I quite like this idea, and it could actually be the answer to how to modify VA to reflect “role on the day” whilst still rewarding those in rather harder roles on squadrons. Split the VA budget in half, 50% for the sort of things it’s currently spent on and 50% for annual bounties.
Out of interest
How much responsibility does an average scout/Guide/BB officer have??
As a comparison it would be interesting to see.
Most youth organisation staff I know, turn up at the event and it’s good to go. Where as we have all sorts of hassle from admin to running buildings. Never mind all the courses that we are required to attend.
The one Scout group leader I know best seems to have responsibility for the training etc, getting new people getting them up to speed, plus he’s on people’s cases for finding money for building maintenance and improvement, as well as the IT, kit etc a sqn cdr might badger people for money for.
So probably on balance the same if not a little bit more. The building side especially is on level above that of the Air Cadets, we get a problem, we call RFCA, The Scouts let their building and benefit from the money.
However a couple of things I see they benefit from are the range of Scout owned/run campsites and activity centres and they do one night a week at most, which removes much of the responsibility to fill 2 nights a week and staff them.
They seem to have the same love/hate relationship with District and County that we have with our adminners.
I really, really dislike this attitude that we shouldn’t be doing this job for the VA, for some people the VA makes the difference between being able to volunteer for us, or not being able to volunteer at all.
When I was looking for my apprenticeship, and mostly unemployed it was the VA that gave me the ability to do what I did. Every activity I did required an advance pay claim, because I needed that money to enable me to pay to go half the time.
If it wasn’t for the VA, my wing wouldn’t have gone to Nijmegen that year, if it wasn’t for the VA I wouldn’t have been able to pay my messing on camp. It was vital.
I know I’m not alone in that regard, and even though I don’t need the VA these days, I wouldnt denigrate anyone who does.
Oh, and spending millions on canoes is a complete waste of time unless you have spent even more money training someone to coach in them.
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@Baldrick is spot on.
Moreover I can’t knock those who are happy with the VA as a bonus. It’s hardly big money. I’d get more doing an extra shift at work. Everyone has their own uses for VA, from car maintenance, new kit or whatever they want.
For me, it’ll be a little bonus for spending my first fathers day as a father taking some cadets on a course as I am the only CFAV on unit available to do so.
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from a legal point of view - the same, if not more?
break it down to what we share as a “job role” - volunteer youth worker, we are all equally responsible.
Something goes wrong on a Parade night, or Scout night, the Staff are responsible, regardless of what colour the tie is that is wrapped around the neck.
likewise for trekking, climbing, camping - any youth worker will be subject to the same responsibilities. to suggest otherwise is foolish.
the amount of admin that it requires however I would suggested is significantly less.
While we (RAFAC) are part of a larger organisation, managed by HQAC, the Scouts is not.
when i was a Scout, and an “occasional helper” for the years afterwards, there was no County involvement or interference. the unit carried on self-sustained with its own pioneering kit, when sailing and had a few canoes too.
providing the RA was complete and a qualified person was present carry on.
there wasn’t a logbook to show continual use of the qualification. a SMS system to upload that admin to and the kids names.
there was never the 2x side of A4 consent forms to consider for each event.
County never inspected the unit in an “AFI” style, nor was there County development courses.
the RAFAC runs in a far different manner, while Scout units can run independently to County involvement, the RAFAC doesn’t work like that.
we can’t get 30 camp beds for one unit to have a weekend away, we can’t even take 30 kids camping for the weekend unless there is sufficient BEL or other camping qualification.
the RAFAC is a victim of the RAF structure and the desire to work as a Wing to run weekend events.
we do a lot different to the Scouts, but a lot of that is not independent and self-sustaining and because of that coordination with other units, and the events that they are it all requires paperwork…
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As a cub leader myself, and a CI who’s just starting the dark road to commission 
Everything is more locally controlled.
If I want to run a hike with my cubs, I come up with a route, maybe I walk it before hand, I check the weather forecast, I confirm I’ll have enough adults, maybe invite some parents to come along for the hike too, and I make sure we’ve got some high vis vests and a couple first aid kits. Then i throw a quick message to my group scout leader to say i’ve done all that and when i want to do the hike and they say yes. I then send out details for parents (bring water bottle, pickup, drop off etc) and we do it.
So all in all we do exactly the same thing, but there’s so much more flexibility because its effectively like having your Wing Sector Officer sign off everything. WSO’s are in the same position as a group scout leader except much more local, and are probably only looking after 3 - 6 sections, 2 of which wont do much outside of the scout hut because they are beavers
It’s interesting the differences I am interested in seeing what the differences are after the WXo describing staff as glorified scout leaders I know some friends quietly watching this thread ready to tell the WXo they will no longer be doing their work!
What about buildings?
What are the responsibilities/ requirements on these
I don’t know if a mod wants to break this into a separate thread…
Is not the WXo just a glorified civil servant, the emphasis on the word servant?
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i might take issue with the word glorified…
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as i understand it both are out of the hands of either organisation.
