Military Driving School
New 6 part series hosted by Jeremy Kyle
ITV1, 19 April, 7.30pm
Press Pack Contents:
Series Overview
Episode 1 programme information
Episode 2 programme information
Interview with Jeremy Kyle
****The content of this press pack is strictly embargoed until 00.01 Tues 12 April
2011****
Series press contact:
Laura Wootton
Laura.wootton@itv.com
Picture contact:
Peter Gray
Peter.gray@itv.com
Military Driving School Series Overview
This brand new series sees Jeremy Kyle find out exactly what it takes to be a driver
in the British Armed Forces.
Jeremy joins the team at the Defence School of Transport in Leconfield, East
Yorkshire, the largest, toughest driving school in the world where 16,000 trainees
pass through each year, taking part in over 100 different courses. It’s here that every
driver deployed in Afghanistan is trained and the skills learned in training help save
lives on the front line.
Over the course of 12 weeks Jeremy follows a group of trainees learning to drive for
the first time and a group of experienced soldiers who are learning to drive highly
specialist vehicles ready for Afghanistan. The series follows servicemen and women
at all levels - from teenage soldiers straight out of basic training, to battle hardened
veterans coming back for extra training,
Throughout the series Jeremy experiences just what is involved in the training and
takes part in exercises including driving a landrover on a knife edge climb and night
training exercises with night vision goggles. He also speaks to the servicemen and
women at the training centre and hears some of their remarkable stories of life on the
front line.
Military Driving School is an ITV Studios production produced with the co-operation
of the Ministry of Defence.
Episode One Programme Information
In this first episode, Jeremy is introduced to some of the school’s impressive fleet of
vehicles and is taken for a spin in a Mastiff, the school’s newest recruits arrive and
start their gruelling training, and Jeremy speaks to an instructor whose driving
training saved his own son’s life in Afghanistan.
The first piece of equipment that Jeremy is introduced to is the Mastiff two – the Rolls
Royce of the army’s transport fleet. It’s one of the most heavily armoured vehicles in
active service and over 300 of these highly protective trucks have been sent out to
Afghanistan this year. Jeremy meets Sergeant Major Darren Hugill who drives him in
a Mastiff and shows exactly what the vehicle can do. He says: “What we’re going to
do now is we’re actually going to go down what’s called the ‘one in three’ – which is a
30 degree ascent… The one we’ve got here is the knife edge so basically it’s just
straight up and then straight back down again.”
The latest recruits joining 110 Squadron Royal Logistic Core have arrived at
Leconfield for their driver training course. They have already passed their basic
training together and now they have joined a unit dedicated to providing professional
drivers for the frontline. The young recruits are met by Corporal Gemma Stonelake
who takes them to their dormitories and outlines their daily chores. She says: “I am
definitely the mother hen. I’ve got the best job in world, it’s brilliant. They’re all out
there, giddy as owt but you know in three to four months time, they could be out in
Afghan. The reality would have kicked in – actually they are doing a really dangerous
driving job.”
Soon after their arrival, the new recruits have their first inspection, and it doesn’t go
well. Corporal Stonelake explains their punishment: “They’ll be getting tomorrow
night taken off them and it will keep going and going and going and even if it comes
to the weekend, they’ll get the weekend taken off them.”
Jeremy meets Sergeant Simon Gill, an instructor at Leconfield, who taught his son
Ben how to drive the Mastiff. His father’s training later saved Ben’s life in Afghanistan
when an IED explosion hit the Mastiff he was in. Simon says: “Since that event, I’ve
used it all the time [in training]. I’ve said I’ve got first hand experience of what
capability this vehicle’s got. I’m not doing it from documents, I’m doing it from realistic
issues that are happening in theatre.”
Talking about the explosion Ben says: “As soon as it happened, I was back to Camp
Bastion. I thought you get chucked off a horse, you want to get back on it and straight
away. I’ll go on the next job, straight back in the Mastiff.”
“I always say the family’s got the hardest tour staying at home. We’re going through a
tour but they’re going through a harder tour than us.”
Jeremy joins the new recruits for their fitness assessment in the gym. It’s a gruelling
physical test that they have to pass before they can begin driving and, for some of
the recruits, it’s too difficult a challenge. After failing to pass her assessment Private
Candice Fitzgerald says: “It just felt disappointing. I felt like I shouldn’t be in the
army.”
But a few days later she’s able to retake the test and passes with encouragement
from her fellow recruits. Watching her pass, Jeremy says: “There’s a real
camaraderie and they’re in it together. There’ll be flaky moments and there are things
that are scary. Yes they all said that their parents and families worry about they might
go to Afghanistan but even at 17, you get the distinct impression they want to make
something of their lives. They’re all in it together and with the training the army
provides, they can get to where they want to get.”
Episode Two Programme Information
In episode two Jeremy joins the school’s trainees on a safety exercise which could
mean the difference between life and death on the front line, hears a first hand
account of an ambush in Afghanistan and tries out driving some of the vehicles for
himself.
Jeremy joins Leconfield’s new recruits as they are trained in the newest and the
biggest of the army’s tactical support vehicles – the Wolfhound. Sergeant Lauren
Vasey is the only female Wolfhound instructor in the Army and today she’s training
the recruits, and Jeremy, in how to deal if the vehicle gets hit. She says: “We do try to
make the training realistic. The last thing I ever want to do is wake up one morning
and switch on the news and see that one of my students, in a Wolfhound, has been
injured.”
Jeremy volunteers to role play as the casualty during the training and the team
successfully carry him out of the vehicle. Safely out, he says: “It’s another example of
teamwork– they took it very seriously. They knew what they were trying to do, they’d
been taking orders, the Commander was in charge. I looked at them at the beginning
and thought, ‘You’ll never be able to lift me out with all the body army,’ and they did
it. It was fantastic.”
