A word from AFF Chief Executive Collette Musgrave…
I’d like to thank everyone who took the time to complete our Your Army Life survey. We have had more than a thousand responses, and many of you provided detailed comments on your experiences of all aspects of life as an army family.
This evidence is incredibly important in the work that we do to inform and influence the army, Ministry of Defence and wider government about the issues that matter to you. Helping them to understand what you need to live the modern family life of your choice can make a real difference.
We saw lots of questions in your survey responses about the Defence Accommodation Strategy (announced in October), and the associated Future Accommodation Model.
While many of you welcome the extension of entitlement to housing for those in established long-term relationships (LTRE), you have lots of questions about how it will work in practice. You want to understand how Service Family Accommodation (SFA) will be allocated – particularly in locations where there is already a shortage of quarters.
There are concerns about how the rising cost of living could affect your family decisions about how and where you live in the future. Will you be able to move into the private rental sector or will the cost of rent in many areas of the UK prohibit this? Will rising interest rates mean that owning your home or moving to a different one has to be put on hold?
And for those of you who are currently overseas or know that you have an overseas posting coming up, there are questions about how this will work. Will there be a level playing field or will LTRE families lose their new-found entitlement if they are posted outside of the UK?
More details are needed for newly entitled families with additional needs, so they can understand, for example, how the adaptations process will work.
We are asking all of these questions on your behalf as we know how important it is to have the information you need to be able to plan – as much as you can!