Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, whether he plans to review the criteria for which applications to join the British Army are rejected on medical grounds.

This Government inherited a recruitment crisis, with targets being missed every year for the past 14 years, and is taking decisive action to get recruitment back on track. This has included the largest pay rise to personnel in decades and scrapping 100 outdated policies that slow recruitment down.

Defence is committed to a diverse workforce and is seeking to ‘select in’ rather than ‘select out’ and is focused on work to review the current policies for Armed Forces recruiting.

An update to Joint Service Publication (JSP) 950 Leaflet 6-7-7, which outlines the medical entry standard for the Armed Forces, was published in August 2024 following an intensive period of review undertaken by clinical experts, Defence personnel staff and the recruiting agencies. Recent updates to policy include; new regulations for a range of conditions including asthma and eczema, and candidates with Autism Spectrum Disorder may now be able to join the Armed Forces providing they meet certain criteria.