Sodexo has extended its pledge to support the Armed Forces Corporate Covenant by adopting it beyond just its defence division to now include its entire UK and Ireland business.

Sodexo in the UK and Ireland delivers a wide range of services that improve the quality of life for its clients and their customers and employees at some 2,000 locations in the corporate, healthcare, education, leisure, justice and defence sectors.

The Armed Forces Corporate Covenant was launched in 2013 to encourage businesses and charitable organisations, who wish to demonstrate their support for the Armed Forces Community, to write and publicise a voluntary pledge; this includes regular and reserve forces and their families. Sodexo Defence signed the pledge shortly after its launch in 2013.

Debbie White, chief executive of Sodexo UK and Ireland said, “We are extremely proud to have signed up to the Armed Forces Corporate Covenant for our UK and Ireland business. As a leading supplier of services to the Ministry of Defence, we believe we are ideally placed to support regular and reserve forces, veterans and their families, through every aspect of our business. This includes our positive recruitment of ex service personnel and our strong policies to support reservists.   We have also recently launched our Public Service Pledge which includes our commitment to employing over 350 ex-service personnel or reservists in the UK and Ireland.”

In 2014 Sodexo was recognised for its commitment and support to military reservists with the Ministry of Defence presenting the company with the silver award as part of its Defence Employer Recognition Scheme.

The award acknowledges Sodexo’s defence business for actively communicating and upholding a positive stance to colleagues via its HR policies and procedures and also supporting reservist employees by offering them the flexibility needed to fulfil their annual training and mobilisation commitments.

Sodexo Defence’s work to support the armed forces community includes raising awareness of reserve forces at Sodexo events, the development of a specific pathway within Sodexo’s induction programme to support veterans, increasing the awareness of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and military anniversaries amongst our managers and supporting the mobile careers of service family members who work for Sodexo.

Back to the list