sector three

Fundraising - how clear are you about it?

2012-01-17T17:54:00.000+01:00

The fundraising industry is an interesting one. As I have noted before "face to face fundraising" (or "chugging" as most of us call it) is something I am not particularly enamoured with, but actually, the more I look at the whole industry of raising funds from individual donors, the less happy I am with the whole thing, the more questions I want to ask, the more information I want to know. The problem with donor fundraising is that the more you look at it the less straightforward it becomes.

On the face of it, it's great: charities carry out a lot of work the world needs, and people give money to pay for it. Want to help starving children in Africa? Give money - it helps! I know I do.

Admin costs

But there's all sorts of problems. Over the years the concerns have been about how much charities spend on overheads and administration - but for me, as someone who has worked in the sector for over 30 years, that has rarely been an issue. I know that if you employ lots of workers and volunteers and do lots of things that are worth doing there are numerous costs you simply cannot avoid that get counted in this way. Managing projects costs money, employing experienced qualified staff costs money, good employment practice costs money, looking after your volunteers costs money, postage, electricity, water... EVERYTHING costs money - everybody has to pay the rent, the heating bills etc. So no question: whether you are running a small local charity or a major international one you are going to have overheads you can't avoid. And actually, ensuring the core costs of running an organisation are met is a huge challenge for every charity.

Fundraising costs

But what does concern me is the cost of fundraising. Charityfacts state that each £1 raised by a charity costs between 15 and 25p, whilst the penny per pound cost of gaining NEW donors is 50-70p (we'll come back to this later). But as they also note, this is based on an unregulated and inconsistent way of reporting how much fundraising actually costs - as costs can be included in project costs, organisation central costs or elsewhere on a balance sheet. So how accurate these percentages actually are, nobody is 100% sure.

The best place to find this information is on the website for CaritasData - or Charities Direct - "the essential uk charity information service". It lists fundraising costs as a % of total income and of total expenditure, and breaks down costs of raising "voluntary income" - i.e. donations (although annoyingly doesn't give this as a percentage). Given the variances of reporting this shows the rough accuracy of Charityfacts' estimates of 15-25% of income received actually spent on fundraising.

Now this on one hand may seem ok - people working hard to successfully raise money for a worthy cause - but what it really means in hard cash terms is that an organisation receiving a million pounds in donations spends over £200,000 on raising it. When that amount is extrapolated across the entire charity world it means tens of millions of pounds are being spent on raising funds. Hmmm. Does this seem right? Is that what you wanted to pay for?

Another interesting thing to consider is that in most cases these are pretty much fixed costs: the costs of hiring an agency, or employing staff, of mail outs, advertising campaigns are pretty much the same whether you raise a thousand or a million pounds.

How do charities get their money?

There is a standard way large national charities raise money (with one or two exceptions). Most earn some money from services they deliver, whether that is via payment from clients or contracts from government agencies (e.g. local Government, NHS Trusts), but rely on most of their income from individual donors. Some of this is received in the form of legacies, but most of this is via direct donations from individuals. A lot of this comes from Direct Debits people sign up to either by responding to an advert or an appeal, or by being chugged in the street. The standard method is signing people up to a regular small monthly payment ("Just £2 a week will prevent this child/donkey/dog from dying/being tortured/etc") - because it makes people feel they are achieving a lot by contributing what for them is very little, and getting people tied up for the long term is in fact the charities' instated aim. In actual fact, mostly with this donation they are achieving bugger all. The administration and fundraising costs (which as we have already noted are mostly fixed) are met by these donations, so the charity from here on in has no fundraising costs worth talking about. If you just give this £2 a month you aren't really doing anything other than paying for fundraising costs. But they have hooked you onto a mailing list as a supporter, and as anyone knows who has signed up to donate like this - boy will they badger you month after month for more of your money. The only point of the £2 a month is to be able to pay for the effort to get you to give more. So, as noted earlier, the cost of getting NEW donors is a lot more than of getting existing donors to cough up more money. Actually I'm willing to bet (since there is very little chance of anyone being able to challenge me) the cost of NEW donors is actually more than most charities care to admit, and that 50-70p per £1 is a major underestimate. The costs of donations raised by chuggers, for example is not usually met within the first year of donations: in other words, if you sign up for a year of donation on the street the charity actually gets .... nothing. Until sometime during year two. (See CharityFacts and the Professional Fundraising Regulatory Agency (PFRA) for figures given by fundraising/charity organisations). Actually, until that point, none of this money even goes in the charity's pocket (unless they are doing chugging in house - rare but the Red Cross does it), but to a private fundraising agency.

