In Australia we are a little cautious about the concept of National Service. In the 1960s and 70s, we had a National Service Lottery - Certain birthdays would be drawn, and if you were born on that day, congratulations! You've won an all-expenses-paid ticket to the Vietnam War!
Needless to say, a lot of "Nashos" never came back (although statistically, given car crashes and drug overdoses, it was still safer to be in Vietnam than in Sydney . . .). This has drastically coloured public opinion to conscription, even if it doesn't truly represent a broad based compulsory National Service program.
Nonetheless, the problem of aimless young people needing some pride and discipline has been noticed, and a proposal was recently made for compulsory volunteer work (say, with world vision or the Salvation Army) to become a part of the final year High school curriculum. Leaving aside the irony of "compulsory volunteering", the volunteer organisations are less than thrilled with the idea of young people that have to be there, and are requesting for it to be made voluntary, which kind of obviates the point of the scheme. . .
