SAVE THE OAC!! DOWNLOAD OUR PETITION HERE!! PETITION UPDATE To email your support of our petition send an email to publicity_sec@luoac.co.uk containing the following text: " I support the Open Air Club's petition which calls for the Liverpool Guild of Students to remove the requirement to have qualified instructors on trips, in accordance with the British Mountaineering Council "seeing compulsory leadership awards as inappropriate for clubs". " **** FRIDAY 13TH JANUARY Email from LGoS advising that meeting with Sport Liverpool happened this afternoon. No outcome detailed in email but wanting to meet to talk through discussions. Asked us to remove petition from OAC website. As we haven't been told of any decision made yet petition will remain online. Waiting for next meeting... **** WEDNESDAY 11TH JANUARY Phone call and email from LGoS asking us to remove posters. Told that review still on-going to find safest possible way we can carry out activity that we do and that they do have our best interests at heart and want us to continue as society. Posters taken down. **** TUESDAY 10TH JANUARY Phone call from Student Activities Manager advising that Chief Executive of LGoS meeting with Sport Liverpool during the week to discuss option of OAC joining Athletics Union. OAC posters put up in LGoS advertising petition. **** FRIDAY 6TH JANUARY 2012 Still waiting for reply from Student Activities Manager and Health and Safety Officer. **** TUESDAY 13TH DECEMBER Email from Student Activities Manager: "Thank you for sending this. I will get back to you A.S.A.P with an update." **** THURSDAY 8TH DECEMBER Email sent to Student Activities Manager outlining the Mountain Leader qualification that they are demanding and also information on first aid courses. Stressed that our stance remains that they are being unreasonable. Contacted Guild Health and Safety Officer to arrange going through our risk assessment. **** TUESDAY 6TH DECEMBER Meeting with Student Activities Manager attended by Jack Williams, Chris Davis and Mark Smith. Guild unaware who BMC are. Having informed them that we are insured through BMC insurance advised that requirements are to protect the reputation of the Guild. Committee Meeting in evening to discuss meeting and campaign. **** THURSDAY 22ND NOVEMBER OAC committee meeting to discuss new requirements and plan way forward for the club. Contact BMC for support and clarification on their position on compulsory qualifications. Request further meeting with Guild's Student Activities Manager. **** TUESDAY 22ND NOVEMBER Email from Student Activities Manager informing club of new requirements; risk assessment, first aid and instructor qualifications. **** In early November The Liverpool Guild of Students (LGoS) carried out a review of "high-risk" society groups, a category which included the Open Air Club. We do not know the reason behind this review, indeed we can't think of any reason to question the safety of the OAC as we have an exemplary record. We are unsure as to who exactly is behind the decision process or what they based their recommendations on, and we find it hard to understand why they didn't consult us or take British Mountaineering Council advice. This isn't an issue solely of the OAC either, many other activity clubs are facing closure due to new requirements being imposed upon them by LGoS. On 22nd November we were told by LGoS that they think the activity that we do as a club is "fantastic" and that they wanted us to continue with it. However they also gave us three requirements that we had to satisfy before they would sanction any future OAC trips: To revise our risk assessment To have a qualified first aider on every trip To have a qualified instructor on every trip We don't know the rationale behind these new requirements, as our practice hasn't changed over the last few years and so we can't think of any reason why safety should be an issue. We maintain that what we do has always been safe. However we have agreed to amend our risk assessment and arrange first aid training for our walk leaders, for which the Guild has promised us funding. Our current issue regards the requirement to have a qualified instructor on every trip. The British Mountaineering Council (BMC), the national representative body for hill walking, climbing and mountaineering in England and Wales, are explicitly clear in "seeing compulsory leadership awards as inappropriate for clubs". Our club is a BMC affiliated student club and all of our members are covered by their liability insurance policy. Nearly all other student mountaineering clubs do not have this requirement, in-line with BMC recommendations. We therefore feel this requirement is completely unnecessary for our club, and we would be unable to implement it anyway as a course costs at least £1000 per person. We have taken advice from the BMC on this matter who fully support our position that we don't need leadership qualifications. There seems to be no appreciation for the value of experience that our leaders currently have and we cannot see why LGoS is insistent on us having these qualifications. We have met with the Student Activities Manager at LGoS since these requirements were given to us. We explained the BMC's position and we told them that our members are insured through the BMC policy, and so this shouldn't be of concern to the Guild. We have also urged them to contact the BMC directly, although we are still waiting to see if this happens. We were told that the requirements would stay as they were, but would be discussed at another internal Guild meeting, to which we aren't permitted to attend, in the near future. We are therefore asking you to sign a petition calling for LGoS to remove this restriction. A lot of people support the OAC and hopefully if we can show to the Guild how popular the club is we can persuade them that they are most clearly not acting in the best interests of our members. We would be grateful if you could sign this petition in support of the Open Air Club, in the hope that we can get this requirement removed and can once again run our activities, as we have done for the last 75 years! DOWNLOAD OUR PETITION HERE!!