Private Fundraising Agencies

And that's just chugging. There are a growing number of private agencies dedicated to raising money for the charity sector. For a list of agencies approved by the PFRA see here . To see which national charities are using their services you can go to the agencies' individual websites, but I can list a few I've noticed here: Amnesty, Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth, Guide Dogs for the Blind, Save the Children Fund, Shelter, NSPCC, Battersea Dogs Home, Great Ormond Street Hospital... and many more. Apologies to the ones mentioned if they feel singled out, but the point I am making is that it is clear from a very brief bit of research that there are large fundraising agencies making a lot of money from large national and international charities - and from your (and my) donations. How happy about this am I? How happy are you?

For me the issue is this: I don't mind charities employing fundraisers. I accept this is necessary to an extent: but I expect them to be straightforward and honest about how they do it, and how they spend it. I don't like them telling me that "£2 a month is all it takes to save this child's life" when they know that my £2 a month will go straight in the pockets of a fundraising agency. I don't mind if my contribution goes towards paying the salary of a fundraiser for a big charity, but I do mind that it is going in the pockets of a private fund-raising agency. Why? Because I have had dealing with these agencies, and they aren't the most transparent, straightforward, or even charitable, organisations I have dealt with.

Let's compare them to the charities we noted above: as I reported, all information on charities and their income and expenditure is pretty transparent. Information about any of these companies, and the profits they make, is pretty much invisible.

Chocolatey goodness

The fundraising part of the charity sector is, in some ways by necessity, the most commercial part of the sector. Those working in fundraising are working in the least admirable part of the sector - their job is raise money, not to rescue kittens - and people working as fundraisers know this. If you ever meet a more defensive group of people I will be amazed: fundraisers feel they often have to get their hands dirty to raise the funds to ensure the work gets done. Fundraisers will portray a charities' clients as victims suffering (preferably with big puppy eyes) whilst other charity workers will emphasise the strength and dignity of those they work with. In my experience, in many large charities those actually working with clients don't mix very often with the fundraisers, the fundraisers often feel they are looked down upon. This is unfair.

On the other hand fundraisers often (it seems) view those they raise funds from with little respect. They target individuals and groups of individuals in the same way the advertising industry does - and in truth the connection between marketing and fundraising is huge, with often many cross overs. In the private sector, the similarities are even closer. So what's the difference between an advertising agency and a fundraising agency? In essence the difference is only one thing: product. So here's the question: do you mind giving 25% of your money spent on a chocolate bar to an ad agency? Of course not, that's not your business, as long as you get your chocolatey goodness.
What then is the problem with 25% of the money you give to a charity going an ad agency?

There is a big difference between buying a chocolate bar and giving to a charity. In the first transaction you are totally buying into a capitalist transaction for entirely selfish reasons. In the second transaction your actions are charitable, benevolent: even assuming modern cynicism people do not donate to a charity to gain from it: there is no chocolate for them, but instead for someone else. The whole transaction is different, with different intentions, and thus it is not unreasonable to expect different outcomes. People assume when giving to charity that individuals are not profiting, just as they assume U2 are not being paid when they perform at LiveAid.

Furthermore, when you sign up for a charitable donation, mostly charities will get you to sign Gift Aid forms to ensure they gain an extra 20% from the government instead of your money going as tax. Now hang on a minute - this means two things: if the charity gains 20p in every pound you give from the government, the amount you were giving is actually even less useful (e.g. they were only making 50-70p out of every 80p you gave not £1), and secondly this means that government money is going in the pockets of these agencies - instead of to schools, hospitals and, ok, royal yachts and bank bailouts.

Regulation and transparency

As noted earlier there is information published regarding the income and expenditure of charities which helps to some extent regulate and ensure the transparency of how charities operate. Fundraising agencies are regulated by being members of various fundraising regulation bodies: the previously mentioned Professional Fundraising Regulatory Agency (PFRA,) the Institute of Fundraising (IoF) and the Fund Raising Standards Board (FRSB). This is supposed to ensure that they are a professional group of regulated organisations, but lets take a further look at this. What are these organisations exactly?

The FRSB says it is "the independent self-regulatory body for UK fundraising" and was set up in 2006. It is supported by the governments of England, Scotland and Wales, and on its board it has representatives from charities, from the PFRA and various "lay" members with experience in the sector. It has over1,000 members and manages complaints from individuals regarding fundraising. In 2010 it recorded 18, 442 complaints. I don't really know what to say about this except the following: it seems like a worthy organisation, it doesn't have many members (given there's more than half a million charities in the UK), and that's a hell of a lot of complaints!
The FRSB plays the amount down by using a formula of number of complaints against numbers of donor transactions . For example only 103 complaints about cash collections against 2,110,317 individual donations thus giving a percentage of 0.005%. Now you don't have to be Einstein to see this is shite. The truth is this: people don't tend to complain, so to get over 18,000 reported complaints in a year IS A LOT!! Anyway, the organisation's role seems to be one of reporting and advising, rather than regulating, and it has no powers whatsoever. Of the fundraising agencies noted above only one or two said they were members of the FRSB.

