Thread: Social workers to operate alongside the Army

London (AP) — Britain's Gordon Brown says a new 1,000-strong pool of civilian specialists will provide expert help to failing states and countries that have suffered conflict or natural disasters

And how does that make you feel!!!!!!!!!!!
Another GB warm and fuzzy plan

Did Gordon Brown take into account that there is a chronic shortage of social workers in the UK and the profession is well under recruited on social work courses at Universities???

Where are these 1000 staff going to come from?????

Christ, we don't have enough social workers to cope with the problems in this country, how the hell are they going to cope with other countries problems? I really do hope this is a wind up.

Originally Posted by dangerousdave

Did Gordon Brown take into account that there is a chronic shortage of social workers in the UK and the profession is well under recruited on social work courses at Universities???

Where are these 1000 staff going to come from?????

I think a lot of ex squaddies could return the favour and become social workers. That would make for an interesting doley interview, "so basically smithy you need to get a job you lazy bugg*r" Oh aye that would work.

Originally Posted by pimpernel

London (AP) — Britain's Gordon Brown says a new 1,000-strong pool of civilian specialists will provide expert help to failing states and countries that have suffered conflict or natural disasters

And how does that make you feel!!!!!!!!!!!
Another GB warm and fuzzy plan

Exactly where does "civilian specialist" become "social worker" ?

I'd guess that they are actually talking about engineers, technicians, medics ?

One of the major criticisms levelled at the operations in Iraq and Afghanistan is that we (and others) were woefully unprepared for the reconstruction and humanitarian assistance necessary after the initial invasions - something that may have cut-back the insurgencies that followed. Stories about the 'interesting' way that DFID operates alonside the military are legion so surely having a pool of civilian specialists more closely integrated with the army is something to be welcomed?

Originally Posted by pimpernel

London (AP) — Britain's Gordon Brown says a new 1,000-strong pool of civilian specialists will provide expert help to failing states and countries that have suffered conflict or natural disasters

And how does that make you feel!!!!!!!!!!!
Another GB warm and fuzzy plan

ONLY social workers ffs, what about "elf & safti", pc, racial diversity training & "uman rites" & all the other shite he has inflicted on us?
You have to wonder what a...hole thought that up
Got to stop, me bloodpressure is going through the roof!

Originally Posted by wedge35

One of the major criticisms levelled at the operations in Iraq and Afghanistan is that we (and others) were woefully unprepared for the reconstruction and humanitarian assistance necessary after the initial invasions - something that may have cut-back the insurgencies that followed. Stories about the 'interesting' way that DFID operates alonside the military are legion so surely having a pool of civilian specialists more closely integrated with the army is something to be welcomed?

Yes but it was ever thus.

USMC Combined Action in Vietnam (probably most successful initiative of the war, won over the locals and kept the VC away, could have won it for them if they rolled it out bigtime) was derided as 'welfare work' by the big battalions doing the ever-so-productive search and destroy.

With substate conflict and insurgency seeming to be the main threat, I'd argue we need more of this sort of civil action thing to stop populations getting pished off with us and win them over. Even better if we integrate the locals into it.

I suspect that this is one of those fatal attempts to keep all the balls in the air at the same time, by creating a joint MoD/DfID programme...

As with most of the major programmes of this sort, it's doomed to failure, I'm afraid.

Great .... the same dysfunctional, lazy, thick, bureaucratic, bigotted, grossly overpaid mongs that some of us met on TELIC in 2003.

Army does all the work, they sit around in endless meetings talking about it and referring to us as "the enemy". Great, really look forward to that.

See the Clare Short thread for details.

Here is the text off the full article, taken from http://www.the-daily-politics.com/ho...gside-the-army

Originally Posted by Associated Press

.London (AP) — Britain's Gordon Brown says a new 1,000-strong pool of civilian specialists will provide expert help to failing states and countries that have suffered conflict or natural disasters.

Brown said Tuesday that Britain's civilian stabilization group is now established — almost two years after he first announced plans to create the group.

Members include economists, governance experts, lawyers and police trainers. They will work alongside military and humanitarian experts.

Brown says the new force will be able to deploy in 24 hours, and bolster work in places including Afghanistan, Iraq and Sudan.

He confirmed civilian experts are traveling to Haiti to help rebuild prisons and assist the World Bank in identifying priority projects.

Copyright 2010 The Associated Press.

Doesn't even mention social workers, let alone 1,000 of them. As I said before, it seems likely that the group has been established to address the kind of problems that were encountered on Telic. Would doing nothing and suffering the same problems next time be a better plan then?

I thought this sounded familiar!
Basically its a bolt on to the established Stabilisation Unit.

http://www.fco.gov.uk/en/news/latest...+RSS+feed%2529

The Civilian Stabilisation Group (CSG) is a thousand-strong pool of civilians requested by the Prime Minister. These individuals have been specially selected for their experience across the public, private, civil and military sectors.

They have the knowledge and expertise to support countries as they try to re-establish peace and security. This pool of people will ensure we are able to deploy the right people, to the right place at the right time to help rebuild fragile states and countries affected by conflict.

The Stabilisation Unit is an inter-departmental UK Government unit that helps improve the UK's ability to support countries emerging from violent conflict. It is jointly owned by the FCO, the Department for International Development (DFID) and Ministry of Defence (MOD) – its three 'parent departments'.

Originally Posted by Associated Press

.London (AP) — Britain's Gordon Brown says a new 1,000-strong pool of civilian specialists will provide expert help to failing states and countries that have suffered conflict or natural disasters.

Good, can we start with the UK then?

Originally Posted by Markintime

Originally Posted by Associated Press

.London (AP) — Britain's Gordon Brown says a new 1,000-strong pool of civilian specialists will provide expert help to failing states and countries that have suffered conflict or natural disasters.

Good, can we start with the UK then?

Better start with Scotland then

Originally Posted by wedge35

Doesn't even mention social workers, let alone 1,000 of them. As I said before, it seems likely that the group has been established to address the kind of problems that were encountered on Telic. Would doing nothing and suffering the same problems next time be a better plan then?

Good and valid point but I have to ask myself why we need to look at this now, are we thinking of overthrowing another regime we don't like?