A UK Scuba Diving club situated between Liverpool to the west and Manchester to the east. Affiliated to the Sub Aqua Association and through them to CMAS the world governing body for sport diving. Membership of the club gives access to two 5.2 metre R.I.Bs and two ex RNLI `D` class inflatables all of which are meticulously maintained. We hold pool sessions twice weekly which are free to members and have several complete sets of SCUBA of various sizes for training purposes, use of the equipment while training is free and may subsequently be hired until personal equipment can be obtained. All our early training is done at inland sites, mainly Capernwray Our geographical location means that any sea diving requires a fairly lengthy drive towing one or more boats, however most weekends find us at dive sites on the Lynn peninsular or Angelsey weather permitting, while trips to other coasts, Scotland and Ireland are also arranged. Becoming ever more popular are week long holidays to the red sea and every year a family holiday is arranged, usually to Spain or the Balearics which caters for both divers and non divers. Membership categories are FULL, STUDENT, JUNIOR, SENIOR, ASSOCIATE and CHILD ASSOCIATE. It should be understood that it is not The Club who organize dives but the members, the club simply administer the clubs affairs, provide the boats and a base for making arrangements. We take pride in our record of training divers to a high standard which is often remarked on. This is a result of long established training practices which allow for no short cuts or borderline passes, there is a requirement to complete every exercise and every written test fully and correctly. None of our instructors will pass a trainee until satisfied that they will not be a danger to themselves or others. A qualification with SHUG is not a rubber stamp to send people off to dive but an assurance that the trainee has properly understood and accepted what ``good diving practices`` mean. When the diving organizations embraced the concept of accepting young people for training we (reluctantly at first) followed suit but having decided to do so resolved to do it properly. A child protection policy was implemented and funding sought from various organizations to ensure that the youngsters in our care had the best equipment and training that an amateur organization could provide. Again the training is thorough, no concessions are made, and must be completed to the same standard as an adult, since we expect our buddy of whatever age to be fully competent and reliable. It is surprising how mature a 13 year old can be when learning something that really interests them.

The club is run by a committee (isn`t everything?) various sinners are sentenced to this task at the annual general meeting held in January. Those currently serving sentences are. Peter Harris ..................... Chairman. Glynn Carter ................... Secretary Frank Beigan ................... Treasurer Colin Murphy................... Diving Officer Dave ``Riggs`` Rigby ......... Equipment Officer Rob Butler ....................... Lay Member Brian Ledger .................... Lay Member Dave Shipsides ................ Lay Member Brian Jones ...................... Lay Member Ted Jones ........................ Lay Member Our Sponsors The St.Helens Underwater Group are most grateful for the funding received from Awards For All, The St.Helens Community Fund and The Coalfields Regeneration Trust. This has helped us provide a new boat and other equipment and has made a great difference to our training. The Coalfields Regeneraton Trust was set up in September 1999 to help tackle the social and economic problems faced by coalfield communities in England Scotland and Wales. Between September 1999 and March 2002 the Trust spent �50 million on 680 projects, and is planning to spend at least another �50 million by March 2005. Our thanks are due to Chris and Norman who put much time and effort into obtaining this funding.