The IoF is a different animal altogether. It is actually a membership organisation for fundraisers, and thus is the organisation that represents the interests of fundraisers, and fundraisers alone. It claims to "set standards" and to "educate" fundraisers - but offers no regulation.

Finally the PFRA. This is the "Regulatory" body for chugging - sorry I mean "face-to-face" fundraising. However it is entirely a self-regulatory body -its membership (who pay fees that pay for the organisation's existence) is entirely made up of charities and fundraisers. It claims to regulate chuggers by monitoring their activity, and by offering an accreditation process. If you can't meet the standards they require, you can't be a member. Does this stop you from doing face-to-face fundraising? Er...no. The PFRA appears to be more than anything a membership body working on behalf of fundraisers, ensuring they cabn all compete with each other ion a level playing field. What it does for donors is debatable, to say the least. What it does for its members its to argue and campaign in favour of chugging (they are very good at getting comments on blogs apposing chugging) Amusingly, it does a pretty poor job in arguing against charges raised against chugging: read the website here which gives you plenty of reasons to loathe chugging, and some very weak arguments in its favour.

So there we have it: what there is is a proliferation of professional bodies that operate in the interest of fundraisers. There is no regulation, no responsibility taken by the Charity Commission or by anyone else. There used to be an independent organisation called Intelligent Giving that investigated things like this: but it was loathed by the fundraising industry (they used to spend an inordinate amount of time attacking it for no one's benefit but their own) but that un fortunately got closed down, and all that remains of it is here.

But where is the money going to come from?

This is the sad cry of the fundraiser who is under attack for their standards. Charities need to raise money to carry out their activities - even more now than ever given the enormous amount of stupid cuts implemented by the Government - I can have no argument with that. Can I argue about their methods? Yes I can, and will continue to do so. Like most people who are happy to give to worthy causes I expect those I give to to be honest and play fair with me. If they use a fundraising agency i want them to tell me. If they use a fundraising agency I want to know about that agency - its profits, its practices and attitudes. If I want to give to a cause, I don't want my money going in the pocket of some private profiteering agency.

Give local

One way around this is to give local. Local projects need your funds as much, and if not more than, these big national charities. Check it out on Caritas: whilst researching this article i noticed that one charity I have given money to before last year made a profit of over a million pounds which added to its healthy reserves (over11 million quid). The total annual income in most boroughs of small charities is only a few million (and getting smaller). Many have closed in the last year for want of a few thousand pounds. And very few of these can afford to employ a single fundraiser, let alone hire in an agency - their ability to gain donations is severely limited by their size: so if YOU care about ensuring your money gets well spent in a good cause, why not look to supporting those who need support in your local community.

Chugging...again

2012-01-13T23:40:00.002+01:00

A couple of years ago I joined in a debate with various fundraisers and other interested parties on the lamented "Intelligent Giving" website (see blog entry http://sectorthree.blogspot.com/2008/11/chuggers.html). This week, whilst reading Third Sector magazine online I notice a piece on proposals from the council in Islington to ban chuggers off the streets of the borough. "Good" I thought, "About time", and added my two cents worth of comment. The next thing I knew was an email from Third Sector, and interview and today's lift;e article. And now I'm being contacted by a radio station in Dublin regarding this.

It is an interesting issue, as far as I am concerned, because I am unconvinced by the benefits of chuggers and chugging. Research by Intelligent Giving - and others - has shown that actually charities benefit very little from what chuggers bring in. Normally chuggers ask people to sign up to direct debits for a few quid a month. It has estimated that it is a year and a half into these direct debits, however, before the charities get a penny - before that all the money raised goes to the agencies paid to collect the funds. After that, if the amounts are in the £2 to £3 a month level, the amount the charity gets is not worth receiving - all it does is cover the admin costs of raising the money in the first place, and the costs of employing the fundraisers.

AS for the people on the street - they don't work for the charities they are collecting for, they work for the agencies that engage the charities, and are employed on a performance-related basis - in other words they don't get paid unless they get signatures. Thus good employment standards, minimum wage etc, go out the window.

There is a Professional Fundraising Association (yes, that's right, an organisation for fundraisers run by fundraisers) that oversees practices in the fundraising business - but frankly it is hard to see how they justify this - or quite a number of other - kinds of fundraising, except to justify their own existence. "Charities need the money" they wail, and of course it's true, and need it even more now they are losing Government funding (local, regional and National) for grants, contracts etc. And losing out on donations as the poor get poorer in all of Europe.

But who suffers as a result of chugging? Why should I object? Well I believe that actually, apart from fundraisers and private fundraising agencies, no one gains from chugging and everyone else loses. People in the street lose out because they are irritated and ironically a lot of the charities lose out themselves because of people's irritation; but most of all, in a place like islington it is local charities, local community groups and local people who lose out: Charities' names are tarnished in general, and those that DO give to chuggers give to national causes (or rather the agencies that collect on their behalf) DON'T give to local organisations. Street collecting for a local hospice or children's centre or other community project gets pushed out. Banning chugging from the streets (of Islington or anywhere) is something I can only applaud.

