It's All Theatre.

The Parliamentary Undersecretary of State for Defence for the Royal Air Force Mr Geoffrey Pattie MP and the Air Member for Personnel Air Marshal Sir John Gingell visited RAF Linton-on-Ouse. Announcing their impending arrival of the VIPs, the public address declared: ‘All personnel are to be meticulous in the paying of compliments.’

The two visitors, escorted by the Group Captain Station Commander, joined the pilot trainees in their crew room.

‘You’ll never be closer to the horse’s mouth than you are this afternoon,’ the Station Commander tells his young pilot trainee subordinates, referring to the Member of Parliament responsible for their welfare. The room almost tilts with the massive power imbalance on opposite sides. The Commander invites questions from them.

‘One of the things that attracted me to the RAF was the prospect of six weeks annual leave,’ a young trainee bravely led off. ‘This last leave year, I only got two weeks.’

‘Everybody needs leave,’ the Undersecretary began, ‘And I’m a great believer in bigger and better holidays…’ And then … ‘BUT… ‘ and he hands over to the Air Marshal (AM) to answer the question.

‘We want everybody to have the maximum whack of leave that he can get in,‘ the AM begins. And then … ‘BUT … there will be periods when we can’t do our job if we have our maximum six weeks.’

The young Officer is not perturbed. He responds by pointing out that he’s not flying as well as a result of his lack of a break from training.

The AM says his fatigue is ‘all part of getting used to the intensity of operations. You grow out of the business of feeling tired after a while. You shouldn’t feel worried if you feel tired just at the moment.’

Another young trainee joins the fray. ‘Do you believe it’s fair to mislead people who are thinking of joining the Air Force ..?’

After the VIPs leave, the trainees review the experience over beers in the Mess. ‘We were being careful about what we said,’ they all agree.

The VIPs also gather to debrief. ‘I was a bit surprised,’ the Undersecretary says. ‘They seemed very much concerned with the day to day problems - leave came up and clothing came up.’

The Station Commander reminds them that the officers were told beforehand that ‘Nothing is taboo and let’s see what comes out. I thought they’d be asking how many seats would there be on [the then newly introduced] Tornados.’

Meanwhile, back in the Mess, one of the trainees says ‘You can’t afford to think about how many bombs your Tornado is going to carry.’ They all agree that their focus is on their next sortie and whether it will lead to a ‘chop ride’ and failure.

‘If he’d asked to come and see us why didn’t he ask us more questions?’ another young officer says to nods all around.

We’ve all been there. ‘Give us your feedback. ‘We value your opinion.’ ‘You are our most important asset.’ ‘There is no such thing as a dumb question.’ ‘We want to hear from you.’ These days its mostly in the form of online ‘anonymous’ surveys.

They pay our mortgage and expect us to tell the truth.

It’s all theatre.