Charity funding

ePolitix.com Stakeholders comment on a National Audit Office report which criticised charity funding for its "baroque complexity".

In a report published on Wednesday, the National Audit Office (NAO) said the public services of 12 large charities, including the British Red Cross and Citizens Advice, were undermined by a lack of coordination in the delivery of funding.

Some £742m of public funds go to the voluntary sector from a range of bodies, including central government departments, local authorities and primary care trusts.

 

Stakeholder Response: Disabilities Trust

To send a comment to the Disabilities Trust, click here

A spokesman said: "This report from the NAO is a welcome contribution to the debate over charity funding.

"The report highlights the duplication of funding streams and the excessive levels of bureaucracy sometimes involved in securing grant and contract funding, and while acknowledging the commitment and work of bodies such as the Office of the Third Sector, it rightly calls for faster progress to be made on tackling these problems.

"The Disabilities Trust receives significant levels of public funding for its service provision. The majority of our funding comes through contracts with local authorities and the NHS, not from grants.

"The process of negotiating and agreeing funding for providing services can be a slow and frustrating one, especially when (and we have experience of this) a local authority may well have up to three departments involved in negotiating the fee for one individual.

"One of the reasons why there are so many problems and frustrations accessing funding, is the fact that many grants and contracts are only for one year and so must be re-negotiated every 12 months.

"The government has recently committed itself to establishing three-year funding settlements and this is a welcome move which should help to overcome some of these difficulties. However, the key is whether local authorities will actually be more willing to agree longer-term contracts.

"Another issue in funding policy that is becoming an increasing problem for the Trust is ‘ordinary residence’. This is the definition used by local authorities to decide who is entitled (on the basis of their normal residency in that authorities’ area) to social care funding.

"Often, individuals needing such services may have moved from their home to another part of the country in order to access the most appropriate service. The Trust itself has experience of this in our brain injury rehabilitation services as we are often contracted to provide services to individuals who have moved many miles from their home.

"Sometimes, when that individual wishes to move on to new accommodation or community housing, the local authority providing the original funding may be reluctant to continue to do so and might also get into a dispute with the authority from the area where that individual previously resided, as to who is actually liable for continuing to support their needs.

"Such a conflict may well leave the service user in limbo and creates great uncertainty, frustration and additional cost.

"The Voluntary Organisations Disability Group, of which the Trust is a member, has recently produced an excellent report highlighting the consequences of this problem and we would urge the government to look at the report and seek solutions to this issue, as well as addressing the NAO’s wider concerns over funding."

Stakeholder Response: Charity Commission

To send a comment to the Charity Commission, click here

A spokesman said: "Many of the findings of the NAO report published today chime very much with the Charity Commission’s Stand and Deliver research report, published in February 2007, which explored the future for charities providing public services.

"Our survey identified that funding arrangements are complex; that the most common funding arrangement is a combination of grants, contracts and service level agreements, and that two thirds of all funding agreement for public service delivery are for one year only.

"The NAO report suggests that the delivery of public services by charities could be undermined and limited by the complexity of funding arrangements.

"Our own evidence and experience also supports this and as the independent regulator of the charitable sector, we will be continuing to work with both charities and funders to promote and encourage good practice, and to highlight these issues more widely."