Tuesday 01-12-2020 - 16:01

The national lockdown comes to an end on Tuesday December 2, but Lancashire will remain categorised as a Tier 3 'very high alert' area.

Guidelines for Tier 3 have been updated and are more stringent then previously. At this time, there also does not seem to be an exemption in place for HE sport.

Post-Lockdown

The current lockdown ends at end of December 2 2020 though the guidance for universities, regardless of their tier, is that no social or extra-curricular activities should be provided during the Student Movement Period from 3-9 December. This means that the current restrictions that we have in place where no activity is taking place will remain.

To be clear, there will be no face-to-face sessions, trainings or fixtures for the remainder of this term.

We know this is will likely be extremely frustrating for you and we share this sentiment with you but there is little that we can do about this.

Next term

The guidance around students returning to campus is due to be published in the next few days and we will update our advice accordingly. We are currently unsure exactly how this will impact activity at the start of next term.

Whilst we hope that Lancaster will be moved out of Tier 3 sooner rather than later, it is important to understand what these restrictions mean for the new term. If Lancaster remains in Tier 3, the following activities would be impacted:

- Indoor activities (unless with your household or support bubble) will not be permitted. This includes indoor sport, fitness and dance. This is a change from the previous Tier 3

- Organised outdoor sport, and physical activity and exercise classes can continue, however higher-risk contact activity should not take place. Until there is clarity from individual National Governing Bodies, we are taking this to include all outdoor team sport and outdoor sport where shared equipment is used. To this end, all sport facilitated through the Students' Union Lancaster will be on hold.

- Closure of cinemas and pool halls

- Large outdoor events

We are currently seeking further guidance as to the impact of these guidelines on all of our sporting fixtures: BUCS and intervarsity; intercollege; and recreational leagues.

If you believe that your face-to-face activity can still go ahead within these guidelines, each activity will be to be approved on a case by case basis by the SU Engagement Manager or their nominee.

Email help@lancastersu.co.uk to contact the team.

Online Activity

We're still encouraging all of our groups to meet online and we will continue to support you with your events and meetings. If you have any events that you're doing over the vacation, please let us know and we'll help you to push these out.

You might also be interested in our 'Be Safe, Be Active' Team with areas for finding someone to exercise with, our Coronactivity Challenges and a whole host of online exercise classes.