For graduates and final-year students looking for a first job after university, the defence industry, in its widest sense, offers a considerable variety and plentiful supply of graduate entry-level roles.

But recent research for The UK Graduate Careers Survey 2008, a nationwide study of final-year students produced by High Fliers Research, suggests that working in defence does not have universal appeal.

The sector topped the list of areas that university-leavers said that they had a moral or ethical objection to working in and several well-known defence employers – including the Ministry of Defence (MoD) – have recently been voted out of The Times Top 100 Graduate Employers, the league table of organisations that finalists believe offer the best opportunities for graduates.

Despite this, around a sixth of the total vacancies on offer from employers featured in the latest edition of the Top 100 are for defence-related roles. The largest single employer is the Army, which expects to recruit around 1,000 new officers this year. There are a further 800 vacancies at the Royal Navy and RAF.

All three Armed Forces report a shortage of engineers and graduates from other technical backgrounds, despite offering starting salaries of up to £28,000. There are also opportunities for graduates at police forces across the UK.

Although there are more than a dozen well-known defence manufacturers, only two – Rolls-Royce and BAE Systems – appear in the Top 100.

Rolls-Royce recruits about 160 graduates annually for engineering, technology and commercial positions and BAE Systems plans to hire at least 300 graduates in 2008 for its air, land and sea defence divisions.

Both companies have a strong reputation for graduate training and development.

For those interested in a public sector role in defence, there are nearly 1,000 openings each year for graduates in Government departments and agencies.

The Security Service, better known as MI5, is recruiting about 100 intelligence officers this year and also regularly recruits transcribers, mobile surveillance officers and electronics technicians to combat threats from terrorism, espionage and international crime.

GCHQ, the Government's communications headquarters in Cheltenham, is another key part of British Intelligence. It will hire more than 200 graduates in 2008 to take on positions as linguists, telecommunications specialists, mathematicians and librarians.

Technical graduates are also in demand at the Defence Engineering and Science Group (DESG), which is the part of the MoD that equips and supports the British Armed Forces. There are around 110 vacancies each year for engineering and science graduates at DESG and a further 100 at the Defence Science & Technology Laboratory (Dstl), which is the MoD agency that provides the Government with scientific and specialist technical research. Relevant degrees are essential for graduate applicants to both DESG and Dstl.

Graduates planning to work in research and development could also consider QinetiQ, an international defence and security technology company. It works closely with the MoD in the UK, the US Department of Defense and commercial customers worldwide and recruits around 150 graduates with a science, IT, numerate or engineering degree.

As with other employment areas, graduate vacancies within the defence sector are filling rapidly and applications to a number of organisations are likely close in the next month or so.

Martin Birchall is managing director of High Fliers Research www.highfliers.co.uk

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