Consultant fails to meet the needs of the voluntary sector

2011-12-09T14:45:00.001+01:00

Consultant says Infrastructure Organisations 'fail to meet needs of small organisations' - Third Sector.

There's a surprise. This one goes next to the headline "Bears shit in woods", and "Pope is a catholic". It is so easy to insult infrastructure organisations as not meeting the needs of small organisations - as freelance consultant Kim Donahue has discovered, since they aren't in any position to fight back. Especially easy when you read she was referring to "National, Regional and sub-regional" organisations - which shows she hasn't got a clue - since the 'micro organisations' she refers to 99% of the time get what support they can from a local organisation. And since all these support organisations have had the shit kicked out of them by central and local government, the comments are really like- not just kicking a dog when it is down, but after someone has broken all its legs, poked its eyes out and shoved a sock down its throat. And from what position do these comments come from? From a freelance consultant with experience of working with "over 200 small organisations". Over 200 - really? If you're going to play the numbers game you are going to have to do better than that. The average borough in the UK has over 500 organisations that meet the criteria she uses to describe "micro-organisations" and I really can't be arsed to do the full count, but I know that there are more than 50,000 in London alone. So 200? Really? Wow. We're real impressed. And what experience does this consultant have exactly? Well her online CV says she's got a lot of experience in the US, and mentions very little about working with small organisations - and NOTHING AT ALL about infrastructure organisations - that's right, she appears to have never worked for a CVS, or for any other local, region, sub-regional or national infrastructure organisation AT ALL, and it appears that ALL her work in the UK has been as a freelance consultant. All this appears to be is a cry :"EMPLOY ME!!!" I'm a freelancer who can't get any work!!! Give me money to write a report!!"

This reminds me of someone I knew years ago who qualified as a social worker and then went and wrote a book about social work - without ever having been a social worker.

For the record, I work some of the time as a freelance consultant. I've even written reports about infrastructure support. But you know what? That was after 25 years of working in the voluntary sector, with 15 years of that working in the part offering infrastructure support. Do you want to know how many small groups I have worked with? Do you know, I don't think I can tell you. I know that as a capacity building worker in voluntary organisations I worked with several hundred a year, I know that as a consultant I have worked with "over 200" ...

All this makes me very angry (as you can tell). This sort of guff is based on virtually no research at all and very little experience. And it does two very bad things: In the wide-world it tells people that "infrastructure organisations are crap" - which gives every council in the UK to cut more to them. In the voluntary sector it has a secondary effect - it makes everyone think all consultants are is parasitic leeches sucking the life from the sector, or in this case, vultures picking at their bones..

Anyway, if anyone wants to give me some money to research how consultants fail to meet the need of the voluntary sector, you know where I am.

A riot on my own - the failure of "New Labour"

2011-08-13T19:07:00.000+02:00

It has been a week since the riots started in London and other UK cities. Analysis of "why" has begun, following the knee-jerk "lock-em up" and "birch 'em" responses - and that's just from the average Guardian reader. So, the consensus runs, young people riot because they feel "disconnected" from their communities. OK, I know the Tories have hacked away at public services in the last 12 months or so, and the amount of services for young people have been sadly destroyed, along with other local community services and voluntary groups - BUT this leaves another problem: for the previous 10 years the Labour government poured millions into regeneration schemes that has as a major theme running through them, engaging young people in their communities. The evidence is that these schemes all failed: Millions of pounds spent on short-termed projects that only provided a short-term solution. Voluntary sector groups spending thousands of hours chasing money attached to schemes already doomed before they started: SRBs, Neighbourhood Renewal, Children's Fund etc. etc. Meanwhile, the youth clubs that were shut in the 1980s didn't re-open, the community centres remained shut and the buildings sold off.

"New Labour" provided patchy crap that only held communities together by the precarious strings that were and are the hard-working individuals - workers and volunteers - who really work for their communities. Almost certainly the same people cleaning up the messes in Tottenham and Hackney at the end of last week. In the 1980s Thatcher destroyed a lot of local community structures by undermining local government powers and finances. Instead of reinvesting in these structures that had provided youth clubs, community centres, art centres etc. Labour threw money at consultants and regeneration schemes, and missed the opportunity to put things back where they needed to be. Instead, a pathetic structure was invented, that hasn't even managed to survive one year of Tory-ism. What a shame. And another shame is the "New new Labour" appears to be offering little else. So whilst the Tories stay in power, and no long-term investment is made in local, sustainable community structures things are unlikely to get better. Locking kids up and taking away their benefits sounds like a recipe for only one thing - more riots.

What future? Big Society is meaningless drivel.

