BT’s Openreach division is seeking 200 ex-armed forces personnel to help deliver super-fast fibre broadband.

The new recruits are due to start their new jobs in May as part of a mobile engineering workforce, which will help to deploy super-fast broadband to homes and businesses across the UK.

Two in three UK premises will have access fibre broadband by the end of 2015 with close to 3,000 full-time engineers currently devoted to the project.

Openreach has been working with the ex-forces career guidance provider Career Transition Partnership (CTP), an arrangement between the Ministry of Defence (MoD) and global talent and career management expert Right Management.

Recruits will benefit from grants, allowances, travel warrants, resettlement leave, transition workshops, one-to-one career guidance support, subsidised vocational training support, housing advice, financial briefs and employment support.

Olivia Garfield, chief executive of Openreach, says: “It’s fantastic that we’ve been able to recruit so many ex-armed services personnel. These people have served their country well and so deserve the chance of full-time employment with a generous reward package. They are highly skilled, motivated and disciplined and have experience of complex engineering tasks in challenging environments.

“Our ‘fast-track’ recruitment programme should see the majority of them join us by the end of May and given their experience, we will be able to train them up quickly and get them straight out where we need them.”

David Duffy, managing director, Career Transition Partnership charity (CTP), says: “The CTP offers a no-cost recruitment solution, supporting organisations with their workforce strategy by understanding their recruitment needs and matching the transferable skills of Service leavers.

“To date, Openreach has carried out 202 interviews specifically for Service leavers, with 181 subsequently being offered positions. This converts to a 90% success rate at interview and reflects the highly sought after skillsets, abilities and attitude of those leaving the Armed Forces.”