Coronavirus Update 1

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**Update** For those following along with the announcements from Headquarters you may be aware that they pre-announced some upcoming changes to guidance today, we are aware of this and will continue to monitor the output from HQ and act accordingly **End**

Last night we hosted our Annual General Meeting, during which I gave a talk on Coronavirus and the reintroduction of Face-to-Face Scouting. A copy of my talk is below.

Time to address the elephant in the room!

I was going to give a talk on the impact of COVID from a Scouting perspective, but we finally have some updates that we can begin to talk about, so if you are interested in a Scouts perspective on the pandemic, please read the blog post or the Annual Report.

In line with government guidance, we closed March 16th.

Initially, we attempted to have everyone work from home with activity packs, with mixed results. As a group, we were somewhat behind the times when it came to digital infrastructure. It became quickly apparent that we were not in a position to do an immediate transition to remote Scouting. We stepped back from digital engagement as we just weren’t ready, and felt that doing less, but better, was more important than doing more, incorrectly, given the potentially significant implications.

In July TSA rolled out the framework for the reintroduction of face to face scouting. This layed out to the leaders what needed to be done. It also introduced us to the Alert level they would be following. And yes, its another traffic light system!

Red – Where all activities face to face must stop.

Amber – Groups of 15 may meet outside only following social distancing rules.
Yellow – Large (yet to be announced) groups may meet outside, and small groups (up to 15) may meet inside, socially distanced
Green – Back to normal.

TSA also laid out a framework for groups to use, to generate their own policies and procedures. This meant a very significant increase in our clerical output. As we were approaching the school holiday, it made more sense to utilise that time finalising our plans, with the intention of reconvening after the holiday.

At present, as I am speaking, we are in the amber phase, which means that we can start meeting *outdoors* with social distancing in place. While this will continue to be subject to change at very quick notice, I want to lay out how we are proceeding while we remain in amber.

First of all, we have considered the risks, the concerns you may have, and have created policy to guide us as we reintroduce face-to-face Scouting.

We have decided to stagger the returning of sections, this is to allow me as the policy lead and the leadership teams time to keep on top of each section as they return. Scouts will return first, as this allows us to learn from our oldest and more mature section, taking what we learn from them back to our younger sections. Cubs and Beavers will return shortly after that.

We expect to meet face-to-face one of every three meetings, while the other two will likely be a mixture of take-home activity packs and remote sessions. The reason for this is because our current situation requires a great deal of extra work for our leaders, and we don’t want these valuable and already busy people to be burned out by taking on too much.

Before anyone can return to face-to-face meeting, we will need a signed permission slip signifying that parents are comfortable with the policies we have designed, and that they agree to take the responsibility for monitoring their children’s health and making safe and appropriate decisions about their participation. This also ensures that parents are aware that their child’s compliance with the new guidelines is expected.

With regard to specific policy, PPE should not be necessary under normal circumstances, as social distancing will be strictly enforced. We have always kept a register of participation, and will continue to do so, so in the event that tracing is needed, the system to do this is already in place.

We are aware that we may have some high risk individuals within our organisation. Please get in touch if this applies to you or your child, so that we can tailor our safety measures as specifically for their needs as possible.
It should come as no surprise to most that during a six month absence many of our members will have aged out of their current sections.

Moving young people up to their next section is something that we will need to do, as currently our middle section, Cubs is full, and as previously mentioned numbers of Scouts has declined. If we can not make more space in Cubs we can not move up the beavers overdue their moves. With the new rules in place section sizes now have a hard cap, and Cubs are currently over it. Our only other option would be to split the section in half, and we do not have the leadership to be able to do this.

On top of this, holding young people back any further will result in them not being able to achieve in the next section. Each section’s program revolves around each young person achieving the Chief Scout Award for their section, and this takes the 2, 2 1⁄2 and 3 1⁄2 years we have when them, respectively. Some members are already 6 months behind where we’d like them to be, and generally speaking this is recoverable, but anymore time is not.

Your section leaders will be in touch with those members that this effects to facilitate this in the smoothest way possible. We understand that this may disappoint some people but if we don’t keep the section flowing we are at risk of drowning one and running the other dry, and this would take the group beyond economic viability and ultimately result in closure.

We ask that everyone keep a close eye on their email, as we will soon be sending out a detailed copy of our policy, information about the start of section meetings,

and the necessary permission forms. Going forward, please continue to be vigilant about watching for email, as we will of course communicate any changes which occur.

All of this is, however, contingent upon one urgent matter. As you know, the outdoor space around our hut is extremely limited. By needing to meet out of doors, we are rendered effectively homeless, and need to find a meeting place. Do you know someone who has a big garden, a field, or a carpark? Do you have any of these things? If so, please get in touch with me ASAP. We will not be able to meet face-to-face if such a home is not found. It would be difficult to express how urgent this matter is. Like so many things right now, Scouting requires a level of participation to carry on functioning, and left dormant for too long, we may not be able to return at all.

Once our home is in place, we can do the final stages of paperwork and announce the return. Things are happening, and hopefully even more will be happening soon.

Thank you for bearing with us through all of this. We are all learning a new system and it takes some time, but we’re getting there.