The five key jobs that will not be conscripted in the UK if WW3 breaks out

The prospect of WW3 is not something that anyone relishes but as Vladimir Putin's push into Ukraine continues - and the US threatens to annexe NATO allies in Canada and Greenland - while Europe rearms, it feels as though a global conflict has never been closer.

But if WW3 does break out, there may be some jobs deemed too vital to national security to be made to fight - so these key vocations could be spared conscription to the front lines or the war effort.

Tensions have ramped up since the US has slapped tariffs on its closest allies and talked about taking Greenland ‘one way or another’, while Donald Trump has told Canada it will end economic sanctions on its neighbour if it ‘becomes the 51st state’ and gives up its sovereignty. Meanwhile, Sir Keir Starmer has promised to put British troops in Ukraine and just this week, Lib Dem MP Mike Martin told the Express that conscription "will happen" if the UK goes to war with Russia.

We don't know exactly what conscription would look like today but we do have some historic precedent from the last global conflict, WW2.

And in WW2, there were some key jobs that were deemed too important to be conscripted. Those in key industries involved in feeding the nation were spared conscription - bakers, farmers, doctors or nurses and engineers in particular.

Those who objected to fighting, known as 'conscientious objectors', were sent to tribunals and then made to work non-combatant jobs that helped the war in other wars. In WW2, conscription began for men aged between 20 to 22 in 1939, up to six months before the war actually broke out.

The UK Parliament website says: “During the spring of 1939 the deteriorating international situation forced the British government under Neville Chamberlain to consider preparations for a possible war against Nazi Germany.

"Plans for limited conscription applying to single men aged between 20 and 22 were given parliamentary approval in the Military Training Act in May 1939. This required men to undertake six months' military training, and some 240,000 registered for service.”

But when war was declared, the age range was immediately widened to any man aged 18 to 41.

It continues: “On the day Britain declared war on Germany, 3 September 1939, Parliament immediately passed a more wide-reaching measure.

"The National Service (Armed Forces) Act imposed conscription on all males aged between 18 and 41 who had to register for service. Those medically unfit were exempted, as were others in key industries and jobs such as baking, farming, medicine, and engineering."

By the end of 1941, women and ‘all childless widows’ between the ages of 20 and 30 were called up, while men aged up to 51 were called up for military service. Even those aged 52 to 60 were required to take part in ‘some form of military service’.

It added: "The main reason was that there were not enough men volunteering for police and civilian defence work, or women for the auxiliary units of the armed forces."

Mike Martin, an Afghanistan veteran and the MP for Tunbridge Wells, told the Express: "There’s a significant chance that it [war with Russia] might happen so we must be prepared.

"Obviously, if we get involved in a general war with Russia, we’ll be conscripting the population - there’s no question about that," the Liberal Democrat added. "Being prepared generates deterrence, which decreases the likelihood [of war]. The whole point about building the military up is it decreases the likelihood of this happening. I think that’s an important caveat. I’ve fought in wars, I’m not a warmonger. But I recognise that you’ve got to [pursue] peace through strength."