NEWS UPDATE
VAC AGM
Thanks to all those who turned out on a cold February evening and a big thanks to our speakers: Cllr Georgia Gould, Dr Caz Sayer and Charlotte Pace. You can view a storify of the event here. Look out for more follow up next week.
Scam Alert
Charities are being warned against an unemployed man who threatens organisations with fake disability legislation if they don’t give in to his outlandish demands.
Gerry Freedman bombards charities, FE colleges and community groups with job applications demanding hotel rooms, first class transport and cash expenses. We know he has attempted to scam at least two Camden organisations. Full story in Third Force News. Contact Robert Armour if you think you may have been approached by Freedman.
Health and Safety Training
A date has been set for our free Health and Safety training course – 21st March 10.00 – 1.00. Details to follow next week.
Camden International Women’s Day event Women in the arts, media and creative industries
Wednesday 8 March 2017 11am to 3pm. Details and booking at Eventbrite
Camden and Islington LGBT History Month
With so much to celebrate, including 50 years since partial decriminalisation of male homosexuality, why not join us for a night of fun, frolics and community spirit. As a valued partner we would like to give up to 10 members of your organisation/friends free tickets. Simply book at https://queeropolis.eventbrite.co.uk and enter promo code PARTNER100 at ‘Checkout’. The full history month programme is available here.
HEALTH
Social Care Crisis
Social Care is approaching crisis and there is an extensive consultation currently under way in Camden. The full details of the consultations and all supporting papers and consultation dates and links to the online consultation can be found here.
The future of social care was the subject of both the VAC AGM and the Camden Disability Action AGM. Cllr Georgia Gould (for Camden Council) and Dr Caz Sayer, Chair of Camden CCG and Sally MacKinnon, Tranformation Lead at Camden CCG have all set out their vision for the future of health and social care in Camden. Their presentations will be available on the VAC website shortly.
Meanwhile, there has been a lot of discussion nationally, behind closed doors, on high level ambitions to involve more volunteers in public services. Without warning (or any open consultation) the government has just issued 6 new guidance documents ” to help public sector commissioners embed volunteering and social action in public services” Full story and links to the guidance in Civil Society.
North Central London Sustainability and Transformation Plan
Camden Council have now held two public meetings about the STP. You can read a summary of the STP here or the full publication here. You can read the Leader of Camden Council’s statement here and Camden CCG statement about the STP here, Campaigners have raised concerns. A major consultation with patients, the public and VCS is expected soon. Navca’s advice for the voluntary sector can be found here. Two notable quotes about STPs are:
“locally, the best source of support for linking with the voluntary sector is frequently the council for voluntary services (CVS)…”The full NCL STP draft document and a summary document are available on the Camden website.
If you would like feed in ideas or comments on the draft STP document, please send them to the NCL STP office at nclstpmo@nhs.net.
You can read the views of Healthwatch Camden on the STP here.
Latest Camden council statement and letter on the LB Camden website..
GENERAL
Business rates revaluation
Do you have premises? Do you pay rates? The central government Valuation Office Agency (VOA) has updated the rateable value of all business properties. The rateable value is used to calculate business rates, which are then collected by councils. In many cases the new rateable values are up to double the old value. The council have told us that they expect the 80% statutory charity rates relief to remain and the Camden arrangements for discretionary rates relief will also remain. If you think your bill is wrong you can appeal it. Use this link to check your current rateable value and the new 2017 rateable value. https://www.gov.uk/correct-your-business-rates
Challenges of demonstrating impact for smaller charities
New research by Think:Learn:Do commissioned by NAVCA highlights difficulties smaller charities have when using data to demonstrate their value. The research, titled In Sickness and in Health, also looked at how local infrastructure can best support them to overcome these difficulties.
This research shows that more needs to be done to support charities to demonstrate impact. Without this support commissioners may wrongly disinvest in smaller charities. The lack of evidence may mean that services providing value for money and producing the best outcomes are overlooked.
Big Society become Shared Society then fizzles out in record time
Prime Minister Theresa May announced in January that a key part of her “shared society” vision for the UK involves “creating an environment in which our charities and social enterprises can thrive”. She pledged to support initiatives such as National Citizen Service, the Points of Light awards to recognise volunteers and supporting the #iwill campaign which was a central part of David Cameron’s big society agenda.
