The Nights Away Permit Scheme

(FS120800) Published October 2024 replacing Jan 2015

This page provides a general overview to the Nights Away Permit Scheme. It should be read in conjunction with Policy, Organisation and Rules (POR) of The Scout Association. More detailed information can be found in the following separate webpages for Applicants guide, Nights Away Assessors guide, and Lead Volunteers and Approvers guide.

The Nights Away Permit Scheme

The Nights Away Permit Scheme promotes quality residential and camping experiences. It shows that all those leading nights away events for young people within Scouts have the skills, experience and personal suitability to take young people away safely.

It's designed so that it can be tailored to be as flexible as possible, while at the same time providing a robust checking process for volunteers leading nights away events.

The permit should be seen as an enabling device to show a volunteers competence and to provide reassurance to parents of the young people. While at the same time, it should also be encouraging to volunteers to acquire and improve the skills required to provide residential experiences.

Permits are only available to volunteers of The Scout Association and cease to be valid if membership ends.

What's the Nights Away Permit Scheme?

Everyone who leads a nights away event for young people within Scouts is required to hold a Nights Away Permit for the type of event they're running.

Although managed locally, the Nights Away Permit Scheme is a national scheme, so once gained, a permit will allow you to run a nights away event in any District or County.

How the Scheme works

Who grants the permit?

The person who grants your permit will be your responsible Lead Volunteer or Permit Approver In most circumstances, this will be at District Lead Volunteer (DLV) if you've a Group or District appointment and your County if you've a County appointment.

A Lead Volunteer or Permit Approver can only grant a permit to the level of the recommendation of the Nights Away Assessor. The Nights Away Assessor will provide a recommendation after an assessment based on the Nights Away Assessment Checklist. 

How long is a permit valid for?

A permit is time limited up to a maximum of five years at which point it expires. A permit is only valid if recorded on the membership system.

If you wish to continue leading nights away events for young people, you'll need to apply for a new permit. However, if the new permit's to exactly the same level as the old permit and you've been running residential events, there may be no need for a practical assessment. That decision is up to the Nights Away Assessor.

Do I need to attend a module 16 or module 38 learning modules?

There are no prior conditions to gaining a permit, so there's no requirement to have attended a Module 16 (Introduction to Residential Experiences) or Module 38 (Skills for Residential Experiences) learning module.

The Nights Away Permit Scheme is different to these modules, so there's no requirement to gain a Nights Away Permit to complete your accreditation.

Validating modules 16 and 38 doesn't automatically grant you a Nights Away Permit.

However, gaining a permit is one way of validating modules 16 and 38, and it's the best way to gain the skills and knowledge needed for a Nights Away Permit where learning is required.

The four areas assessed to gain a permit

The four areas assessed to gain a permit are:

1. Technical Competence. This is assessed by the Nights Away Assessor (NAA) and looks at the eight core skill areas required to run a nights away event. It's usually assessed through a practical assessment of running an event.

2. Scout Association Rules. This can be assessed by either a Nights Away Assessor or the responsible Lead Volunteer or Permit Approver. It looks at whether the Applicant is aware of the Rules and guidance for running nights away events within Scouts.

3. Safety and Safeguarding. This'll be carried out by the responsible Lead Volunteer or Permit Approver and ensures that the necessary criminal record checks have been carried out and the appropriate safety and safeguarding learning has taken place. 

4. Personal Suitability. This is carried out by the responsible Lead Volunteer or Permit Approver, often in conjunction with a Group Lead Volunteer or similar, to check the applicant is suitable (in terms of attitude) to be leading nights away events for young people.

Event Passports

To encourage young people led residential events, such as patrol camps or Explorer Scout expeditions, a Nights Away Permit holder can grant a nights away passport to someone under 18 years old. This'll be done after a check on the young person's knowledge and ability to lead the event by the permit holder.

It'll allow the young person to lead a residential event for members of their own section and will last for a single event. The permit holder can only issue a Passport to the level of their own permit.

Passports can't be used if adults, without permits, are present for the duration (or a significant part) of the residential event.

Passports can't be used to take members of a younger section away, such as an Explorer Scout Young Leader taking a Patrol of Scouts away.

Find out more about Event Passports.

Nights Away Notification and Approval

Once an applicant has been granted a permit, they can start running nights away events.

Each time they run a nights away event they need to notify their District Lead Volunteer or Nights Away Approver before the event takes place to gain approval for the event to go ahead. 

This is done through either passing the information in the Nights Away Notification (NAN) form to the District Lead Volunteer or Nights Away Approver, or by, through a local digital solution or on the membership system.

If one permit is being used for more than one group, the responsibility lies with the Permit holder to inform the appropriate Lead Volunteer for each group.

Permit renewal

All permits have an expiry date, which is a maximum of 5 years from the date of issue. After this the permit ceases to be valid.

Renewal of a permit is conducted in the same way as initial application except the method of assessment which is likely to differ. The permit holder will need apply for a new permit through the membership system and find a Nights Away Assessor.

The Nights Away Assessor will then decide on the most appropriate method of assessment. A practical assessment is unlikely to be required, but the Nights Away Assessor may wish to meet the applicant.

Alternatively, they may simply consider the experience and issue a recommendation to the Lead Volunteer or Permit Approver on the log book supplied.