2011-02-28T12:08:00.000+01:00

There is no consistency in Government policy towards the voluntary sector. Or anywhere else for that matter. On one hand they talk "Big Society" and seem to envision the voluntary and community sector delivering lots of public services. On the other hand they don't seem to understand where the sector gets its money from in the first place, and that the consequence of massive cuts to local and regional government, as well as other centrally-funded schemes, will result in mass destruction for swathes of the sector. And in addition to the millions of pounds being lost through local government etc, the sector is of course getting less money through donations, less money is available from trusts as their investments tumble and the government is going to get poorer by receiving less income tax because of all the people no longer earning, and the lack of profits companies are making.

So not only is the voluntary sector suffering, but the coalition's policies don't even make sense in their own terms. They won't cut deficits in the long term if their income is so cut. Services won't be delivered by a non-existent voluntary organisation (or an organisation with less funds and bigger demands) and their are no savings left to be made through privatisation. All that can be privatised for profit has already been done by the last Tory and Labour governments. Everything that can be sold off for profit already has been. Which is why they are reduced to selling of forests, and trying to privatise public services that can only be profitable for the private sector if the Government gives them lots of money (thus not making savings). The last Labour government was beginning to realise this, and were looking daily less enthusiastic about PFI as financial chickens came home to roost, and less happy about the amount of subsidy going to the private sector to deliver public services - most notably Rail services.

So what is the future for the voluntary sector, and for the UK in general? It's very hard to predict where this downturn will end with the current policies in place. The banks need controlling (if not nationalising), and more investment is needed all over, not less. The Uk appears to be heading for bankruptcy unless things change, and the voluntary sector, particularly at a local level - where people mostly engage - is being destroyed. Bang goes the big society. Bang goes everything.

Odds on a general election in 2011 are 11/4 at Paddy Power...

RedBubble profiting from genocide

2011-01-25T13:23:00.002+01:00

See http://matelles-art.blogspot.com/2011/01/more-redbubble-hijinks-they-are-nazi.html

for the full story.

My work at RedBubble

2010-06-08T13:02:00.000+02:00

A coalition

2010-05-20T17:17:00.001+02:00

If you haven't visited www.matelles-art.com yet, taken a look at the artwork, bought a t-shirt or two, then it's probably time you did.

Stuff the voluntary sector for the moment and consider this...

2010-04-29T12:18:00.001+02:00

New venture in the south of France, Matelles-Art. You can also purchase exciting artwork, T shirts, etc on line at the website: www.matelles-art.com. Go on, take a look. You know you want to. Much more exciting than general elections, council elections and a WHOLE lot more interesting than thinking about fundraising.

Building Our Futures Report now NOT available for download

2010-04-29T12:14:00.000+02:00

Sorry about that. It seems I jumped the gun. Despite the fact I finished the bloody thing ages ago. It'll be back in June (I am advised).

Building Our Futures Report now available for download

2010-04-19T12:12:00.001+02:00

The Building Our Futures report is now available, in Word and PDF format, for download. Also available (and more digestible) is a summary report. The report looks at employment issues within Disabled People's Organisations (DPOs) and concludes that more investment in DPOs' infrastructure and HR is necessary to ensure the sustainability of these valuable organisations. For more details see the report itself. Download from www.toosh.org.uk/bof.htm.

Accountability - charities and banks

2009-11-26T14:11:00.003+01:00

Charities publish detailed accounts, and as recipients of millions of pounds' worth of public money, declare the salaries of staff earning over £50,000 a year. Meanwhile, UK banks receive BILLIONS of pounds of taxpayers' money and won't declare details of staff who earn over £1 million a year. Hmmm, something inequitable there, don't you think?

Furthermore, for what reason will banks not declare their over-paid employees' income? Because, they say, such practices may drive them abroad. Yes, you have it right, the last thing we want to do is lose those fantastic employees who contribute, and have contributed, so much to the UK's wealth. Yes, those high-powered-high-fliers are just what the UK economy needs, after all it wasn't their fault that the banks collapsed and dragged the whole world into a recession, was it? Oh, it was? Sorry, I must have missed something.

In that case, why don't we just publish their names and drive them abroad, because actually the UK doesn't need people like that at all, bye bye - or if that's too upsetting at least threaten to unless they are prepared to donate their millions to charities.

Arrogant greedy bastards.

Tories, Saving Money for the Rich, and Contracts for public services

2009-10-06T12:06:00.005+02:00

Suddenly this is back on the agenda in a bigger way than ever before. Why? It's not as if there hasn't been a move in this direction for a number of years now, with greater 3rd sector involvement in delivery of commissioned services at local regional and national level. The answer is obvious when you think about it: Tories. Whatever misgivings anyone may have about New Labour's move to the right, encouragement of PPP (that's private/public/partnerships), PFI (that's Private Finance Initiatives) and the involvement in the voluntary and community sector (Hey, I'll go with the flow and use VCS) in delivering public services on the cheap, Labour are amateurs compared to the Tories.

