The strategic advantage of non profits and civil society groups

image: Storm Force by John Gaffen www.whitewindmillphotography.co.uk

"After decades of discourse about how nonprofits need to be more businesslike, I am driven to discuss the differences structurally and in more detail. The admonition to be more like a business is a preposterous proposition—ill informed and exhibiting a sloppy state of mind that tries to draw us all off track to a space of unaccountability. Don’t fall for it. For goodness’ sake—if you want to act like a business, be a business! The major distinguishing factor of a business is its ability to build the wealth of individual owners rather than build collective well-being and value. Decide which bottom line you are dedicated to, and make it your own"
Ruth McCambridge

Like Ruth McCambridge, I have long been a critic of those who claim that nonprofits should be more business-like and operate like business to remodel themselves along business and market lines. It is both an ill informed and dangerous claim.

The claim reflects a naive understanding of non profit organizations and is predicated on a false assumption that non profits need a dose of "business thinking" to be more effective and effective.

Others who express similar views to McCambridge and I, include Michael Edwards and Deborah Allcock Tyler.

In her article Use it or Lose it: Frittering Away Civil Society's Strategic Advantage in the excellent online and print journal Non Profit Quarterly, of which she is the Editor, McCambridge argues that non profits have a strategic advantage that they are often blind to because they don't recognize or use it. 

And she argues that blindness to this strategic advantage is leading the nonprofit and civil society sector to lose its opportunity to become more influential, particularly in terms of responding to debates and solutions about important social, economic and political issues.

McCambridge argues that this strategic advantage springs from a number of distinguishing characteristics of non profits that need to be valued much more and worked with in a more conscious and powerful way.  

Strategic advantage is not to be found in the lure of competition, business metrics, market orientation, growth for growth's sake and obsession with money and profitability.

Some of the strategic advantages highlighted in Ruth McCambridge's article include:

• the tradition of collective association and collective endeavor for the common good
• the tradition of being close to constituents and to communities and of providing opportunities to maximise and amplify their voice
• the importance of shared values and collective aspirations
• the importance of scale, particularly smallness and nimbleness 
• close engagement and shared fit between the interests and aspiration of those who run the organization and those who benefit from its activities
• the focus on mutual benefit and the common good
• the tradition of mobilizing people to work together for shared value and of working non competitively in networks
• the important of trust and credibility in the eyes of constituents and stakeholders, rather than public image and brand 
• acting as the vehicle through which constituents and citizens can take action for the common good and mutual benefit
• appealing to common cause and individual aspiration through activity aimed explicitly at common benefit as a way for engaging the energy of stakeholders.
• availing ourselves of our constituents/stakeholders’ unpaid/volunteer labor.

The Abbott Government, social policy and the greedy ghost of market fundamentalism

Treasurer Joe Hockey's announcement that the Abbott Government plans to increase the pension age (from 67 to 70), impose more welfare means testing and introduce co-payments for medical services comes as no surprise, but provides more evidence of the continuing assault on public spending for the less well off, the vulnerable and disadvantaged.

The Abbott Government has already imposed severe spending cuts across many portfolios and shown its intention to cut back public expenditure for the less well off by fundamentally transforming income support in areas such as the Disability Support pension (DSP), family and welfare payments and welfare support for the long term unemployed.

In addition, there is the expectation that both the report into the Welfare System (the McClure Review) and the report of the National Commission of Audit (the Business Council of Australia report), both due to be released soon, will recommend serious austerity policies and market driven social policies.

The Abbott Government's market fundamentalist policies and its austerity agenda are intended to dismantle public spending for the less well off and the vulnerable, and fundamentally transform public spending and public assets to make them suitable to deliver profit to the business and corporate sector and largess to the already well off.

What is also worth noting is that this fundamental transformation of social policy and welfare support is being undertaken without any real consultation with the social policy and welfare sector, and continues to be driven by advice from, and the agendas of influential pro- business and corporate lobby groups, such as the Business Council of Australia.

Moreover, the Abbott  Government has consistently concealed its real social policy intentions and denied it was planning to impose these policies. None of the policies were made public prior to the last election and back in November 2013 Treasurer Joe Hockey lied when he said that the Government had no plans to increase the pension age.

