Model Forum / General / Railroads / November 2009

Hi,
Slightly off topic but i'm in Amateur Dramatics, and my outfit started
talking about setting upa  youth arm, in order to get teenager off the
streets and give them something useful to do.

When we started to investigate what this would entail, we found that we
would have to basically build a complete new dressing room for the kids
to be staffed by CRB checked people.  We quickly abandoned the idea on
cost ground befroe anything else.  Guess who lost out in the end.  The
very tennagers that society is demonising because they are out of control.

We did once have a young girl in a play but she was chapperoned by her
grandad, but how many parents could be arsed these days to actually
spend time with their kids?

The UK is going to the dogs.

Rob.

Its worth finding out if you can get checks as a volunteers as those are
free.
I've no idea if non-profit model clubs can do this in practise, but the
comments by spokes-people on the radio imply that those who are volunteering
their time and not earning can have their check for free. The discussion is
usually in terms of sports, charities or other leisure activities for
children where the adults are not paid.

I can't see a fundamental difference between a hobby athletics club with a
junior section and a hobby model club with a junior section.  Both have a
structure and someone to look after the club's money, some premises (either
rented or bought), some equipment bought for the activity, subscriptions
paid by members to cover costs of running club, members who have their own
equipment and bring it along to the club, have events where the public can
pay to come and see what's happening (sports competition vs. model
exhibition), do things which occupy the members, encourage juniors to
participate, learn skills, become more capable, etc..   In those terms, I
cannot see a difference; if the athletics club volunteers can have free CRB
checks, then so can the model club.

Otherwise, I think your choice of actions are down to either;
a) no under 18's and no vulnerable adults (typically learning difficulties)
or
b) under 18's / vulnerable adults ONLY if accompanied by their
parent/guardian/career.

The current rules, whilst perhaps for well meaning intent, are destroying a
lot of club activities and voluntary work. I think the baby has gone out
with the bathwater, bath, and most of the bathroom fittings.

- Nigel

Isn't it a sad reflection of society when knee-jerk reactions become the
norm & ordinary people are potentially demonised in this way.

It the namby-pamby brigade want to legislate to avoid child abuse, then it
should be aimed at the area where most problems arise, and that's with the
parents and close relatives of kids.

Maybe potential parents should be required to have a CRB check before
they're allowed to have kids.

John.

least one club

is a pity.We are

welcome any advice

Hi Keith, I think I can help here, I have walked this way before and
although what I am about to present is under the "Previous regime" my
understanding is that things have NOT CHANGED substantively with the latest
version that has obviously sparked this debate.

We, Fareham & Dist MRC, had a vexatious member who, for reasons best known
to himself, tried to stop us having the junior members in the club at all
when the CRB system first came in.  As a result we went through the "proper
channels" and set everything up the way is should be.  This is what you need
to know:

1.    The first thing you will need to do is to talk to your local Council
for Voluntary Service.  Your email address suggests that you live in Powys,
if so then your nearest contact would be Powys Association of Voluntary
Organisations.  Their website is http://www.pavo.org.uk.  If this isn't
where you live then google "Council for voluntary Service <location>" to
find out who to contact.  Our organisation is Fareham Community Action at
http://www.farehamaction.org.uk.

2.    They will advise you to write a Protection Policy for the club and you
need to get it approved by your membership.  Depending on how your club is
set up you might be able to make it a part of your constitution.  You will
find ours at http://www.fadmrc.hampshire.org.uk/fownload/vmppolicy.pdf.

3.    The way we work it is that we insist that if a youngster wants to come
along then it is the parent who joins the club and takes full responsibility
for the youngster's safety and actions whilst on club premises.  We are
"flexible" as to who actually comes with the child, it could be the mother
one week and the father the next, it doesn't really matter as long as there
is always an adult to take charge of the child.  And you'd be surprised just
how keen the parents are to get involved, even if it is just making the tea
(or cleaning our kitchen area up).

3a.   We find this approach also gives us the ability to protect the club
from the child, for instance we had one child who was a total nightmare and
wouldn't accept that when we were using power tools and said to him, "don't
stand there, its dangerous" we really meant it.  In that case we said to the
mother, if he won't take safety advice we can't have him in the club - and
they left.  Handling that situation without the parent available would be
very difficult (as any teacher will tell you).

4.    Don't forget, it isn't just children that need protecting in this way.
The proper title of our policy is Vulnerable Members Protection Policy; we
have a couple of late teen/early adulthood members/prospective members who
have learning difficulties and they are very much in the sphere of needing
"protection" as well.

Finally, if anyone tries to tell you that you need to make a clean CRB check
a condition of membership ignore them, to do so would be an infringement of
human rights (or so I was told).  This was the approach our vexatious member
insisted we went down until we were able to rein him in.  Also, I see in
some of the other responses in this thread that the question has surfaced of
who can apply for the CRB disclosure and how much it costs.  The answer is,
for a voluntary organisation it has to be the CVS in who's jurisdiction the
organisation resides, in our case Fareham Community Action; that's not to
say that the someone might slip under the radar and manage to get a
disclosure direct from the Bureau, but in theory they should only release
info to the responsible CVS.  The cost is very much down to the CVS, I think
ours charge a fiver to cover the postage &c but they can and do waive the
charge if they think that might be the most appropriate thing to do.

Hope this has helped, let me know how you get on.

Regards

Elliott

Just to say many thanks for the useful responses (and the somewhat OT
diversions!) to my original query. Your varied suggestions, well not all of
them!, are being considered for incorporation into our club rules

My local engineering has recently enquired upon this matter to the county
council's protection officer, and the advice received, at least as far as
public running and exhibitions goes, is that provided the child's parents
are present, then there has only to be one official accredited under the
CRB also present at all times.

I appreciate that this situation isn't quite the question posed, but
may nonetheless be of interest