From the Chief Commissioner
Hi everyone, hope you are having a great month!
Welcome to another great month of Scouting!
We are gearing up this month for end of term two, with LEAP North and LEAP South camps, Brisbane Gang Show about to hit the stage – all of these happening in the June/July School holidays.
Further our Youth Program Tweaks continue to be implemented and our progress on establishing our “Specialised Activity Centres” is gathering pace to be piloted in Term three. If your young person wants to get involved with their patrol or unit have them speak to their Leaders in Term three. There will be three pilot sites, and I will provide more detail about that next month.
One of the components that we are seeking to address is the issue around more Leader support. Accordingly, over term two and term three we are asking District Commissioner’s and Section Support Leaders to arrange a visit to each Unit to check in and see what else we can be doing to support our Leaders in their role.
These teams will be asking four questions and recording responses via an App to allow us to understand what we need to be doing more of – to support Leaders.
- What feedback came from youth members?
- What feedback came from adult Leaders?
- What feedback came from the parents?
- What support does the Unit need (if anything) to shine and “be their best”?
Please note that this visit is one of coaching and support – not an audit.
I wanted to take a moment this week to highlight the importance of our obligations as adults regarding mandatory reporting on any child safe matters. I am sure we are all aware of the need for mandatory reporting, should we become aware of or witness something, that we believe could be inappropriate behaviour towards a child.
Our responsibility is to report, using our online reporting form or contact Police Link on 131 444.
Our job is to report and nobody gets into trouble (from anybody) for reporting. The report is simply lodged and reviewed by the appropriate personnel to determine the next steps.
We should all be aware of the other measures we have in place to support the safety of youth members: –
- Child Safe Briefings before events/activities
- Child Safe Scouting Officers
- Two deep leadership
- Mandatory training modules to be completed by all adults (each second year)
- Development of Unit Codes which should include “behaviour and feeling safe:”
Our job initially is to report!
I am excited to advise that we had eight applications to the Leadership through Adventure Fund approved in May. My congratulations to all applicants for these upcoming exciting journeys where 55 youth members will challenge themselves on what will be I am sure wonderful activities.
There is a list below of the successful applicants, and a link to the LTAF Website.
Scouts Australia released a New Code of Conduct in February 2025. This code needs to be completed by all adult members by 1 August 2025. It will become a mandatory module going forward. You can jump into your training record and login to complete. Please make that time as soon as you can.
I wanted to provide an update on our Strategic Plan, given the end of the Scout year as of 31 March 2025. We have achieved some wonderful things over the last 12 months.
Some highlights include: –
- Rollout of independent reference checking for adults – thus reducing work for Formation Leaders.
- Forty-six percent (46%) uplift in Adult Recognition Award nominations for the year.
- Strong local community recognition for our Brand and our Scouting volunteers.
- Delivered a successful 26th Australian Scout Jamboree.
- Significant Government engagement with $1M infrastructure funding, $700K funding to support AJ2025 and $1.5M in election commitments from October 2024.
- 69 VET qualifications issued over the year, with 1,290 statements of attainment.
- 112 training courses held with 1,162 participants.
- New Assistant Chief Commissioner Specialist Activities appointed.
- Two new Region Commissioners appointed.
- All groups now on Operoo.
Our membership for the year to 31 March 2025 was 8061 which was a small reduction over the year of 3%. I am delighted to report that as the time of this newsletter we have regained that loss and we are growing up by 6% with a membership of 8600. So, there is still a desire for families to engage in Scouting.
We are in the middle of our Annual Report Presentations (ARP’s). and these reports are a great way to engage the local community and share with them what your Group/District/Region has been doing over the last year.
It is a great opportunity to engage your local Councillor, State Member and or Federal Member of Parliament. If you do, give them a job – make a small speech, present some certificates or even a badge.
I am also excited to see the lead roles our youth members are taking in these ARP meetings. Videos, photos and wonderful stories about their Scouting experiences over the year.
Finally, from me if your young person is still wearing their AJ2025 event badge – it now needs to be removed from their uniform, please.
Have a great month and good Scouting!