While it dismantles social policies that support the less well off and the vulnerable it retains and expands profligate policies for the corporate and business sector and the rich and already well off, such as superannuation tax concessions, various housing-related tax benefits, paid parental leave, asset tests and corporate tax benefits, to name but a few.

On his blog En Passant former Tax Office economist, blogger, activist and academic John Passant alerts us to the hypocrisy and deceit of Treasurer Joe Hockey's proposals on the age pension:

Let me get this right. The revenue forgone on tax concessions for superannuation at $45 bn will soon be more than the cost of the pension (over $40 bn). Of that $45 bn in tax concessions $10 to $15 bn will go to the top 10% of income earners. Yet Australia’s greatest Treasurer, Joe Hockey, wants to rein in expenditure on the pension by for example extending the access age to 70 (after Labor increased it to 67 over time by 2023) and tightening up the asset test to perhaps include the family home. Priorities. 

According to the OECD Australia has one of the lowest relative pensions of any member countries (Turkey and Mexico are lower) and 35% of Australian pensioners live in poverty. Priorities.

So are there too many non profits?

Like Deborah Allcock Tyler I am constantly annoyed when I hear business people, Ministers, senior people in Government agencies, and many people in the non profit sector complain that there are too many non profits, particularly too many small non profits.

The claims vary- overlapping or uncoordinated services, duplication of effort and resources, failure to'get their act together', lack of efficiency, wastage of resources and reduced effectiveness, too many different voices, too many agencies for Governments to deal with. I have heard them all.

And the suggestion that follows is usually that someone- Government, the sector, the bigger agencies, the smaller agencies- should rationalise and reduce the number of non profits, particularly smaller ones who, it is claimed, are often unviable and less effective.

Many Government agencies have operated on this assumption for years, and have used their contracting and procurement regimes as a defacto strategy to rationalise the sector.

On many occasions I have heard senior Government officers and leaders of nonprofit organisations admit that one benefit of the contracting and procurement regimes that Federal and State Governments have imposed on the non profit sector here in Australia is that it it leads to a rationalization of the non profit sector by squeezing out what they perceive as 'unviable and less effective' (they mean 'less businesslike') non profits, usually smaller agencies.

Obviously, non profits should look at ways they can work more effectively with others to reduce duplication and improve their effectiveness and impact. This includes exploring collaborative partnerships with other non profits, if it is a way to deliver better outcomes for the people and the communities they exist to serve.

However, I have never understood the claim that more non profits is a bad thing. In particular, it is fundamentally anti-democratic for someone else to decide which non profits should exist, or to decide that there should be an arbitrary limit on the number of non profits.

Efforts to reduce the number of non profits, ultimately has the effect of reducing the democratic rights of citizens to take action.

And compare this claim that there are too many non profits, with views about for profit businesses. You never hear the claim that there are too many for profit business, despite the evidence of a huge number of failing, poorly run businesses, engaged in criminal and highly questionable conduct. Rather, the view is that the more for profit businesses there are, the better.

Deborah Allcock Tyler is spot when she writes:

One principle of a free democracy is the ability of people to come together in service of something they care about, regardless of whether or not someone else is already doing it and thinks they're doing it better than anyone else (which they always do!) or, indeed, if others don't think their cause is important..................................

The belief that there are too many charities is pardonable from those outside our sector, who are less likely to see the bigger picture and more likely to see donors and volunteers as willing and obedient stooges and beneficiaries as voiceless, choiceless victims who should be grateful for whatever they get from whomever is allowed to give it.

But that belief is, for me, incomprehensible when held by those within the sector. To them I say this: all right, if you genuinely believe that there really are too many charities, close yours down and that will be one less.

The issue of whether there are too many non profits in the US context is discussed here and here. A Canadian perspective is here.

Neoliberalism, market fundamentalism and the colonization of Aboriginal policy

"Neo-liberalism is a hungry beast and this 21st Century strain of capitalism is shaping the agenda for control of Aboriginal lands...........Australian Government policy is heavily influenced by neo-liberalism through its extraordinary emphasis on managing access for mining companies to resources on Aboriginal lands. This involves controlling what is still perceived as ‘the Aboriginal problem’ and forcing a social transition from traditional values and cultural practice to ‘mainstream’ modernism of a particular brand. It also involves displacing many Aboriginal people from their traditional lands and concentrating them in ‘growth towns.......To make any sense of the aggression behind most current Indigenous policy in Australia you need to study the impact of neo-liberalism around the globe"  

Jeff McMullen

The Australian journalist, writer and social justice campaigner Jeff McMullen has written two cogent and articulate critiques of the colonization of Aboriginal policy making in this country by the cancer of neo-liberalism (or what others call market fundamentalism). 

