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  • Sexual Abuse

    My story is actually an observation about the lack of safeguarding in the Scouts. I worked with a man who was a high-level Scout Leader, and was known at work as a lecherous, ‘creepy’ person. We both worked in supporting vulnerable adults at the time, and he went away to a Scout camping week and on his return, showed me photographs he had taken on his phone of young girls at the event, sitting around the camp fire and in various activities. The photos were inappropriately angled (upskirting) and I found this utterly revolting. I told him that he should not only delete the pictures but also that he should not be taking pictures of the young people anyway – it’s not appropriate. I have been away on many trips with vulnerable people, and never ever have I seen anyone taking pictures of the people we worked with using their own camera. We had a camera that belonged to the organisation, and it would be handed over to the Manager at the end of the trip, and the pictures would be checked and deleted / edited as necessary by her and myself. This chap saw no problem with having these pictures on his phone and made several comments about how lovely these girls looked. I felt this shows a clear lack of understanding of basic safeguarding and child protection on the part of the Scouts – especially as this chap was a ‘Leader’.