Jeremy meets Colour Sergeant Gavin Paton, Commander of a troop of Jackals in
Sangin, Afghanistan to hear how the training that the military receives in Leconfield is
invaluable on the front line. The Jackal is both a patrol vehicle and weapons platform
and Colour Sergeant Paton says: “I think the most important thing about the Jackal is
the fact that it allows you to interact with the population. You’re not enclosed in a box.
This allows people to come up to me and speak to me and you can get some
conversation going.”
Colour Sergeant Paton also tells Jeremy about a large ambush that he was involved
in in Afghanistan, where he had to lead his troops to safety. He says: “I really don’t
think there’s any amount of training that can prepare you for the feeling of the first
round that comes your way…I had six vehicles to move at that stage and it’s a big
target. The roads are rough so it’s not a case of just putting your foot down and
scooting off into the distance. So I gave the order to return fire, the target indication
was given, they all identified the enemy and then we just fought our way out.”
In order to learn what the recruits at Leconfield go through, Jeremy decides it’s time
he got some hands on driving experience, starting out in the stalwart of all military
vehicles – the Landover. Civilian specialist instructor Ashley Walker takes Jeremy
through the off road course before Jeremy’s next challenge – night driving. Sergeant
Simon Gill puts Jeremy in the gunner’s position at the top of a Mastiff, introduces him
to the various pieces of equipment, including night vision goggles, and they set off.
Sergeant Gill explains: “We’ve got an infra red vision system working from five TV
sensors and we’ve also got a thermal image fitted on the front of the vehicle. So any
terrain, any type of light is no problems at all.”
Jeremy says: “This is blinding, absolutely blinding. Mind you, let’s be perfectly
honest, it might be blinding now but the thought of standing up when there’s
somebody about to shoot your head off, it’s a bit different I guess.”
One of the new young recruits at the centre is Private Connie Johnson, who arrived
just weeks ago after completing her basic training. She tells Jeremy that she always
wanted to be an army driver: “Ever since my dad’s been able to work, he’s always
dealt with trucks and big vehicles. Growing up, I would go to work with my dad and sit
in his truck and think, ‘Wow, this is cool.’”
Today Connie faces her driving test, her first step in becoming a driver in the armed
forces. Jeremy meets her afterwards and hears the good news that she has passed
on the first attempt. And when she goes home at the weekend, there’s even more
good news when she discovers that her parents have bought her her first car. Her
proud dad says: “You’ve done well, mate, we’re proud of you. And this is our little
present to you for what you’ve done to us.”
Back in Leconfield Jeremy says: “It’s pretty obvious to me how vital the support of the
family is to these young soldiers. At the moment they can pop home for the weekend,
have a good time, see their mates, see their family. Out in Afghanistan, so far from
home, it’s a completely different ball game.”
Jeremy Kyle Interview
How much did you know about military life before you did the series?
My dad did National Service but he worked for the Royal Family for 40 years for the
Queen Mother, so I guess the whole military thing was always something I sort of
knew about. I’ve always been massively supportive of the armed forces, so when the
chance came to do the series I jumped at it. There are men and women out there
fighting and I think the programme is a bit of an insight to what they actually have to
go through.
What knowledge of military driving did you have beforehand?
None at all! But the best thing about doing the whole series, apart from meeting
everybody and building those relationships, was actually testing myself and
managing to actually do it all.
How good a driver are you?
I do like driving but I don’t get a chance to do as much as I did with the cast. It’s like a
Boy’s Own adventure -driving loads of Landrovers and tanks up and down huge
mountains and water crossings. The main thing is the night drives because you think
‘oh my god’ but it’s brilliant. It was a really good experience and what a way to do it,
with a great bunch of people.
What was the most hair-raising experience you had during filming?
The night driving was quite hair-raising, but there were other things as well. I drove a
sixty foot lorry, the massive great tank that carries fuel or water, up the knife-edge.
You drive up this thing and all you can see at the top is sky, then it all creeps forward
and you think you’re going back but it’s all swinging forward. That was an ‘oh my god’
moment. The husky at night was extraordinary as well. It was all a great experience
even just driving the quad bikes through the mud.
You followed new recruits through their 12 week training. What was the best part for
you?
Watching the development was extraordinary. Bearing in mind that they’d already
had 23 weeks basic training, so they had a basic knowledge of what the army was
about. A lot of kids that age that I speak to are causing trouble or have a problem
with their life, whereas these kids at their age voluntarily walked into an army
recruitment office and then signed up for something that ultimately could end up with
them in Afghanistan.
The most amazing thing about watching them develop and the whole experience is
the fact that this organisation is like a family and people are supported to find out
something about themselves that perhaps they didn’t think existed. Yes they are
pushed to the limits but they are supported massively. If they fail a test the instructors
don’t have a go at them, they encourage them, and they’re probably doing the test
again a few days later.
Take Connie for example- when she walked through the door you wouldn’t have
thought she could carry a pint of water and now she’s driving vehicles for the British
Army. Her parents are hugely proud and she’s been deployed. So it’s a fascinating
experience and I missed it when I finished filming.
Now you’ve filmed the series, do you think you could have gone into the army?
Because of what I do, people say to me ‘shouldn’t we have national service?’ But the
army don’t want that, they want people who want to do it and who obviously think it’s
important. People think the army is really strict and disciplined - yes it is but what’s
extraordinary is seeing these kids develop with that discipline and find out what skills
are being encouraged. You look at that and think, I wish I’d have done that at 18. I
think you would be far more prepared and far more ready for life, far more organised.
That’s just my personal opinion but yes I wish I had done it.