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London [UK]Aug. 20 (ANI/Sputnik): All reports of positive discrimination in the Royal Air Force (RAF) will be investigated, British Defense Secretary James Hippey said on Saturday.
Earlier, British media quoted people familiar with the matter as saying that the RAF was blocking the recruitment of white men to achieve minority and female diversity goals. “No Minister of Defence and the head of any department must break the law. So if there is evidence of positive discrimination, the person responsible for it will be held severely,” Heappey told Sky News.
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He confirmed that the ministry did ask the armed forces to consider aggressive action to improve diversity in the workplace, however, lowering standards and operational impact is unacceptable.
“It is absolutely not true that the recruitment of white men is suspended in any way. It is absolutely not true that women and minorities are now being trained while white men are not,” the minister added. Earlier this week, the head of RAF recruitment resigned in protest at meeting an “impossible” diversity target this year, Sky News reported.
In 2015, the UK government set a recruitment target for all armed forces to reach 10% of minority recruits and 15% of female recruits by 2020. In March 2021, the RAF announced it had surpassed that target, reaching 20% of female recruits, according to Sky News, citing the army, which could not be verified based on RAF statistics, which showed they only recruited 18.5% of women, and there are no data on ethnic minorities.
Responding to the allegations, an RAF spokesman said operational efficiency was paramount to the Armed Forces and standards had never been lowered. (ANI/Sputnik)
(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from the Syndicated News feed, the body of the content may not have been modified or edited by LatestLY staff)
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