A petition has been started to halt the closure of a Girl Guides activity centre used by thousands of youngsters from Brighton and Hove.
Blackland Farm, near East Grinstead, has also a popular destination for school trips from Brighton and Hove.
The site was opened in 1938 and given to the organisation now known as Girlguiding. It is one of five activity centres that have all earmarked for closure.
More than 23,000 people have signed a petition started by Jenni Schumann.
She said: “The five Girlguiding activity centres – Blackland Farm, Foxlease, Glenbrook, Waddow Hall and Ynysgain – have been offering outdoor and adventurous opportunities to Girlguiding members for many years and whenever you visit one, you will always find new Guiding friends.
“The decision to sell the centres will affect not only a large number of members of staff, many of whom are Girlguiding volunteers in their own time, but also a huge number of Rainbows, Brownies, Guides, Rangers, Leaders, Volunteers and Trefoil Guild members.”
To sign the petition, click here.
A similar petition started by Nic Cowan said: “In an email sent to members, Girlguiding has announced they are planning to close the activity centres of Blackland Farm, Foxlease, Glenbrook, Waddow Hall and Ynysgain because of the investment needed and the reduced number of members using them in the past decade.
“This decision is wrong and not in the principles of Guiding that have stood for over 113 years and their new strapline of ‘Every Girl Can’.
“If every girl cannot go to a national activity centre, then what is the point of this strap line when it seems they can’t do that?
“As a member of Guiding for over 30 years, I’m angry and saddened by the attempts of the board of trustees to strip Guiding of its assets to save money as they say girls are not interested in using the facilities. This is not true with every unit, division, district, county, and region of Guiding.
“Please sign this petition, to ask the board of trustees to rethink the closure of these places so that future Rainbows Brownies, Guides, Rangers, leaders, Trefoil Guild, and the general public can use these places”
To sign the petition, click here.
One Hove mother said that she went to Blackland Farm a couple of times as a Guide and that it had helped her to build belief in herself and to understand the need to work things out, often as part of teamwork or co-in operation with others.
She added: “My daughter went there on a school trip. She had great fun, of course, but she also came back with more self-confidence, resilience and determination.
“It made me realise how, as a family, we needed to do more outdoors, and now we are doing that, my children are fitter, healthier and more self-reliant.
“Places like Blackland Farm are crucial for planting seeds like these in a generation that all too often seems to be glued to a screen.
“I really hope that if those responsible for running these places are struggling with ideas about how to make it pay, they will stand aside for others who won’t give up so easily.
“My sister is a Guiding leader and the trustees haven’t really done any of the positive things you would expect in a situation like this.
“How about a crowdfunder? How about getting in touch with the schools that laid on trips before covid to try to get them to book trips again? How about some inititative?
“When I look back, those few trips were a really important part of my childhood. I’m glad one of my children went there but every child, and certainly every Girl Guide, should have that chance.”
I think this would fit into the Community Ownership Fund really well if a group could form a Trustee CIC or similar to bid for it. Exactly what that funding is for, to prevent community assets from being closed by bringing them into community ownership.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/community-ownership-fund-prospectus
This cannot happen. Keep our girl guides
Girl guiding is dead in the water. The Christian overtones, the pro empire, pro monarchy, single sex (girls only unlike scouts which has modernised and realised girls and boys don’t need separate groups and activities) is just totally unappealing to modern parents and girls. Hopefully these sights will be sold and refurbished and then made available for all you f people to use. It doesn’t have to be owned by guides to be of use to the community. Why don’t the local communities group up to try to buy them?
If there are a group of people who want to form a Trusteeship, that’s very achieveable with the CMF, long as they can match fund.
Strange that many girls still seem to enjoy traditional guiding just for girls in spight of entitled woke generation Zs demanding agnostic republicism and gender flexibility.
According to Girl Guiding UK membership is increasing https://www.girlguiding.org.uk/about-us/press-releases/membership-numbers-and-appeal-for-volunteers/#:~:text=Girlguiding%2C%20the%20leading%20charity%20for%20girls%20and%20young,184%2C000%20young%20member%20enquiries%20submitted%20in%202021%20alone.
27,000 groups in the UK and 110,000 adult members. 56,882 on waiting lists.
I have been a Brownie leader, and for a time Guides too, for many years now, and have enjoyed camps and holidays at Blackland Farm and Foxlease. I feel it is a disaster if all 5 Girlguiding Activity Centres are closed. Where else can the girls enjoy such beautiful, safe places to test themselves by trying so many adventurous activities, and finding that they CAN DO IT!
I find it impossible to imagine Girlguiding without these centres. Whatever would Lord and Lady Baden-Powell think of the current Trustees and their disastrous decisions?
This proposal MUST BE STOPPED!