She has also asked Mind CEO to work with “employers and mental health groups to create a new partnership with industry.” She pledged £14M to support mental health (about 20p per person). Full story in Civil Society. The third sector press north of the border was more skeptical of the initiative, with Third Force News calling it a “sham” and warning politicians to “keep off our territory.”
Barely a month later the policy seems all but forgotten.
Charities and Campaigning
Within days of launching the ‘Shared Society’, the Prime Minister, Theresa May, attacked the Red Cross as “irresponsible“. NCVO have produced an excellent guide: “How to talk about charities and campaigning” which sets out the positive argument for why charities should campaign and what is allowed within the law. Paul Perkins, a former Charity Commissioner has also written an excellent piece telling the story of how RNIB campaigning lead to a revolution in NHS services to deaf people.
Pensions – What small charities need to know about auto-enrolment
Small and micro charities are coming up to their auto-enrolment staging dates. This CFG guide provides a quick refresh for those currently going through the process.
All charities that have at least one paid worker will have automatic enrolment duties. Charities need to assess their staff, put those who meet certain criteria into a pension scheme (and make contributions to it), tell them what you’ve done, and complete a declaration of compliance. More details here.
GOVERNANCE
Making Digital Work: 12 Questions for Trustees
If you’re interested in how digital can add value to your charity and are unsure where to start, have a look at the new tool. The contains 12 questions to get you started. Download it from the Charity Commission website.
Trustees Feel Under Pressure
More than a quarter of charity trustees have considered quitting because of pressure, survey finds
Research carried out in partnership with Third Sector indicates that almost three quarters of board members think the demands on them are increasing and almost a quarter thought that the pressure had become too much. Read the full article in Third Sector.
CONTRACT CULTURE
Small charities ‘priced out of council contracts’
Small charities are being “priced out and scaled out” of bidding for local authority contracts and it is “inevitable” that charities will take over some local government services, local government representatives have told the Lords Select Committee on Charities.
Appearing before the committee, Daniel Hurford, head of policy at the Welsh Local Government Association, and Robert Light, a Kirklees councillor, both said that the funding cuts faced by councils and the shift from grants to contracts had had a negative impact on local charities.
Hurford said that despite a general understanding from the charity sector that local authorities were facing severe budget reductions, “there is increasing tension over how that funding is distributed to the sector”.
He said there was a risk that smaller organisations “are priced out and scaled out of the market” and the increasing focus on larger contracts with bigger organisations meant the charity sector risked losing “some of the value it brought as a body, both as a potential deliverer of services but also as a representative body, as an advocate and as having local community ties”.
Lloyds Bank Foundation Director Warns Lords Committee that the Value of Small Organisations is being lost and blames ‘broken commissioning’
He argues that the bar for the third sector is often set higher than that demanded of other sectors. Small charities in particular face an ill-informed presumption that they’re not good at reporting or measuring their impact.
“Over the years I’ve met countless small charities and I am yet to meet one that isn’t interested in improving impact measurement. But they struggle to find any money to fund formal evaluations, so they focus on measures that relate directly to their day-to-day work. Many use industry-recognised methods, such as the Outcomes Star, that create a different, nuanced conversation with their beneficiaries at the point of “sale”. Most public and private businesses would give their eye teeth for that degree of bespoke customer experience.
Society can’t afford to have these services, or the impact they have on local communities, trivialised in this way. We need to measure impact through the eyes of a person receiving the service: as a good business would its consumers.” Read the full document here.
Furthermore Lloyds TSB Foundation are warning that Broken Commissioning Threatens the Survival of Small Charities and warns of widespread closure of small charities. The report warns that we “urgently need common sense reforms to ensure small charities are able to compete for contracts on a level playing field. This isn’t about spending more money, but making better use of the funds that are available”. The Guardian has picked up the story and writes: “Research finds government’s ‘shockingly complicated’ tendering processes threatens the survival of smaller charities. Smaller charities are being shut out of competition for government and council contracts by “shockingly complicated”, bureaucratic and inappropriate processes…”
The future of many smaller charities with priceless local knowledge and connections is being put at risk by their inability to comply with the myriad requirements and paperwork that typifies official tendering, the analysis suggests.” Civil Society also has an article about commissioning in crisis.
