Clause 2 - Statements of Inherent Risk
Promotion of Volunteering Bill
2:30 pm
Mr Julian Brazier (Shadow Minister, International Affairs; Canterbury, Conservative)
The hon. Gentleman has made a good point, but as they were fundraisers I think that there is a strong chance that they would be covered. For example, there is a very nice charity—I shall not mention its name as it has not given me permission to do so—that fundraises on a large scale for a medical cause. Its representatives wrote to ask whether I could do various things, which would have been way outside the scope of the Bill. When I replied explaining what we are doing, the charity replied: ''That's terrific, because people who fundraise for us often take part in the sort of activities for which we could use certificates.'' I do not know which charity the man in question was raising money for, but I hope that once it becomes known that the statements of inherent risk are available, their use will become standard practice for those who want to provide protection.
I shall not detain the Committee by reading my entire list of cases, but I shall give one more example. A dance instructor was sued when a member of the dance club slipped on a highly polished floor. The incident took place in spring 2000 at a club in west Yorkshire. The floor had been treated to reduce the likelihood of a slip, but a reasonably shiny surface is necessary for dancing. The case continues.
I do not want to bang on, because we have been round and round the buoys on this issue, but my point is that whereas in other areas of activity, including other parts of the voluntary sector, it has been possible to drive down the risk of litigation by the simple factor of driving out risk altogether, we do not want to be reduced to that in this context. We do not want sport, adventure training and many forms of recreation to become risk free. We need those forms of activity to involve people to a degree in taking responsibility for their risks. The Bill is, crucially, about that.