27 Mar
On 18th March Education Queensland ordered all Queensland schools to stop their camp and excursion programs effective 20th March. The Federal Government then ordered a closure of Community and Recreation Centres to assist in the containment of the Covi-19 pandemic.
QCCC is committed to working with authorities and our clients to minimise the spread and impact of the Covid-19 virus. QCCC’s management has had successful negotiations with its financiers and is confident of QCCC’s ability to endure through the containment period and thrive afterwards.
All four QCCC venues retain essential staff to maintain and upkeep facilities, liaise with client groups and have the sites ready to resume operations, in consultation with health authorities, within a 48-hour period. QCCC is adopting a wait-and-see” approach to all bookings from May 2020, and particularly into Term 3 and 4.
Our advice to client groups is not to cancel bookings, but to work with our bookings staff to see them go ahead when safe to do so or postpone them to a later date in the year. We will vary our normal cancellation policies to enable a collaborative approach which gives as much time for bookings to go ahead.
QCCC will also allow postponed bookings to proceed at any of our sites, if the initially booked site is unavailable, at no additional charge. We are committed to work with each client group to find innovative solutions for their booking to go ahead in 2020 once the containment period is over. Each site has a contingency plan for operations with appropriate social distancing measures.
Our bookings staff remain available for liaison with all client groups, though on a part-time arrangement their response time may be slightly longer. Each of our sites have a permanent 24/7 staff presence, for operational and security reasons.
This is a difficult time for the Outdoor Education industry, which has collectively lost more than $250m of income nationally. We recognise however that we are far from alone in feeling the full impact of the Covid crisis. Having worked with generations of Australians to build resilience and community, we are confident our nation will come through this event stronger and vibrant. We look forward to working with many more generations of Australians in our great Outdoors.