This week is Tory conference time, and the recession has really allowed those old tories to come out of their shells. It has given the right in the Tory party the chance to propagate their policies of Government's 'lighter hand', of LESS public services (for the poor) saving MORE money (for the rich). Hey, we wouldn't want to alienate the bankers would we? So what do the Tories come out with this week - first cuts to benefits for disabled people, secondly, cuts to pensions, thirdly cuts to public services. Of course these are slightly dressed up. Let's have a look.

1. Cuts to benefits for disabled people - well no this isn't what it is at all, is it? This will be a policy to encourage disabled people into jobs, and discourage them from living off the state - a good thing surely? NO: this may sound reasonable, but in real life this isn't what happens. and what would happen. Disabled people to be assessed (by who - oh god no, not the same idiots who screw up mobility allowances surely - Oh yes) whether the CAN work. If so they get a job. Simples. Except if you have a disability that flairs up only part of the time (there are millions of examples), then how are you judged? Except what jobs, in times of high unemployment ARE you going to get? Er... yes, this is simply a way of cutting benefits for the most vulnerable members of our community. WELL DONE YOU TORY BASTARDS.

2. Cutting pensions: no no no no no, there won't be cuts to pensions, you just won't get one until you are 66, instead of 65. Wait a minute, that means a year's less pension for everyone... several thousands pounds less for older people. Another group of the most vulnerable people in our society. WELL DONE AGAIN.

3.Cuts to public services: NO, we just want the voluntary sector to deliver services, because they'll do them SO much better than the public sector and SO much cheaper (shhh, don't tell anyone that bit). So what we will have is services delivered on the cheap, with costs kept as low as possible to ensure contracts are won. How are these costs kept low? Well it won't be bureaucracy (got to pay those CEOs somehow), so it will be done in two ways: by subsidising services through other funds: Yes that's what you gave your donation to charity for isn't it? For delivery of public services. Wait a minute isn't that what you paid your tax for? And by keeping wages low. Which a lot of large unscrupulous charities will be able to do because their staff aren't unionised and there are no collective agreements in place and because there will be no shortage of cheap labour (Hey, there's all those cripples looking for jobs, they'll be cheap, and we'll look great!).

Most sickening of all is the stupidity of people in senior positions in the VCS who think there's nothing wrong with this. They love the 'contract culture', it makes the voluntary sector 'modern', 'effective' and 'efficient'. Silly fools, can't you see you are being conned? The Tories can't get elected if they're seen as being too right wing, but they can get elected if they manage to con the british public into believing their crap. They are trying to con people into believing they are 'new' Tories, 'caring' Tories. But efficient, responsible Tories, not like bumbler Brown. I'm no Labour supporter (I'm a socialist, obviously) but even I can see what a horrible option the Tories are.

So where does that put the suck-up sector? ACEVO and their like? Are they Tories themselves, or are they stupid? The fact they employ a series of policy officers with no 'at the coal-face' experience gives you no confidence in them, the fact that they spend so much time aggrandising themselves doesn't help either.

People in Britain want good public services. They want good health services, good education services, efficiently managed hospitals, schools, universities, prisons, nurseries etc. If anyone bothers to analyse services to actually see what is good and what is bad, there is one thing in common: they are well managed, they are responsive, they are accountable, they are run and delivered by committed staff. What difference does it make what sector they are in? Very little, except that it is obvious services get worse when costs are cut: when staff are underpaid and demoralised and there is no top down commitment to the service but a commitment instead to low costs, to the bottom line. Unfortunately that's the route successive governments have taken: and the joke is that thousands of billions of pounds have been siphoned off into the private sector who proceeded to blow it all in their banks that they couldn't manage.

The VCS has been forced into a position where it has to play the game to some extent, but it doesn't have to cheer along on the sidelines, and it should draw a line somewhere. The fear that some dodgy newly-developed Public Interest Company ( a private organisation in disguise) will get a contract if the VCS doesn't bid should be, in many cases, dismissed. In the long run the shit WILL hit the fan: for example the poor over-priced health services being delivered by PCIs won't last the pace. Does the sector really want to join in this service suicide? I look forward to the day when a charity running a prison (or whatever) has to publicly explain how so many prisoners escaped/were abused (or whatever). No doubt they will moan it was lack of funds that caused the problem.... HELLO-O!! That's why you got the contract, fool.

Running a charity is political (whatever the Charity Commission say). Back two paragraphs ago I said people want good services. When chasing a contract Charities' trustees should ask themselves: Can you really do it? Will it benefit the public? Will it benefit society? Will you have to compromise your values to do it? Could someone else do it better? Will it benefit the Charity? Are you sure?

Summer Events for Disabled People's Organisations (DPOs)

2009-05-21T17:20:00.003+02:00

This summer, as part of the Building Our Futures project, six events are being organised for DPOs in London. They all range around employment issues in DPOs, in line with the reseach part of the project, and are organised in response to the research - meeting identified needs.

