The Canadian Armed Forces has received more than 21,000 applications from permanent residents eager to join the chronically understaffed military full time — but CBC News has learned that less than 100 of them have made it into the regular force in the year since they were allowed to sign up.
No shit they lost interest… 18-24 months is ridiculous.
The Minister of Defense’s suggestion to accept them on a probationary basis makes a lot of sense; do a quick scan for international crime/terror lists and a Canadian criminal records check, then maybe a phone call with a Canadian citizen who can confirm their identity? idk, but that ought to be quick and should catch most, then don’t give them access to classified data or unsupervised postings until they pass a full security clearance.
Yeah even the normal recruitment process for some positions can be slow af even for normal citizens compared to civilian jobs.
It’s one of the single biggest, if not the biggest, impediments to military recruitment right now. Someone really has to get it through to the people running the recruitment process that applicants can’t just sit around for six months waiting to find out if they have a job. That ain’t how shit works.
When I tried just a couple years ago it was 6 or 7 months before I got a follow up. It’s also not intended for people with children, at all. They told me it would be at least 1 year of mandatory barracks living with multiple locations during that time, some for as short as 3 months.
Ultimately I decided against because I have young children and I didn’t want to miss that much time, knowing I’d be physically and mentally drained on weekends which would possibly be the only time I might be able to see them.
Happy I didn’t pursue it further because I landed the career change I was seeking in the private sector instead with a much higher starting wage and I’m home after work every day.
