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The UK’s new scout chief has credited the group for providing him with a place to “belong” after he survived a stabbing and an attempted shooting during his youth.<\/b><\/p>\n
Explorer and presenter Dwayne Fields, 41, told the BBC’s Today Programme that attending Scouts helped him avoid growing up “on the wrong side of the tracks”.<\/p>\n
Mr Fields, the first black Briton to reach the North Pole, said he wanted to use his tenure to show Scouts is “a family for absolutely anyone”. <\/p>\n
He also said he feared many traditional outdoor skills were “at risk” and that he hoped to see membership to the group grow. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Mr Fields told the BBC that inner-city London was violent and robberies were commonplace when he was young.<\/p>\n
“I was stabbed, I was a victim of street violence, I’d never carried a knife with malice, I’ve never carried any instruments with malice, and I suffered a stabbing incident just for being in the wrong place at the wrong time,” he added.<\/p>\n
Born in Jamaica, Mr Fields came to the UK aged six and grew up in east and north London.<\/p>\n
According to reports, he was stabbed twice when he was 19 after an altercation outside a nightclub. <\/p>\n
At 21, he says he had a gun pointed at him and only survived because the weapon jammed.<\/p>\n
Mr Fields first attended a Scouts meeting in Palmers Green, north London, when he was seven, and said: “I never thought I belonged anywhere until the moment I walked into that hut.”<\/p>\n
In 2010, he made his expedition to the North Pole, and has since presented programmes for Channel 5, Disney+ and National Geographic. <\/p>\n
“To be given this role as chief scout, to me it’s pride of place, really,” he said.<\/p>\n
“There are a lot of groups and communities who still think that maybe scouting isn’t for them and I’m hoping that they’ll look at me and say, ‘Well, actually, I have something in common with that guy – he grew up where I grew up, he looks like me. If scouting is for him, it’s for me as well.'”<\/p>\n