They include three network events - one for workers, one for Chief Officers and one for chairs of management committees (Trustees), and three training events - managing performance, managing sickness and managing Access to Work. So far the events are proving popular, but there are still some places left, so if you want to book a place go to the website at www.toosh.co.uk/bof.htm and download a booking form. Information is there in Word and PDF format, and also in EayRead.

All events are fully accessible, and we will attempt to meet all attendees access needs if they book before the end of may (that's not to say it can't be done after that date).

What DO partnerships add to democracy?

2008-11-27T11:33:00.007+01:00

As reported in Third Sector In a speech to NCVO members Simon Jenkins questioned the voluntary sector's role in a democratic society, in terms of what they contribute to, in particular, local democracy. As someone who sat on a Local Strategic Partnership (LSP) for a number of years, and was Chair of a Community Network and vice-Chair of the LSP, I have to say that in a number of ways, he has a point. The problem with local democracy has been, for some time, the lack of participation of local people, with turn outs at local elections commonly being as low as 20%, and research showing particularly poor participation by 'excluded groups' - black and minority ethnic people, refugees, disabled people, older people, etc. The idea of including voluntary and community groups into local partnerships was clearly to improve community involvement with local planning and development, but there are fundamental problems with this. Whilst not wishing to 'do down' anyone involved in a community network or an LSP representing voluntary/community groups, who elected them? I know I was elected by the Community Network Committee, mainly because no one else wanted to do it, and as CEO of the local CVS I felt I ought to (as did my management committee). Obviously I tried my best to represent those I was there to represent, but then again, who were they? Other members of the committee, in many cases professional voluntary sector workers themselves. Everyone with very good intentions, but really, not very democratically elected. And when we tried to involve new good community activists into the Community Network structures, they, quite reasonably, ran a mile when they realised what was expected of them (and how dull the whole thing was).

The other side of this argument however is that the elected councillors were usually only elected by a couple of hundred people who were often the local middle class. Many of whom were friends of the local councillor or friends of friends etc, and contributed very little to local community life. So they aren't very representative either.

However, as proven by what happened in Islington (for this is where I experienced this) the advantage of democracy is that when the Council is led by an unpleasant twit (and their equally unpleasant sidekick) who appears to be only interested in advancing their own career at the expense of local people and their services (sidekick ditto) local people are free and able to vote them out. As they did. (Boy did we celebrate).

So what is the answer - probably, as Simon Jenkins intimates, improvements to local democracy - investment in local democracy, and simply, better systems. The changes implemented in recent years (getting elected mayors, paid leaderships etc) have actually served to lessen local democracy, giving greater power to fewer people. The introduction of LSPs might appear to reduce this power (and probably does via implementation of LAAs) but does this result in an increase in democracy?

Chuggers

2008-11-27T11:33:00.006+01:00

Well done Intelligent Giving who have publicly exposed how unpleasant and badly delivered and managed 'face to face fundraising' (chugging to you and me) is in the real world, and boo to the PFRA who have attacked Intelligent Giving, saying that their methods were 'unfair', 'unprofessional' and 'damaging'. The responses on the Intelligent Giving website from fundraisers is something to be seen. Have you ever heard such a bunch of self-serving parasitic twerps defending lousy practice? No, nor me.

Fundraisers inevitably defend themselves by showing how much money is made from what they do. Many charities, they claim, wouldn't survive without this sort of fundraising. (Not that they have a vested interest of course). But is this so? I have seen some statistics that show that chugging raises money, but I have never seen NET statistics with all the costs of the fundraisers and the agencies etc taken out. Never, either, have I seen figures showing how much charities who don't use chugging do worse... And strangely, never have I seen statistics showing how a chugger who uses aggressive tactics in breach of the law (as described by IG and as experienced on a daily basis by most of us) raises more money than someone behaving in a socially acceptable way. (THIS DOESN'T HAPPEN! shout the fundraisers. What world do they live in?) Nor have I seen anything convincing that shows that this sort of behaviour doesn't damage a charity's reputation.

Get over it. People don't like being chugged. It is NOT the same as being asked to buy a copy of the Big Issue, it is not the same as being asked to put a few bob in a collector's tin outside Sainsbury's. It is exactly what it seems - an aggressive approach to get money in the street, invented entirely because people have got wise to the unpleasantness of those other fundraising methods,and mainly learned how to ignore, direct mail and direct telephone fundraising.

So here's a challenge to fundraisers: be inventive and come up with a method of fundraising that doesn't want to make me, and millions like me, want to punch you in the face.

Botham's walk for Leukaemia Research

2008-10-11T14:20:00.004+02:00

I was listening to the radio this morning and heard Ian Botham (sorry, SIR Ian Botham, or just 'Beefy') talking about his walk for Leukaemia Research. It is fantastic what he's doing, and I (amongst many of you) am happy to give something to support his work to help the work LR do. As Botham says, seeing all the kids in the cancer wards in Great Ormond Street is enough to give you a different perspective in life - or should be. Unfortunately I have.

