Dwindling British Army now smaller than Britain’s vast number of traffic wardens, who patrol streets nationwide seeking improperly parked cars to ticket, a report states.
An industry survey finds the number of people working in parking enforcement — traffic wardens, in other words — is stable at 82,000, as it has been for over a decade, reports The Daily Telegraph.
Yet in that time the size of the British Army has collapsed through endless rounds of budget cuts and a permanent recruitment crisis, calling from some 110,000 at the beginning of the last decade to some 73,000 now. The United Kingdom now has more traffic wardens than professional soldiers, almost certainly for the first time ever.
The Armed Forces in total still tops the parking ticket brigade, but only if all arms are counted. Between regulars and reservists, and the Navy, Army, and Air Force, there are some 180,000 servicemen in all.
Yet as reported earlier this month, even that is crushed by the sheer volume of illegal boat migrant arrivals. Since the start of the boat crisis back in 2018, well north of 181,000 alleged refugees have crossed the English Channel, outmanning the military.
Think tank Migration Watch said at the time of the data release that the sheer numbers involved and the fact the fast majority of arrivals are “military age men” presents a potential threat to national security.
According to the latest available figures there are the equivalent of 163,000 full time police officers in England, Wales, and Scotland.
Former head of the British Army Lord Dannatt told GB News on Wednesday night that comparisons between the military and traffic wardens is not new, as a scandal that broke during his time 20 years ago was that the government was paying private soldiers less to fight than a traffic warden earned to ticket cars.
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