News

Delayed plans for how £80m will be used to build the infrastructure of the voluntary sector have been unveiled, with a warning that money must be used innovatively.

Launching the consultation document at the National Association of Councils for Voluntary Service annual conference, voluntary sector minister Fiona Mactaggart told groups: "If all you do is use the money to tackle the same old problems in the same old way, I am not convinced you will get continued funding."

The document, originally expected in May, sets out details for increasing the capacity of the sector so it can take on a bigger role in the delivery of public services by 2006.

A £2.4m development fund and a £3.8m exemplar fund were also announced by Mactaggart to "kick-start" the strategy.

But delegates raised concerns that the money and time allocated to make the changes needed were inadequate.

Mactaggart admitted there was a risk that local authorities would see the new money, allocated within the Treasury cross-cutting review published last September, as an alternative to local authority support and choose to stop providing infrastructure funding to the sector. But she said she had been working with the Local Government Association to try to prevent this happening.

Full details on the how the money will be spent have not been set out, but £10m has been allocated for information and communications technology, £3m for a review of skills in the sector, and £2m for improving performance.

Fears that the voluntary sector will lose its cherished independence if it becomes more involved in the delivery of public services have also resurfaced.

Many of the 400 delegates expressed concern at the Leicester conference that the consultation document did not focus enough on developing the sector as a whole, only with developing it in relation to delivering public services.

A group of leading voluntary sector organisations has joined forces to challenge the government's agenda. In their report, A Model for the Future, they argue that the government must provide a long-term strategic plan for the sector otherwise the cash provided by the Treasury review will be wasted.


Stuart Etherington, chief executive of the National Council for Voluntary Organisations, said: "Government support for the voluntary and community sector infrastructure must be sustainable and be built upon a long-term strategy, otherwise it could be wasting £80m of taxpayers' money."

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Objectives of the infrastructure review

Support for diverse voluntary and community organisations (VCOs) delivered as close to the point of need as is economically viable.

• Effective local, regional and national tiers of generic infrastructure organisations better able to provide advice and assistance to individual VCOs, be a voice for VCOs and act as a channel for cross-sector communication. This may be supplemented by activity at a sub-regional level.
• Accessible, high-quality support covering volunteering, ethnic minority and other diversity issues, social and community enterprise, community development, rural needs and information technology available across the VCOs.
• Strengthened specialist infrastructure organisations operating nationally - ideally complemented by regional structures where this meets sector needs - covering thematic areas of VCO activity and service delivery such as child care and vocational training.