RFCA look after our buildings, be that a joint Cadet forces centre, sole use and occupied hut, or otherwise. I know of Units in schools and Scout huts which will be managed by the “landlord” (for want of a better phrase) but the rent is still coordinated by RFCA.
for the Scouts it is almost the same varied mix, typically either the local Church Hall used as their meeting point, or their own hut which they self maintain - in these examples I know of (in towns) several groups use the building throughout the week, so is in use 3-4 nights a week and often throughout the evening catering for the different age groups.
as such although their own building there are potentially a dozen different groups meeting a week each paying subs which I predict would go towards its upkeep and running costs.
Of course the Scouts has a close link with the CofE Church and there maybe financial support from that route too…?
Fixed budget of PTDs per section for your own self-generated activites (off the top of my head it’s something like 13 - not per officer or per cadet, per unit regardless of size); if you book activities using instructors from the recall list their pay is deducted from your budget; no pay for OIC at Dartmouth.
On the other hand if you support their centrally run courses as DS, the pay is from a different budget.
Problem is, most schools run termly field weekends which rapidly eats up the PTDs leaving nothing for any Contingent camps e.g. AT.
The intent is clear - our central courses are important; your own activities less so - but CCF RN officers are caught between the conflicting demands of the school and the RN.
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Sounds like a car crash waiting to happen!
I was thinking of who is responsible for building RAs, letting in contractors, H&S reports etc as opposed to renting it out.
After what you said I take it it would the scout group leader.
That’s all well and good providing the centrally run courses can give every cadet on the contingent a place. We don’t have an RN section but for the Army /RAF Section you’re lucky to get two cadets on a course, hence why we try and run things internally.
I would have thought so - although what would a Scout RA cover in a Church Hall for instance that wouldn’t be covered by the Guides, or the WI, or a Church coffee morning?
I could imagine, certainly the Scout group i am local to (and know the lead Scout, Explorer and Beaver leaders personally having been to school with them all) doubt there RAs go into much detail.
“use of hall for Scouting activities”
in that would be the typical slips, trips and falls, use of the kitchen for “Ready steady cook” style evenings, the garden area for erecting tents. all covered by a single fairly generic RA
So which is better in terms of getting the kids doing things?
Which is the best organisation as a member of staff?
Do people within Scouting/Guiding, because there isn’t the paperwork and control systems we have, take unnecessary risks as implied by HQAC about CFAV?
Do people do less because they don’t paid like we do? In this I exclude the NCO, drill, leadership etc courses, which seem to take a lot of time out of the organisation.
What you describe is how it used to be in the Air Cadets. We (as did a number of sqns) block booked 2 or 3 locations for camping, kayaking and climbing from April to October using the forms we had at the time and just went, as and when we fancied it. This made it more spontaneous, fun and definitely more flexible and these are the elements we need back. However we didn’t have the plethora of courses etc that get in the way, that if you don’t send cadets on, you get it people nagging at you.
Different age group (mostly), different objectives. It’s hard to say on is objectively “better”.
Again, it’s done differently, each has their benefits and drawbacks. It’s easier to get onto training courses (ie NGB) in the RAFAC, and cheaper!
Yes.
With the scouts, yes, we tend to do less. We’ll maybe do one weekend camp a year (push it to a week if we can get the leaders - very few will stay the whole week though). We obviously only do one night a week, and we’ll tend to do more fun and games with a small amount of topic learning involved.
However, we’ll usually find ourselves issuing 3-4 different badges to the whole troop (/colony/pack) per term - in that respect, I’d say we’ve probably done more.
To be fair the RN courses are pretty generous with places; unless cadets bid for really popular courses (Powerboat L2 first week of summer holiday…) they usually get on.
The Army system is probably better: a fixed budget of PTDs per cadet which you can use as you see fit (and if some schools underspend, you may well be able to overspend). But they don’t have the same number of central camps and courses to support nor with quite the same range of specialist qualifications for those DS.
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Although @ThatDrummerBoy is correct since I’m a Cub Scout Leader (8 - 10), you do of course have the Scouts (10 - 14) and the Explorers (14 - 18).
Perfectly honest, you can do far wider range of activities within scouting. Of course The cadets will do more “military” style activities but scouts/explorers can do similar activities with a greater emphasis on the teamwork.
Not sure I entirely agree with @ThatDrummerBoy here either. Within the cadets we have our corps/regional/wing run courses. However the scouts actually have a proper training framework for adults, with a whole host of different training modules that have to be completed depending on your role. These are generally (if not always) free of charge, apart from maybe a tea fund, and organised at a district or county level. There is much more support for leaders in scouting.
One of the core values of scouting is that the young people have a sense of adventure in everything they do. of course that “sense of adventure” will be slightly manufactured with safety in mind, but safety must not interfere with that sense of adventure.
There is still paperwork, although not as dictated as RAFAC (you must use this form ver.6.0.3.1.5 to do an RA), the approach is much more flexible to to put the onus on the organiser(s) to do what they think appropriate, and you’ll find alot more activities being risk assessed dynamically. So no, I don’t think scouting has more “unnecessary risks” because there will be risks with any activity, and sure if you can mitigate some risks without making the activity “un-adventurous” then great.
You do get lots of leaders who help with their section and that’s it, which is fine, its what they are comfortable with and that’s what they can fit into their lives. but there are loads more that help out all over the county, or in multiple sections, or help run a cub pack AND run adult training for the county etc etc.
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