Look In: to the Scouting No-Man’s Land of Ballymacarratt. Gone are the Groups at St.Patrick’s, St.Clement’s and the Salvation Army; and the dear old 37th who were driven into the neighbouring South East District. Nearby, the St.Mark’s Group (59th) is in limbo. What potential there is in this general area and, so far, nothing seems to be being done about filling such a glaring void.

Look Out: into the great outdoors. How much is being done to wean our charges away from a surfeit of computer games, e-mail and Internet? There are viable counter attractions to Summer Camp (although these are over-emphasised in my opinion) but how many of our charges get a day or two trekking or a few nights camping at Crawfordsburn or elsewhere? A lot of the impetus for getting out disappeared when the gaining of outdoor proficiency badges ceased to be an integral part of the core Awards of the Movement and I would love to see adaptations (by age) of the old Bushman’s Thong revisited.

Look Up: into the dearth of Members of Venture Scout age. Less than 50 in the whole of East: it’s a ridiculously low number. There should be a District Venture Scout Unit, splitting down to 2 or 3 District Units if numbers increased sufficiently. I suggest one meeting a month, rotated around every Group in the District, irrespective of whether or not a Unit exists at the particular host Group. A fully uniformed Meeting-unless there is a specific non-uniform activity in the programme-with a properly organised and sourced agenda which has been pre-circulated. It may be a little high in communication costs but would be time and money well spent.

Look after: the weaker Groups. There is not a shortage of Leaders. District-wise, there is one Leader for every seven members, taking into account all Sections. The standard of personnel management in Scouting is woefully low, and East is no exception. It is a disgrace that the likes of 8th and 59th should fold because of a lack of Leaders and that there are other Groups without Sections or with only one or two Leaders. In recent years, the general quality of Leader Applicants attending Warrant Interviews has been first rate, but 3 or 4 years later one finds that many of the same Applicants have left the Movement. Some do move to other pastures, I know, but I believe that a number of them leave because they are not given a worthwhile job to do in their Group or a sufficiently challenging responsibility as a Leader. Between the ages of 17 and 26, I held one ASM and 2 SM (note the ‘M’ bit) warrants in 3 different Groups because I was taken away from the Group in which I grew up by the DC and directed- yes, directed, to take up Leadership in Groups having a greater need. In one case, the greater need was the existing SM being called up for military service after completing his University course, and another case was the command to start up Scouting in a brand new housing estate similar to Tullycarnet. That latter Group, by the way, is now an Admiralty Recognised Sea Scout Group.

Enough of my ramblings, then. Thank you for listening (I hope that you were!) and my best wishes for all your efforts for this Great Movement of ours.

Phil Holland