Hundreds of cubs come together for competition

More than 300 cub scouts from across the region came together at Moor House Activity Centre, in West Rainton, for the annual Pete Swinney competition.

The event, organised by Durham County Scout Association saw children, aged between eight and ten, take part in a fun-filled afternoon of challenges featuring many of the activities available in the grounds of Moor House such as crate stacking, bouldering, climbing and archery.

Working in teams, cubs were given a map of Moor House showing the 46 different mental, physical and skills challenges available for them to undertake.

Each challenge was allocated a number of points for successful completion and teams could choose the challenges they wanted to try using the map to find them.

The team with the most points at the end of two hours was the winner.

The success of the 2018 Pete Swinney competition, which had the largest number of participants to date, comes hot on the heels of the news that Scouting in Durham is growing.

Durham Scouts, which covers County Durham, Gateshead, South Tyneside and Sunderland, have recorded another year of growth, including a 5% increase in volunteers, according to the latest annual membership figures released in April.

Following a call out for more adult volunteers in 2017, 95 signed up in the last 12 months.

These new adults have supported the growth of 34 new youth members, with a total of 2,198 adults and 6,012 young people enjoying adventure and learning valuable skills for life.

David Stokes, County Commissioner and Lead Volunteer for Durham Scouts, said: “It is great to see continued growth for scouting in Durham and it’s great to see the young people enjoying the Pete Swinney competition.

“Much of this is down to our amazing volunteers and it’s good to see adult volunteer numbers start to catch up with the growth in our youth numbers. There are still more young people – especially girls and young women – who want to join us, and we continue to need more adult volunteers as we look to open new provision in some of the most disadvantaged areas in Durham.”