[WiLT] Voluntary group issues warning over creeping local authority control

[WiL Admin]

Voluntary group issues warning over creeping local authority control

Some local authorities are trying to gain control over the third
sector to make it easier to meet their local area agreement targets,
the vice chair of a collapsed voluntary group has claimed.

Ellie Lynall, of Voluntary Action Bolsover (VAB), a council for
voluntary service in Derbyshire, said the deteriorating relationship
between the organisation and its local strategic partnership (LSP) had
led to it losing funds and being forced to close.

She said the organisation and the LSP had been in talks about merging
voluntary infrastructure groups into a new organisation, Community
Voluntary Partners, which would also support the community empowerment
network.

VAB was thrown out of the LSP working group that was setting up the
new organisation and the LSP stopped funding it, according to Ms
Lynall. Subsequent bids to the Big Lottery Fund were either
unsuccessful or had not been decided by the time VAB's funding ran
out.

'There's a severe misunderstanding of what the voluntary sector is,
how it works and what its culture is,' she said.

'It is also perceived as being out of control because of its
independence. As the local area agreement requirements bite locally
there are advantages to the council and the LSP of extending [their]
control as much as possible into areas that affect service delivery.

'We know people are being told that VAB had a chance to join the
process, but we did not. We wanted to be a part of it but were not
given a legal way to do it.'

Two of the three community forums hosted by VAB could also close. The
disability forum has called a dissolution meeting and the ethnic
minority group is deciding whether or not to dissolve.

Mandy Chambers, chair of the local strategic partnership, said:
'Following lengthy debate and discussions, Voluntary Action Bolsover
took the decision to no longer participate in the process to form a
new umbrella organisation.'

Five members of staff at VAB will lose their jobs because of the
closure.

Elin Gudnadottir, deputy chief executive of third sector umbrella
group Urban Forum, said: 'The change from funding coming from central
government to going through the local area agreement controlled by the
local authority automatically gives them more power.'

from New Start Magazine 14 March 2007

http://www.newstartmag.co.uk/news/article/voluntary-group-issues-warning-over-creeping-local-authority-control

Posted on WiLT blog at
http://www.freecharity.org.uk/~womeninlondon/?p=270