Employer Recognition Scheme Awards
The Defence Secretary has introduced the winners of this year's Employer Recognition Awards.
I바카라 사이트檓 delighted to be here and it바카라 사이트檚 a great honour to have Prince Harry joining us fresh from a triumphant Invictus Games and from raising awareness of mental health issues in the Armed Forces earlier today.
We are, Your Royal Highness, incredibly fortunate to have someone with such immense energy and enthusiasm working on our Armed Forces바카라 사이트� behalf.
It바카라 사이트檚 also a privilege to meet in this iconic museum, currently celebrating its centenary. If you get the chance, wander the halls.
There you바카라 사이트檒l find our national story documented in deeds of outstanding courage from Gallipoli and the Battle of Britain, to our exploits in the Atlantic during the Cold War.
Among the modern day exhibits you바카라 사이트檒l find extraordinarily mementos of sheer courage such as Johnson Beharry바카라 사이트檚 Victoria Cross, the first Victoria Cross awarded in the 21st century, to a soldier who twice survived hits by rocket propelled grenades who despite his own injuries and showing complete disregard for his own safety then saved his comrades from the fire.
Today, as Your Royal Highness knows, our forces are serving on operations in more than 25 countries.
They바카라 사이트檙e helping fragile democracies from Afghanistan to Iraq, supporting peacekeeping in Somalia and South Sudan, and leading in NATO with troops in Estonia and Poland. Our planes protecting the Black Sea Skies, and our ships of the Royal Navy leading NATO바카라 사이트檚 maritime task groups.
No praise can be high enough for them. Nor for those who go out of their way to support them.
So today whether you hail from the public or private sector whether you바카라 사이트檙e in a business employing fewer than 10 people or more than 500 people, I바카라 사이트檇 like to thank you all.
First, for supporting our Reserves. For giving those civic minded citizens more than flexibility to train or to go on deployment but for giving them also encouragement and recognition. It is your support has enabled us to increase our Reserve numbers by 1,280 up almost 4 per cent since last year with our total trained and untrained strength now standing at 36,580.
Second, I want to thank you for what you바카라 사이트檙e doing for our veterans. Laing O Rourke and Build Force are attracting service leavers into the building trade. North West Ambulance Service, one of four blue light organisations to scoop gold, is helping veterans retrain as ambulance drivers.
Transport for London and Airbus are offering placements to wounded, injured and sick soldiers. And Combat pest control a small business that doesn바카라 사이트檛 just free homes from household menaces but provides assistance to children from Afghanistan to Africa is a workforce entirely composed of veterans.
Thirdly, thank you for the help you바카라 사이트檙e giving to our wider Armed Forces families.
Sodexo is actively welcoming military spouses into its workforce, allowing spouses to transfer to different sites when their partners are deployed or posted elsewhere. X-forces are helping veterans and their partners into work. And Manpower are giving free employability sessions to spouses living on Salisbury Plain.
Yet those efforts, for our reserves, our veterans, our families don바카라 사이트檛 account for why the people in this hall now hold gold.
The reason you바카라 사이트檙e listed among our elite 80 employers is because you바카라 사이트檙e also superb advocates leading by example showing that employing Reservists and veterans simply makes business sense.
We have here amongst us Corporal Ian Taylor. A systems integration and test engineer for General Dynamics. His Royal Highness will know him well.
He바카라 사이트檚 just back from the Invictus Games in Toronto, where he not only competed in swimming, powerlifting and rowing, he not only set a personal best, but won silver in the breast stroke.
Who wouldn바카라 사이트檛 want to employ someone with such grit and guts, determination and drive in their company too?
Your collective efforts have encouraged more and more companies to commit to the Armed Forces Covenant.
Today we have more than 1900 companies that have signed up 바카라 사이트� and we are on track to hit 2000 soon.
Back in 1920 at the official opening of Imperial War Museum its founder Sir Alfred Mond declared the museum would not be a 바카라 사이트渕onument of military glory, but a record of toil and sacrifice바카라 사이트� wherein all would find 바카라 사이트渁n example or illustration of the sacrifice he or she made바카라 사이트�.
So today, alongside sacrifice we record the service of great employers. As years to come, as the threats against us intensify, we will increasingly look to our wider Armed Forces family to help us manage all those demands and pressures.
But with your example, inspiring the businesses of the future to follow in your footsteps, I am very confident that our Armed Forces family will continue to thrive.