Lloyds TSB Foundation have published a thoughtful article about their reasons for sounding the alarm as well as “Championing Small Charities” containing practical suggestions for funders including:
~ Work with local charities to better understand who they work with, the existing services in your area and learn from their expertise about what support is needed
~ Ensure any commissioning involves contract sizes and processes proportionate to what you are trying to achieve to allow small charities to have a fair chance of succeeding
~ Use grants wherever possible
~ Improve transparency in commissioning and supply chains and challenge bad practice
~ Provide core, long term funding for small and local charities
Fairer Contracting and Commissioning
The Guardian has an excellent article “Fairer UK charity contracts will demand long-term government support” which pinpoints the current commissioning culture as part of the problem. The article says that small charities are losing out and therefore depriving the public sector (and their clients) of local expertise and reach. The article sets out the governments plan to tackle the problems but warns that the plans may take some time and still depend on local commissioners seeing the value of the sector.
Faulty By Design – The State of Public Service Commissioning
Faults in publc-service commissioning came to a head when the government’s ‘Troubled Families’ initiative hit 99% success rate and most areas that took part found precisely the number of troubled families that central government predicted they would have. Reform’s latest report, Faulty by design. The state of public-service commissioning, published today, seeks to shed light on the successes and failures of the current framework and serves as a case for change from the current system. More info, interviews and full report here.
Locality launches campaign against ‘counterproductive’ commissioning practices
Locality has called current commissioning trends “counterproductive” and “inefficient”, and has launched a campaign to keep commissioning local.
The Keep it Local campaign and accompanying report is calling for locally-commissioned and delivered public services which provide “substantially better outcomes and value than standardised, one-size-fits-all services”. Full details Civil Society
ECONOMY
Autumn Budget
In the autumn the Chancellor announced announced
~ Banking fines – a further £102m will be committed over the next 4 years to support Armed Forces and Emergency Services charities
~ Tampon Tax Fund – £3m will go to Comic Relief to distribute to a range of women’s charities
~ Gift Aid Small Donations Scheme – will be amended to make it more accessible and flexible
~ Gift Aid Digital – will simplify the process for donors making digital donations
In NAVCA’s response, Neil Cleeveley, Chief Executive, said;
“On a day when all the talk is about the nation’s multi-billion pounds public finances, it is important to remember that small investments can make a huge difference to people’s lives. The Chancellor has acted in a disappointingly traditional manner. I would argue for a more radical approach to match these very changed times.”
More reactions from the voluntary sector in Civil Society and The Guardian and NCVO.
A complete failure to mention health and social care has caused alarm among local authorities and the NHS. The Kings Fund said that “the government will have to look again…” Camden Council said “Today’s failure to address this crisis is as saddening as it is staggering.”
Spring Budget
A coalition of nine charity infrastructure bodies has written to the Chancellor Philip Hammond calling for a range of measures to match tax concessions being giving to the private sector.
One of these is increasing business rates relief to 100 per cent. The letter, which was coordinated by the Charity Finance Group (CFG) ahead of next month’s Budget, says that businesses have benefited from a £6.7bn rates cut which will see some businesses paying no rates at all. Businesses now get more favourable treatment on National Insurance, as well as the long standing problem of VAT – which is irrecoverable by charities and costs the sector £1.5bn a year. Details in Civil Society. The demands are contained in a letter that urges the government to deal with the sector in a more strategic way as opposed to the distribution of £0.5bn of libor fines that have been distributed by the treasury in a completely opaque way to a handful of charities. Full story in Third Sector.
Local Budget
There will be a budget debate at Camden council on the 27th February. Details will be available here. Cllr Theo Blackwell has written a long article setting out some of the difficulties that lie ahead.
DISABILITY
The Independent Living Fund, one year on
The report, One year on: Evaluating the impact of the closure of the Independent Living Fund, was launched in Parliament with the help of Green Party co-leader Jonathan Bartley and Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell. It looks at what has happened, particularly in the 33 London boroughs, since the Independent Living Fund was closed in 2015.
Welcome to the second VAC quarterly selection of Policy highlights of relevance to the VCS in Camden. The policy highlights are drawn from a wide variety of sources and may have featured in recent editions of the e-bulletin or have been drawn from conferences, workshops or seminars. Please do give us feedback on the briefing and let us know if there are particular issues you would like covered in more depth. The VAC e-bulletin will be back as usual next Friday.
