240 spouses and across several Royal Air Force locations in the UK for 200 spouses. The trial is ahead of schedule for enabling 440 spouses/partners to take up the opportunity of a £879 training grant.

Wolverhampton Business Start Up Programme – “Supporting the Unsung Hero” is a business start-up programme specifically designed for Armed Forces families. It provides transferrable skills and the ability to start a business over a 10 month programme for Service personnel, spouses and dependents of Regulars/Reserves and Veterans. Courses have been delivered both in the UK and overseas. By the end of phase two 199 course participants had set up their own business. The programme received two grants of LIBOR funding totalling £324,000 and subsequent support of £606,000 from HSBC to continue this work until 2020.

Royal British Legion Industries Lifeworks Families – LIBOR funding of £241,000 provides Employability coaching services to develop key skills, CV writing, increase confidence and motivation and identify career and training opportunities. Over three years this initiative has assisted over 750 spouses and dependants across UK, Germany and Cyprus of serving/recently discharged Regulars and Reserves. The programme will continue until 2019 post LIBOR funding, with funding secured from the Royal British Legion, Annington Homes and Greenwich Hospital.

In addition to these three pillars, Defence Relationship Management (DRM) continues to increase the number of organisations and employers making the pledge to support the Armed Forces Covenant (there are currently over 1,300 signatories). DRM account managers encourage employers to review their HR policies to assist spousal employment and a number are doing so through the Service Families Federation channels.