The number of applicants to join Canada’s military is soaring. Why hasn’t that resulted in more of them in uniform?

In a recent interview with the Star, Defence Minister Bill Blair said recruitment needs to get faster and that he hopes it won’t take until 2032 for the military to return to full strength, as his department pursues a new, $73-billion strategy to expand the armed forces to meet what the federal government sees as the threats of a more dangerous, 21st century world. 

“I don’t want to wait till 2032 to replace the 16,500. I think we need to go faster,” Blair said, adding that the military will need even more recruits once it fills its thousands of vacant positions. 

“I need more people,” he said. 

But the pace of new recruits hasn’t kept up with the increase in applications, after the military opened recruitment to permanent residents and loosened rules for hairstyles and tattoos. Despite taking in 70,080 applications in 2023-24 — a five-year high — the military actually enrolled just 4,301 new recruits, according to new figures provided to the Star. 

That’s just a small uptick from 2022-23, when 3,930 recruits were enrolled and far fewer applications — 43,934 — were received. 

Recruitment was also lower in the most recent fiscal year than the 5,167 who enrolled in 2019-20, when the military received 36,662 applications, and in 2021-22, when 4,778 recruits were accepted and 38,030 applications were received, the figures show. 

In a statement to the Star, Department of National Defence spokesperson Capt. Geneviève Paris blamed the “length and complexity” of the current recruitment process for contributing to the slower enrolment numbers. She also said about 20,000 of the 70,080 applications in 2023-24 were permanent residents who require security clearances before their applications can be assessed, which takes “more time and resources.”

Paris said the military is making changes to “streamline” the recruitment process, including trials that have started to update medical eligibility and speed up the time it takes to complete security clearances, among other changes. 

“We recognize that much more needs to be done to ensure faster enrolment of applicants,” Paris said. “The CAF is confident that ongoing improvements to the recruiting process will lead to an increase in the number of enrolments.”

As part of its efforts to increase intake, the military has kick-started ad campaigns to increase awareness about education benefits, reserve forces and “priority occupations,” according to a summary of results from focus group research of potential applicants that DND conducted last October.

“Only a few” participants had considered joining the military as a “potential career path,” and many were “reluctant” to consider joining the reserves, “primarily due to concerns that they may be deployed” in a national emergency or “large-scale conflict,” the study found. 

“Most indicated that they would be unlikely to consider a position with the CAF either now or in the near future. For many, this was primarily due to a perceived lack of flexibility in their own lives, including having young children and the desire to maintain their current career,” the summary said.