One of Jeff McMullen's articles The New Land Grab is available on line here (in The New Internationalist blog). The second piece is a book chapter titled Dispossession- Neoliberalism and the Struggle for Aboriginal Land and Rights in the 21st Century which appears in a new book In Black and White: Australians at the Cross Roads (edited by Rhonda Craven, Anthony Dillon & Nigel Parbury). This article is available here on Jeff McMullen's own website

In drawing on the work of David Harvey and others, and incorporating the voices of Aboriginal people, McMullen makes the case that neoliberalism is a key driver of the agenda for the control of Aboriginal lands and assimilation of Aboriginal people in Australia.  

Neoliberalism, McMullen argues is the ideological underpinning of a uniquely Australian strain of state-corporate capitalism that aims to control Aboriginal communities to enable exploitation of the land and mineral wealth on Aboriginal lands. McMullan argues that the real goal here is the upward redistribution of land and mineral wealth.

McMullen demonstrates the way that successive Federal and State Governments have used the coercive powers of the state to impose an agenda of modernization, control of Aboriginal lands and assimilation and assault on Aboriginal rights and culture.

Drawing on David Harvey's book A Brief History of Neoliberalism, McMullen identifies 4 essential features of the neoliberal agenda and analyses the extent to which they are manifest in Aboriginal policy making in this country:

1. Privatization and commodification of public and community goods. This has occurred through the privatization of Aboriginal lands, via policies that open up Aboriginal land to resource exploitation and attempts to override community land ownership and impose private property ownership rights.
2. Financialization to treat good or bad events as opportunities for economic speculation.
3. Management and manipulation of crises to establish a neoliberal agenda. This includes using the  Northern Territory Intervention as justification for  exerting greater control over Aboriginal communities to enable market and corporate exploitation of the minerals and resources on Aboriginal lands and the use  of 'military style campaigns to exert control and challenge Aboriginal sovereignty
4. State redistribution of wealth, not to the poor but to the rich and powerful.

Analyzing Aboriginal policy through the lens of neoliberalism as McMullen does, helps us to understand what drives social policies such as the Northern Territory Intervention and the social engineering to control Aboriginal people still living on traditional lands, as well as the aggressive land grab by mining and resource companies, aided and abetted by Federal and State Governments, which divides Aboriginal communities, and even Aboriginal families.  He writes:

'Neoliberalism connects the agendas of modernising Aboriginal culture and allowing mining companies to vigorously exploit and minimal cost the mineral treasures on Aboriginal lands'.

McMullen points to the divide and conquer tactics of mining companies and governments in the Kimberley and Pilbara in Western Australia, across the Northern Territory, on Cape York and in parts of NSW and South Australia, as manifestation of these neoliberal agendas.

McMullen is scathing about the role played by influential Aboriginal leaders, such as Noel Pearson, Marcia Langton and Warren Mundine who have become influential advocates and brokers for neoliberal policies and have gathered adherents and supporters in both political parties and corporate Australia.

Not- for- profits take on corporate heavyweights

Environmental not- for- profits in Australia are at the front line in campaigns and actions against corporate heavyweights.
 

As corporations increasingly use their financial and legal power to silence and challenge campaigning organizations, the risks to not-for- profits are significant.

Environmental organizations and campaigners are particularly vulnerable as they face off against corporate heavyweights who are well-resourced, well-connected and powerful.

The risks facing not-for-profits who take on corporate heavyweights was demonstrated in the recent case of the WWF and its legal stoush with mining magnate  Clive Palmer.

In a media release WWF claimed  that the Clive Palmer owned Yubala nickel refinery near Townsville Queensland was threatening to collapse, thereby releasing toxins into the environment. The WWF claimed that three ponds containing toxic industrial waste were at capacity and could collapse and create a major environmental disaster. 

Palmer sued the WWF and was successful in the court proceedings. The WWF  was forced to apologize to Clive Palmer and agreed to pay his legal costs over its claims..

Now Greenpace Australia is taking on another global corporate heavyweight Coca Cola and it will be interesting to see how it all unfolds.

