Activities not on the MOD indemnity and ATC insurance activities list

Hi everyone. Looking for a bit of advice. Does anyone know for certain if we are allowed to take part in activities which are not on the ‘activities covered by MOD indemnity and ATC insurance’ list but are insured by the activity provider?

Things like bowling, laser tag or even paintball?

ACP300 says this:
6. Other activities, including ten pin bowling, ice skating, cinema visits, adventure park visits and indoor games, such as skittles and pool, fall under the broad heading of recreational and team building activities. They are normally covered in insurance terms by the owner of the facility in question. These activities may be undertaken as long as a full risk assessment has been carried out in accordance with single Service procedures (including travel arrangements where applicable) along with compliance with Paragraph 5 above. In these instances, MOD indemnity will apply for all the escort and supervisory duties involved on the part of the adult volunteers.

I’d class the activities i’d listed above as team building activities, but need to know for sure as i’m planning a camp which may include them.

Any advice would be useful.

I’ve always been told laser tag and paintball are prohibited cadet activities as we can’t have cadets shooting at each other. (!) But I don’t know where that is written if it is actually true

Do them as a private venture, sort the risk assessments out with the organisers and each cadet to take a disclaimer form home for parents to sign as not an official activity and not covered by ACO insurance.

We had a dad do paintball birthday party and all but 3 kids were cadets. They were full of it and I was asked if I’d done a paintball session, as they’d mentioned it on there SM with photos of a group all known to be cadets. I pointed them to the dad, but they declined the offer to ask him the question.

We used to have private ventures and HQAC got their thongs knotted over them. While perfectly sensible and giving you more options, I feel the poor loves got confused and didn’t and still don’t understand that commercial providers have to be insured, staff qualified and kit up to scratch (more so than much Corps kit) or they don’t the license to operate. I would sooner use places like these where people are doing it for a living than via the weekend warriors in the ATC. We were at a climbing wall and the instructors seemed to be climbing most of the time. They used the climbing wall job to get money to pay for their holidays which seemed to involve climbing. Similarly at an outdoor centre the canoeists seemed to teaching/running groups at the centre and doing a lot of personal stuff as well.

The upside of commercial providers is that you use them when you want to use them and not waiting for some ATC bod to say I’m doing this or that.

As for paintball etc I don’t and still don’t understand the problem. Boys have always played war, cowboys and Indians etc and nowadays how many spend hours playing one of the myriad of video games, that are far more realistic.

1 Like

The important bit from the DIN is this:

"5. Activities not listed can still be undertaken, with Cadet Force HQ approval, but personnel will be required either to self insure or to be insured by a cadet organisation. "

Obviously you don’t actually need to self insure if you use a provider with the correct insurance.

Paintball yes, laser tag is fine. It used to be on the indemnified list. It isn’t anymore but I don’t see the problem if the provider has insurance.

Thanks for the clarification!

To be more specific, you CAN paintball, but only at targets and not people. A local CCF have paintball equipment that they use to set up battle lanes when doing fieldcraft. Makes things more interesting.

3 Likes

Paintball has been an activity on (at least two of) the D&C camps on that basis.

We Laser Tagged a while back. It was passable.

We also did battlefield live on one of the wettest day of the year. The cadets loved it.

Does anybody do nurf war?

You are probably already aware, but in ACP300, below the MOD indemnity list, is an extra list of activities:
“ADDITIONAL ACTIVITIES COVERED BY ATC PERSONAL ACCIDENT INSURANCE ONLY – NOT COVERED BY MOD INDEMNITY – ACTIVITY PROVIDER MUST HAVE PUBLIC LIABILITY COVER.”

You’ll see that Lazerquest is on there.

The irony is that HQAC or whoever don’t understand that as a commercial provider, anyone we go to for any activity must have PLI, qualified staff etc or they wouldn’t be in business. If we do a community event, they will have to have PLI and whole host of other things, or they won’t be able to hold the event, as they will have to get LA permission to hold the event.
Many of the non ATC providers we use have 1000s or 10000s of paying customers use them every year, they’re not just waiting for a couple of car loads of Air Cadets every other weekend.

It is amusing that businesses with people qualified and they doing things more often than the ATCs weekend warriors, aren’t trusted as places to do things, over a member of staff from the Corps turning up and doing something.

1 Like

Ah Teflon, the real,irony is that sometimes ATC Sqns use cowboy providers with no insurance and the MOD get sued for large amounts of money when it all goes wrong. The money comes out of the £26M that the MOD gives to fund the Air Cadets. Easy to be cavalier when you do not know what you are talking about.

1 Like

The issue with paintball in particular is that it can (and does) cause actual harm when you are shot. Anyone who has been paintballing at a centre with tell you, they come back with various bruises. Yes the centre is insured and has qualified staff etc… but the ATC is who will have the angry parent with the kid covered in bruises, because his mates thought it was funny to " light him up" in the middle of a game. I’ve seen it happen at paintball sites before (not with cadets), it’s kid’s nature to mess about.

Laser tag is a better option, as it doesn’t involve physical contact from any form of projectile.

You’re PJ or Duncan and i claim my £5!!!

3 Likes

Oh no, not bruises. how ever would we cope.

1 Like

What parents get excited about bruises?
Their schools must love them to bits.

1 Like

Thinking back to my last few paintball games, under 18s had to have a signed parental waiver accepting that bruising will probably happen. This is over and above our consent form OR our “notanATCactivityhonestguv” form.

1 Like

Or, if using a cowboy provider with inadequate equipment and an unfortunate accident, potentially eye injury, etc.

No, they SHOULD have PLI. The requirement to check is to make sure that it’s not some dodgy, fly-by-night operation providing the activity.