Saeima deputy Artūrs Butāns (NA) has proposed that the missing part of each State Defence Service (VAD) call-up, after volunteers are included, be filled first from citizens who are not in education and are not employed.
He submitted the proposal as an amendment to the VAD law for the third reading. After volunteers are taken in, the remaining number of conscripts would be drawn first from citizens subject to the service who, on the selection day, are neither obtaining an education nor employed.
If more such citizens were available than the number required, selection among them would be by lot. If they were not enough to complete the call-up, the rest would be chosen at random from other citizens subject to the VAD who had not volunteered, and from citizens whose suitability assessment was stopped because they withdrew their application before the health check was finished or did not fulfil duties set out in the law.
The proposal would treat a person as neither studying nor employed if the State Education Information System shows no active pupil or student status and the State Revenue Service (VID) system does not register them as an employee or as a person carrying out economic activity.
To make that selection possible, Butāns proposes a right to obtain from VID systems information on a conscript’s employee status, the dates that status was gained and lost, and whether the person is engaged in economic activity.
He also proposes that the government adopt the necessary changes to regulations by 31 December this year, so the new order could apply to the January 2028 call-up.
The VAD was introduced in Latvia in 2023. At first the service was voluntary only, because enough citizens applied of their own accord. The first mandatory call-up, with selection, took place in 2025.