“Oh no we accidentally copy-pasted the RC’s email address into the footer of our partial stand down email… what a shame…. anyways…”
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Treat everyone equally and cancel, with an explanation email to parents with OC Wing and RC cc’d in.
(In the real world we’re just carrying on as normal. It’s not as if the last 30 odd years have caused us any issues when we’ve been without female cover)
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I’d be very wary of running any events for male / female cadets only, but would escalate via the CoC rather than cancel or ignore.
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Isn’t this just following policy?
I’m not convinced that would be a good enough defence.
I don’t understand how this aligns with our legal obligations: Equality Act 2010 and Public Sector Equality Duty.
We have a duty to eliminate discrimination and promote equality between those who share and don’t share a protected characteristic.
If we’re preventing girls (most likely) from attending an organisation to which they belong (and pay to attend), then the reason needs to be incredibly strong.
I just don’t feel that a lack of female staff is good enough as a reason for excluding female cadets.
I’m struggling to see how this is proportionate and not a legal issue.
Can anyone break this down for me? I’m really uncomfortable with this one and I don’t feel I understand it well enough.
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Wouldn’t the counter to this be that without female staff, they cannot keep female cadets safe and safeguarded?
Not that I agree with that argument - if there’s a serious issue, any cadet should feel comfortable to go to any CFAV. If they don’t, that’s an us problem, and shouldn’t be attributed to sex/gender. Do schools require female staff present when female students are?
I’m sure that the requirement for female staff to supervise female cadets has been around much longer than the SCD though. The “correct” answer to the poll would be to cancel the activity for female cadets. Having female staff on call rather than present if having them there in person could make things slightly easier I suppose, but we have a real issue with recruiting and retaining volunteers at the moment - writing into policy another thing that is going to hamstring us seems quite counterproductive. We need to be looking at ways we can do more with what we have, not with what HQ thinks the organisation is like.
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I see what you’re saying there, but my son’s nursery never had male staff. I think I’ve seen one male teacher at his primary school.
I also don’t see the point of having a female member of staff on call. At that point, just call the parents back.
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I completely agree here by the way, I think it’s just another hoop, and if schools don’t have to meet the requirement and we see them much less often, is there a need for us to? Would be interested in hearing what other youth groups do.
If it’s about female members genuinely not being safe without a female member of staff, then I don’t know what to tell you. Maybe our organisation shouldn’t exist because our safeguarding is riddled with flaws.
But this line of enquiry is fraught with difficulty and probably more legal jeopardy. Are lesbians as unsafe as straight men?
Is it terrible to suggest they might be?
Does that make it terrible to suggest a straight man might be?
Are gay men safe with the females!?
On and on…
If it’s about how the cadet may feel, then that’s different. But we can let them make that call (and then do some reflection if they don’t feel safe).
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and to add to this - if the above is true, should be be excluding any CFAVs who identify as bisexual as they are clearly “unsafe” to both males and females?
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This is my fear.
We’re understandably careful about safeguarding and making sure our cadets are comfortable, but we need to be really careful about feeding stereotypes.
Not least because you can then find yourself looking the wrong way. It’s like the whole “stranger danger”, when most offences are perpetrated by someone they know.
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And of course, all of this assumes that being unsafe is sexual in nature. Children aren’t just at risk from sexual exploitation.
I somewhat get it for residential activities.
But for single day activities, I really don’t see what issue we’re trying to solve that couldn’t be solved by either:
- A cadet’s friend(s)
- A staff member of a different gender
- A parent collecting
- A 111/999 call
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I think we’d really struggle to justify excluding a particular gender, particularly (again) for a non-residential activity. Reasonable adaptions (such as calling a parent) exist.
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crux of the issue
and this is proven by schools.
Steve Junior is in nursery with 100% female staff
he’s going to school in September with 100% teaching staff female
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~#flippant remark on#~
As the SCD has used the term gender when identifying males and females. Just get a male member of staff to identify as female for the period that female cover is needed. Job done, female cover sorted.
~#flippant remark off#~
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I’d do both, escalate up the chain with a note that if the RC doesn’t authorise you will have to remove all the females and run it as a male only event, I doubt many will have the bottle to say no with that sort of paper trail. If they do when you cancel the females write a letter stating the reasons why (including the policy) and that you sought authority from Group Captain X with an explanation that a refusal would lead to this happening and they said no anyway.
You will very quickly find a parent that decides to escalate to their MP and Air Command.
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I would love to see puzzle palaces reaction to that - the poor unfortunate who’s number has been given out tells HQAC in the Monday morning round-up that an OC rang them on Friday night with a female cover problem but them came up with the cunning wheeze of getting Dave, a 40yo CI who’s built like a brick outhouse and wins national beard growing and axe throwing competitions, to identify as a woman called Crystal Jade for 3 hours until the kids go home.
Job jobbed days the poor unfortunate with an amused smile, and the OC and Dave are still laughing their tits off - so what happens in the Remedial Wing at Sleaford Tech?
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This year, there is a requirement for a female member of staff in each Nijmegen team if you wanted to bring female cadets. This has been policy for a while now but only really strictly enforced recently. There is also a rule that only 2 staff can attend per team.
Technically speaking, if the female CFAV withdraws from the march, all female cadets would need to withdraw too due to not having female staff cover on the route. If a female cadet withdraws, the female CFAV is meant to withdraw to provide staff cover for them, so all other female cadets need to withdraw.
The ability to forward/succession plan for this event is now impossible as any Team Leaders are meant to have experience as a deputy before taking on the TL role. Unless your DTL and successor is the opposite sex to you, you can never train up anyone to take over from you.
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