This petition was submitted during the 2010-2015 parliament
Petition Raise Armed Forces entrance age to 21
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It is considered that a child soldier is a person below the age of 18 who is a member of or attached to government armed forces (recruited in any way), or any other regular or irregular armed force.
Currently, anyone may enlist in the Armed Forces at 16 with parental consent. Although they will only commence Phase 1 training, they are still connected with the Armed Forces and can be considered as child soldiers; the UK has ratified the Rights of a Child CS policy.
The main reasons people agree with the current policy, according to statistics, are that younger soldiers have less commitments and are easier to train. These reasons don't outweigh those against younger soldiers: less ability to judge risk, moral conflictions, lack of previous responsibility and higher suicide and death rates.
The outcome of this petition ideally would be the government raising the Armed Forces entrance age to 21.
This petition is closed This petition ran for 6 months
8 signatures
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10,000 signatures required to get a government response