Dear RIA member,
Following the Government press conference on 16 March 2020, the Prime Minister, Chief Medical Officer and Chief Scientific Officer, have asked for people to work from home, avoid unnecessary travel and avoid large gatherings.
Based on the Government guidance, RIA is now implementing a “social-distancing” policy:
- No meetings or events will be held at Headfort Place until further notice (including all existing bookings); however, those meetings led by RIA could be converted to conference call / video-conference meetings instead;
- Regarding the current RIA programme of activity, we will switch Special Interest Groups and Technical Interest Groups to conference call / video conference (WebEx, Teams, Skype for Business) meetings – those in the various groups will get instructions from the various forum leaders; and
- With regard to the large events RIA is involved with – such as Infrarail, RIA Innovation Conference, Innotrans, the RIA Annual Conference, Unlocking Innovation and Exports events – the status of these will for now be communicated on a case by case basis, though we assume Government guidance will mean these events are in effect banned over a certain size RIA. RIA would like to make it clear that until the Government advises a return to normal: i) RIA members who have booked to attend RIA events will get a full refund if the event is cancelled; or ii) if an event is rescheduled, then any delegate bookings or sponsorships will be carried over to the rescheduled event.
RIA members and stakeholders should be aware that all RIA team members will now be working from home, and will be available directly by email and mobile phone.
Finally, I apologise in advance for these measures. Members will appreciate these measure are not taken lightly, though I hope members will be supportive of what we are trying to do to keep operations and services going during what is a very difficult time for everyone. If you have any questions or concerns on the above, please do contact myself or a RIA member of staff either by email – [email protected] – or on 020 7201 0777. We will send further updates as and when there are any changes.
Kind regards
Darren Caplan, RIA Chief Executive