Outcomes
Such radical change was not welcomed by all members and a rival report, "A Boy Scout Black Paper", was produced in 1970 by "The Scout Action Group". This provided some alternative proposals for the development of the Movement and asked for Groups that wished to continue to follow Baden-Powell's original scheme to be allowed to do so. The content of this Report was not accepted by The Scout Association, resulting in a split developing in the Movement and the formation of the Baden-Powell Scouts' Association.
Following several years of reduction in overall numbers, the annual census of 31 March 1969 (18 months after the implementation of the Report) showed modest increases across two sections of the Association. The total of 531,011 included 249,561 Cub Scouts, 188,379 Scouts and 21,698 Venture Scouts in 11,704 Scout Groups. The total number of young people in the Association who were within the reduced Statutory Youth Service age range of 14 to 21 was over 81,000.
The Advance Party Report failed to recover the losses of older boys, with 55,206 Senior Scouts and Rover Scouts recorded in 1966 having been replaced by 21,698 Venture Scouts in the 1969 figures. The highest recorded membership of the Venture Scout section was 39,307 in 1989 (after the 1976 admission of girls into the Venture Scout section).
By March 1978, a decade after implementation, the overall Scout Association total had risen to 636,148, including 308,152 Cub Scouts, 207,276 Scouts and 27.905 Venture Scouts (of whom, 2,218 were girls). The number of Scout Groups had fallen to 11,464, reflecting the policy of amalgamating smaller units which had been proposed by the Advance Party. By 1998 the majority (68%) of members of The Scout Association were under 11 years old.
Read more about this topic: The Chief Scouts' Advance Party Report