He actually said this, though, in response to the interviewer's question about how this 'put into perspective' all the stuff going on in the City and in the banking world. And he is absolutely right - but for me it brings up another issue, and a different way of thinking: the banks are losing billions, the government are investing billions in saving banks because of their irresponsibility in managing their businesses, and their 'lack of confidence' - in each other (for goodness sake - if they don't have confidence in each other why should anyone else, and why should the government have confidence in bailing them out with billions...?).. anyhow, whilst that is going on Botham is humbly very grateful for the £30,000 he raised through his walk in one day.

I am certainly not belittling his achievements or his efforts (it should be clear I admire him for it) but I am absolutely sickened by a society that throws billions at underachieving, untrustworthy banks, whilst thousands can make such a difference to people's lives. As Sir Ian "Beefy" Botham says - when he started his walks for LR in 1985 "children diagnosed with leukaemia had just a 20% chance of survival. Today it is an 80% chance."

Fantastic work. But what sort of society have we built where this is the only way to make this happen?

Fundraising, confidentiality and fear

2008-09-29T17:15:00.005+02:00

I have been involved in a blog debate on the Intelligent Giving website, which started out as a debate about chugging, but moved into more fundamental levels about fundraising, politics, disclosure and downright insults(!). I should probably apologise to one or two people for winding them up, but really, I was shocked by the regressive views being expressed. It amazes me how defensive professional fundraisers seem to be, and amazes me how so many of them believe that by expressing their views on a blog could endanger their job. We'll come back to that in a minute, but I would first like to say something about fundraising.

I've done fundraising for years: 25 years ago I was working in a community centre in camden that would have gone under if we hadn't raised money after the council had cut our funds, and in addition we successfully raised funds for a new family centre for local kids - many of whom were living in "homeless families accommodation" on the estate. I didn't know anything about fundraising at the time, but received excellent advice from Zena Brabazon, who at the time was Chief Officer of Elfrida Rathbone (Camden), who advised me to look at my users in the way that made them the most needy, and "sell" them to funders, donors, companies, or whoever would give us money. She told me to separate the act of fundraising from the act of providing the service: that one thing was worth doing to support the other. But it had no other saving grace.

Since then I have raised millions of pounds for several charities: some who I worked for, some who I was on the management committee of, some as a consultant, and some as a favour. In every case I never felt I was doing a particularly honourable thing, nor a pretty awful thing, but after doing it, I'd often feel like I needed a wash. If people want to give money to charity, good. I strongly believe that giving money to charities is a good thing, and getting the information about charities out so that people can give money (and open and honest information as Intelligent Giving always say) is an honourable thing too.

But fundraising itself is an act of professional marketing, no different to marketing anything else, be it a fizzy drink that causes diabetes, a car that pollutes the atmosphere or a high interest loan that forces someone into poverty. OK I admit that in this day and age its probably the only way some charities survive, but really, in an ideal world is that how you want to live?

When I suggested on the IG website I would prefer a system where an elected government gave state funds (our taxes) to good causes i was accused of being a communist - which is completely bizarre - in that I was 'restricting choice'. Goodness knows how this would prevent people from giving to charities, and of course we have so much choice NOW on how our taxes are spent: on arms for example, on Northern Rock and Bradford & Bingley for example... I personally believe in an elected democratic government spending my taxes on worthwhile things. Apparently, these days this makes me a dangerous revolutionary.

The other issue was confidentiality. I was suspicious about posters on the Blog not using their names, but using their aliases. Who are you? I asked. What are your motivations for supporting chugging? I was deeply suspicious they were people working for a professional chugging outfit (yes these guys really exist - they take approximately the first year -often more- of all the money you sign up for with whatever charity they are working for), and were therefore hardly speaking from a neutral viewpoint. But, assuming they were telling the truth (I have no reason to assume otherwise) they were not. They were fundraisers working for a charity, afraid to reveal their names in case they got in trouble.

Apart from the issue of using employers' time (which they didn't seem to be, posting in evenings) I am seriously shocked at this. People working for charities actually scared to reveal their names on a blog discussing charities and fundraising - and they are not even arguing a line that their charities would disapprove of. To propose another 'dangerous socialist' idea: why don't these guys join a trade union? And if there really ARE charities out there where people work in such bad working conditions they aren't even allowed to argue with me on an open discussion board about charity issues - I for one want to know who they are working for - because I for one won't be donating to those bastards.

A new blog for new issues

2008-09-29T16:32:00.001+02:00

This blog is entirely for voluntary and community sector issues. I will use it entirely to discuss issues of concern relating to the voluntary and community sector, in relation to stuff I am working on, things I have read elsewhere and policy developments.

For example, thew first two blogs, following this introductory message, will feature fundraising, and the Building Our Futures project which I am currently working on (see the Building Our Futures page on the toosh website.)