Like most organisations, The Key continues to closely monitor the situation with Coronovirus (COVID-19). We are following the Government issued statements as they are being published, and we are acting in accordance with the guidance issued by the National Council for Voluntary Organisations (NCVO) at www.ncvo.org.uk/practical-support/information/coronavirus . Our overriding priority is to protect the health and wellbeing of our staff, and those of our partner organisations, and all the young people who benefit from the work we all do.

Whilst the whole team is currently healthy and safe, we have therefore made the decision to close our office from Tuesday 17th March and change to working remotely. All our staff have full access to emails during this time and so we ask that, should you need to contact us, you do so by individual email or by emailing our office email address (theteam@thekeyuk.org). 

We will also be limiting our attendance at external meetings and events, and we will keep you informed of any changes to the arrangements for events that we are planning. We are committed to maintaining our high standards of customer service and data security during this period.

Otherwise we are advising you to follow your own organisation's COVID-19 guidelines before making an informed decision on whether to cancel or postpone any Key related projects, activities or events. You can rest assured that, should you need to take such action, you have The Key's full support in doing so and this will not prevent your groups’ onward progression through The Key Framework. If your group sessions, panels and projects do take place, then we advise you to follow the current spread prevention guidelines.

We ask that any support requests or queries are submitted to us by email at theteam@thekeyuk.org  in the first instance, so that the whole team can monitor these regardless of where they are working. We will then get back to you as soon as possible either by phone or by email. If possible, please scan anything you would normally send by post and attach it to an email instead. In addition, I will be grateful if you would keep us informed of any changes in your organisation that will impact on your Key activity so that we can monitor the position overall and keep our funders appraised of the situation.

Please pass on our best wishes to your staff, volunteers and young people. Take care of yourselves – and let us know if there is anything further we can do to help.

- Austin McNamara (Interim CEO) and The Key Team