If Governor Sir John Vereker was hoping for radical proposals on the future of the Bermuda Regiment from a recently completed review, he was probably disappointed.

In effect, the review by the Defence Board said the Regiment should not change its current roles, its methods of recruiting or much else. New equipment is needed and the Regiment should explore expanding its role in providing help to other countries dealing the national disasters and the like.

But that was mostly it in terms of change, according to the members of the Defence Board who compiled the Review.

Perhaps the most telling point in the review spoke to the Regiment's organisational weakness.

"In its current state, the Bermuda Regiment is able to fulfil its existing roles adequately but not perfectly," the Review said. "Its strength is its people, conscription notwithstanding.

"The Regiment is a small unit with little non-Bermudian inflow, which is both a strength and weakness. The Regiment needs to be aware of, and ward against, the disproportionate effect of personality."

Indeed. What that says is that the Regiment is heavily dependent on the quality of its senior officers and senior non-commissioned officers to ensure that it continues to meet its roles with professionalism and high morale.

What it implies is that the Regiment's institutional strengths through training and procedures are not as strong as they could be, meaning any significant turnover in the senior ranks could damage the Regiment and creates the risk that it would no longer fulfil its roles.

This is particularly important, the Review says, because the Regiment's multiple roles place increasing demands on the performance of individual soldiers, meaning "there should be a fresh look at the current training policy and programmes".

This is all too true. Aside from its ceremonial role, the Regiment has two broad functions ? internal security and disaster relief, both from natural disasters like hurricanes and from the possibility of terrorism acts.

The British Army, on which the Regiment is modelled, has always placed heavy emphasis on the initiative of the junior ranks, and this will probably increase. A strong commanding officer is obviously important, but he or she cannot be everywhere at once.

Retaining soldiers beyond their three-year term of enlistment is obviously key to making this work, and the review recommends that pay be looked at to encourage soldiers to remain in service, and, perhaps as importantly, that employers be made aware of how the Regiment can help them have better staff.

All of that is sensible, but it begs the question of whether the Regiment's roles, as they are now likely to continue, provide enough incentive to retain soldiers. In that context, there seems to be nothing in the review to encourage the Regiment to expand the role of its boat troop, when a greater Coast Guard role would seem obvious and has been talked about for years.

Similarly, different forms of adventure training, like scuba diving and Outward Bound-type activities, would also make the Regiment more compelling for young men and women, and would also enable the Regiment to build closer ties with the Police.

And although it was touched on, there was little discussion of the kinds of overseas relief that the Regiment could provide of the kind that was conducted in the Cayman Islands and Grenada after the 2004 hurricanes. This would seem to be a natural outlet for the Regiment while doing some good as well.

Clearly, the Regiment needs to do better than to fulfil its functions "adequately". And as it is likely that resistance to conscription ? still the preferred and perhaps only realistic major method of recruitment ? will grow and not diminish, the Regiment needs to show that it performs it functions to a very high standard.

Government backbencher Renee Webb has pointed out that yesterday's editorial incorrectly stated that she had laid the problems in education entirely at the feet of teachers. While she said teachers had to shoulder some of the blame, she cited a range of other problems as well.