I really do believe that if the fuel prices stay where they are, or go up (as expected), we will have quite a few CFAVs cutting back on what they do because they can’t afford it. And I don’t blame them. This 25p/mile really needs to be reviewed. If the MOD won’t budge on reviewing/increasing it, then HQAC need to work out another solution.
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Several of our staff are refusing to drive cadets in their own vehicles
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Is this information being fed back up the chain though? The only sort of discussion I’ve seen about this is the post on VoV. And that post didn’t go anywhere other than ‘MOD says no’. Surely they have to understand that not even paying volunteers their basic expenses really doesn’t make them feel valued.
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I haven’t looked at VoV since it went to Teams, but that was the same response our Wg Cdr gave (though that was probably informed by VoV I guess). You’re absolutely right, no volunteer should be out of pocket. Perhaps the ATC staff should get top-up expenses from the GPF…
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Regulars are kicking off aswell
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Are you referring to the paid civil service staff or CFAVs? For a specific trip maybe the CWC could help if it’s in their constitution and stop paying into the Wing CWC at least for the moment.
CFAVs
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I still can’t believe a pushbike gets more than half the allowance of a car, mind with 6 miles given free you would have to pedal some distance to get anything worthwhile back. I’d be too tired to do anything when I arrived after taking 5 times as long to get there.
Even if it was, do they care? They know we’re volunteers doing it for the kids and don’t want to see the kids disadvantaged, so we’ll never over backwards to give them opportunities.
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Unfortunately my staff and I are on the ‘young family’ end of the CFAV scale and we are at the stage where we can’t bear out the costs (all things taken into account) and so yes - decisions are being made on what events we can and can’t support.
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From a CIs point of view: It amazes me that we’re told there’s no money and they can’t put the rate up, yet are still paying uniformed staff VA. There’s Sqn Ldrs getting silly money for turning up and observing what’s going on/drinking tea…
Don’t get me wrong there are some great uniform staff doing great things too. But it’s insulting as a CI seeing the above kind of example, when I’m not even getting my fuel covered to and from the event. I’m not suggesting getting rid of VA at all but the way, I’m saying money isn’t the problem, it’s politics.
Simply put, we need milage claimable at 45p/mile. Being able to back pay that from the start of this year when the fuel prices went horribly bad would be even better.
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I don’t know a reason why the organisation couldn’t provide a top up fund additional to the MOD rate.
The commandant will say it is down to civcoms. But then on the other hand say he wants to get rid of them.
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But how can they buy phones for cadets if they’re paying for CFAV travel?
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Why not? Maybe this should be the answer. Get rid of VA and put it into reimbursing actual costs. It means the people actually doing things get paid for it and all the throbbers who just turn up to ponce about in uniform suddenly don’t see the point. Win win.
Awesome. My day rate just tripled 
This system would get hammered by everyone buying all new kit and cashing in on their old.
But this is getting away from Travel and into VA, which there are other threads for.
i don’t believe anyone is saying that
it is a MOD thing - the MOD decides that 25p/mile is sufficient and so HQAC hands are tied.
doesn’t mean Wing or Sqns CWC can’t reimburse the difference.
comes from a different pot so even if it were a case of budgets it isn’t coming from the same pot of money as i understand it.
we absolutely do and some organizations do go that far - ours unfortunately does not
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and yet I work for MoD and get 45p
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So, it’s not an MOD issue then? Is it a certain part of the MOD?
well yeah. ok I’m in an exec agency of the MoD rather than MoD itself, but we’re pretty close. We get 45p/mile for first 10000 miles then 25p, but you’re the unlucky sod if anyone ever audits that 10000 cause it’s not worth the cost in time to do so.