London funding changes could spell end for hundreds of voluntary sector projects
Howard Lake | 11 November 2010 | News
Unite, the largest union in the country, has warned that plans to give individual London boroughs control of a large tranche of funding for the voluntary sector could see hundreds of projects axed.
It believes that proposals for the London Councils’ Grants Committee (LCGC) to transfer a significant proportion of their funding to individual councils will see projects closed down, because there will be no ring-fencing of the money.
Doug Nicholls, Unite’s National Officer for the Nor for Profit sector, which has 20,000 voluntary sector members in the capital, said: “Plans by the LCGC will let Londoners down and be another nail in the coffin of a strategic shared approach to solving some of the capital’s most entrenched social problems.
“A worst case proposal” he added, “could see funding for 400 projects end on 31 March next year and future funds disappearing into the overall councils’ budgets with no ring fencing or guarantee that it would go to the voluntary sector to support the most disadvantaged.”
Unite is therefore urging all London councils to retain a London-wide funding scheme for a range of vital services provided by voluntary sector organisations.
Currently, London councils invest £28 million a year in voluntary organisations on behalf of all the London councils. They fund more than 400 organisations, with individual grants ranging from between £5,000 and £500,000.
This council’s funding is provided by the London Boroughs Grants Scheme, which was operated since 1985. It is funded and governed by all 32 London boroughs and the Corporation of London.
It enables London’s local authorities to fund voluntary organisations working in more than one borough, sub-regionally or across the capital to meet the needs of London as a whole.
Nicholls commented: “With the Comprehensive Spending Review having created a hole of about £1.5 billion for local authorities, you can see they will be tempted to claim back any penny from anywhere. But this will only lead to the further fragmentation of essential services in London. It will not be cost effective.”
www.unitetheunion.com
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.