Important Announcement:
BF will be undertaking a review of the Luxembourg JWC trip for Epee.
Hotel reservations were made for all the athletes, staff, and officials in line with our published trip plans. We appreciate that some parents have tried to be helpful, yet it is important to point out that parents directly contacting the hotel to make changes to official bookings creates a significant risk where athletes or staff could be left without somewhere to stay. This is something that has happened more than once in the past. The risk of errors, accidental cancellations or incorrect room allocations created by these actions could place the welfare of everyone involved in this trip at risk. We are regularly reviewing our trip plans to accommodate changing COVID regulations and respond to last-minute changes and requirements from competition organisers and country entry requirements.
The welfare and safety of BF staff, volunteers, officials, and athletes are always our primary concerns. As such, and in response to the conflicting messages/issues/concerns received from parents, we are conducting a full review and during this time will not be communicating any further regarding this trip until the process is complete.
We have also been asked by the competition organisers to ask parents and coaches to channel all communications through BF as the National Federation due to the volume of contact they have received directly. Please note that this is standard practice for FIE events.
At this time parents and coaches are asked to carefully consider their communications, particularly those that are online. Recent comments made to and about BF staff members and volunteers are forcing key support personnel to reconsider their position regarding this trip, thereby placing the viability of the trip and therefore the competition nomination status also under review.
Athletes have reported directly to BF their concerns around the ‘toxic’ nature of the communications they are witnessing online. Should behaviours and the levels of respect not meet appropriate standards, BF will take action to protect staff, volunteers, and athletes.
The outcomes of this review will be shared by close of business Friday, 12th November 2021.
Please note: BF staff and volunteers are doing everything we can to deliver these trips for the athletes. Luxembourg is one of 22 current trips that we are actively administering, with most of them requiring different COVID measures to attend the events. We are receiving hundreds of related communications daily and we ask our community to please be patient whilst we work through them.
Please remember that BF is a very small organisation with a staff team the equivalent of 13 full-time employees working across all aspects of the sport.
Yours sincerely,
Georgina Usher, CEO & Steve Kemp, Head of Pathways
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