Student says Rishi Sunak tried to ‘escape’ National Service query

The student who was assured by Rishi Sunak that he would ‘love’ mandated military service after confronting him in a pub says he felt the Prime Minister tried to ‘escape the question’.

Henry Hassell, who lives in Drewsteignton, in west Devon, approached Mr Sunak in The Drewe Arms pub on Wednesday and questioned him on his plan to enforce mandatory National Service if the Conservatives are elected.

A now-viral TikTok of the encounter shows how the 16-year-old asked Mr Sunak ‘why do you hate young people so much? You’re making us go into the Army.’ The Prime Minister replied, ‘no, no, you’ll have a choice’ and reassured he would ‘love it’.

Henry has now said that Mr Sunak ‘started scuttling out the pub’ after he asked about National Service, alleging he was ‘trying to escape the question’. 

He also claimed that when the Prime Minister left the pub he revealed how he views ‘different age demographics’ by excitedly greeting elderly women, but ‘completely ignoring me’ when the teen tried to shake his hand.

Henry, an indie singer/songwriter who first started performing at seven-years-old, explained that he decided to approach the Prime Minister after having seen many young people have ‘negative reactions’ to mandatory National Service plan.

Addressing the interaction, Henry said on Friday: ‘Recently, there’s been a lot of stuff going viral on my TikTok and Instagram about how young people who are turning 18 if the Tories get elected are going to have to do a year’s national service mandatory or going to have to volunteer once every month.

‘Obviously there’s been a lot of negative reactions to that from people my age, so I thought it would be a good opportunity to ask Rishi Sunak himself why he was doing it and to be honest, why he hated young people so much.’

He said of Mr Sunak: ‘I thought he was trying to escape the question.

‘He started scuttling out the pub and when I asked the question, as you can hear in the video, he said “you’ll love it, if you’ve done it before, you’ll like it”.

‘But I was thinking: I’ve done volunteering, I’ve busked for cancer research on the streets because I’m a singer-songwriter and I’ve busked in schools for a few weeks with my mum, who works in a school.

‘I thought: if I’ve done this volunteering already, why does it have to be mandatory and when I’m finally coming out of education, why do I have to do it all again?’

Henry claimed when Mr Sunak left the pub, he greeted elderly women coming to see him excitedly, but when he tried to shake the hand of the Prime Minister he ‘completely ignored me and went to another lady’.

‘That really put into perspective how he treats the different age demographics,’ he added.

The teenager said while he is not able to vote in the upcoming General Election, nor is he a member of any political party, his family supports Labour and he would vote for Labour when he is able to vote.

Henry also said it has been ‘crazy’ to see the video ‘blowing up’, with close to 100,000 views on TikTok.

‘I’ve been getting lots of emails and texts from different places and people and it feels good to get that opinion out there and show that there is a lot of disagreement with the younger generation to the Tory party,’ he added.

In the now-viral footage posted on TikTok, the Prime Minister is seen chatting in the pub when he is approached by Henry. 

Mr Sunak assumes Henry wants a photo before the teenager says: ‘I was just going to ask, why do you hate young people so much? You’re making us go into the Army.’ 

The Prime Minister can be heard replying: ‘No, you’ll have a choice, you’ll have a choice.’

When Henry mentioned he has taken part in volunteering opportunities his whole life, Mr Sunak replies: ‘Then you’ll love it, you’ll love it,’ as he heads out of the pub.

After Henry asked: ‘Why do I have to do it all again when I’m finally coming out of education?’

Mr Sunak responded: ‘I wouldn’t view it like that. A culture of service is a good thing for our country, and you’ll have a choice.’

The confrontation came after the Prime Minister pledged to make teenagers do National Service in a policy that will see 18-year-olds forced to either sign up to the military or cyber defence force, or undertake unpaid community work. 

He argued the move would make society ‘more cohesive’ and strengthen the UK’s defence.

Mr Sunak on Friday attended Burrs Country Park during a Conservative general election campaign event in Bury. 

Since announcing that the UK General Election will be held on July 4, the Prime Minister has kicked off his six-week campaign period in Derbyshire and has visited key battleground regions across the UK.

Mr Sunak was facing mounting woes on Friday as he attempted to keep the Conservatives’ general election campaign on track.

The PM suffered a blow when Aaron Bell, who was Tory MP for Newcastle-under-Lyme until Parliament was dissolved this week, said he won’t be standing on July 4. 

Mr Bell announced his bombshell decision despite having joined Mr Sunak on the campaign trail in Stoke-on-Trent just days ago.

In a second setback for the PM, a former Tory MP who lost the whip over sexual assault claims performed a U-turn and said he would now stand as an independent.

Julian Knight was the Conservative MP for Solihull from 2015 to 2022.

He was stripped of the party whip in December 2022 after it was revealed he was being investigated by police over a claim of serious sexual assault.

Mr Knight previously said he would not seek re-election in his constituency, but he today announced he would stand against the Tories in the West Midlands seat.