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Reviewing our Permit Schemes

In the upcoming year we’re planning to make some changes to our Permit Schemes in Scouts. This webpage explores the findings from our Permit reviews and our next steps.

As part of our response to the Prevention of Future Deaths notice, we committed to externally review both our Adventurous Activities and Nights Away Permit Schemes. 

These reviews were carried out in 2025 by independent safety specialists. They reviewed how Permits are used and assessed across the whole of UK Scouts.  

Our UK Adventure Team, made up of volunteer specialists across many different adventurous activities, are now leading on a project to consider the reviews, make recommendations for changes to our Permit Scheme and overseeing the delivery.  The projects will also be supported by volunteers and staff from the Safety, Programme and Volunteer teams.  

Findings from the reviews 

Overall, the reviews found that both our Adventurous Activities and Nights Away Permit Schemes work well and we’re able to continue to offer a safe programme under our current schemes.  

However, they have recommended some improvements which impact the following areas: 

  • The consistency of learning delivery
  • Assessment of Adventurous Activities and Nights Away Permit Holders 
  • Guidance and support available for Permit Assessors and Approvers
  • Ongoing learning opportunities for Permit Holders and Assessors  

There are no plans to publish the full reports due to the technical nature of the content, though summaries may be available at a later date, once the scope of work has been agreed. 

Next steps 

The reports from the reviews and the proposed project structure have been reviewed by the UK Scouts Safety Committee, and plans are now being developed by our UK Adventure Team to help all volunteers navigate our Permit Schemes – providing improved and consistent learning and assessment across the UK.  

We’re also reviewing some wider safety work around risk, categories of activities and the classification of the environments, terrain and water where our activities take place. We’re working closely with our National Governing Bodies to align our requirements to their qualifications and environment classifications and descriptions where appropriate. 

We’ve already begun to make the straightforward amendments, and you’ll start to see some of the changes within our guidance on scouts.org.uk and the rules within POR.  

We’re currently working on a plan to introduce any wider changes and have begun to set up project teams to help us implement these changes. 

Where there are specific changes to Activity Permits these will be communicated to the relevant Permit Holders and Assessors, as well as volunteers in Leadership Teams and those holding Safety accreditations.  

We’ll keep this page updated throughout with updates for all volunteers interested to hear about this work.  

Thank you for your support

A huge thank you to everyone who shared their observations, suggestions and feedback through the Support Centre and at events with the Adventure and Safety teams over the past few months.  

Every piece of communication we receive is logged and reviewed. We’re continuing to work hard to make sure that the outcomes of these reviews will lead to a more straightforward, modern and accessible permit scheme for all volunteers which will help to offer even more young people the opportunity to safely participate in adventurous and overnight activities.