Greenpeace Australia has launched a media campaign against  corporate heavyweight Coca Cola Amatil to pressure Federal and State Governments to implement a national containers scheme. 

Greenpeace's campaign comes in the wake of Coca Cola Amatil's victory in the Northern Terriry courts where the powerful and wealthy multinational corporation used its financial and legal power  to successfully dismantle the Northern Territory Government's recycling scheme 'cash for containers'. In January 2011 the Northern Territory Government introduced a deposit scheme to encourgage people to recycle bottles and cans. Coca Cola successfully challenged the scheme in court claiming it was an inefficient and expensive method of increasing recycling rates.

Greenpeace is running full-page ads in The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald. Its campaign has been entirely funded by  individual donations. In just over two weeks, over 50,000 people have  signed up to the campaign calling on politicians to implement a national ‘Cash for Containers’ scheme. 

Greenpeace is targeting Coca Cola Amatil directly arguing that: 

"Coke is currently trashing a popular and proven 10 cent recycling refund scheme and is the main blocker standing in the way of a national scheme. ‘Cash for containers’ has run successfully for 30 years in South Australia, where recycling rates are almost double those across the rest of the country.

Coca Cola Amatil has for years sought to undermine this proven system, spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on misleading advertising and reportedly threatening to campaign against MPs who support the policy.

In Queensland freedom of speech does not apply to some NGOs and civil society

Funny how Liberal National Governments vehemently defend the right to freedom of speech for racists, anti Islamists, climate change deniers and corporations, but not for civil society groups and NGO's who speak out on public policy issues.

Since its election the  Queensland Liberal-National Newman Government has sought to silence NGO's who wish to contribute to political debate. The Government has made it clear that NGOs must remain silent if they wish  to receive public funding. Grant contracts now include clauses preventing non-government organisations advocating for state and federal legislative change.

Stories about the attacks on the free speech rights of NGOs in Queensland are  here, here, here, here and here. 

This latest piece is from the todays Brisbane Times.

Springborg defends 'draconian' gag orders

Queensland's health minister has defended gag orders on not-for-profit groups that receive state funding and has told the federal government to butt out.

The federal government will introduce a new bill which would ban gag clauses from all commonwealth contracts with the not-for-profit sector.

It plans to write to state and territory leaders asking them to match the federal commitment.

Federal Finance Finance Minister Penny Wong has called the Newman government's gag orders "nothing short of draconian".

"First, the Newman government cuts funding to those without a voice and then silences those who speak on their behalf," she said.

But Queensland Health Minister Lawrence Springborg said not-for-profit groups should not be wasting their time and money on political advocacy.

He said the federal government should stop trying to interfere.

"We will decide how public money is spent in Queensland," he said on Monday.

"In Queensland we believe that if we give money in Queensland Health to an organisation, then that organisation should be doing what we fund them for.

"Not running around with political advocacy."

 

Why demands for greater accountability and stronger governance should be challenged

Very good advice from Helmut Anheier who calls on not-for-profits to resist and lobby against demands  by legislators, politicians, academic think tanks and corporate leaders for greater not- for- profit accountability.

This is a critical issue here in Australia where Governments of all political persuasions and corporate and business leaders demand greater not- for- profit accountability and exhort the sector to "rise to the accountability challenge".

Of course their demand for greater not- for- profit accountability is wholly incompatible with their commitment to reduce accountability and regulation of politicians and political parties, and corporations and business.

Anheier argues (here) that the continual focus on accountability and governance produces undermines the reasons why not- for- profits exist.

Charity leaders must lobby against ever greater accountability requirements, delegates were told at Acevo’s annual conference today.

Speaking at the event in London today, Helmut Anheier, professor of sociology and dean at the Hertie School of Governance in Berlin, said he was concerned about the growing expectation for the voluntary sector to become more accountable.

"Why I’m concerned is that continual emphasis on good governance and accountability will ultimately put non-profits on the defensive, making it very difficult for them to meet these expectations, unless we take a proactive solution and steps in that direction," he said.

Anheier, who was Centennial Professor at the London School of Economics between 2001 and 2009, said the debate about the need for charities to be more accountable stretched back almost 20 years, but was now getting louder.

"It is the ‘audit society’, general institutionalisation, the suggestion that more and more mechanisms are needed to reassure us that things are okay," he said. "This is merged with ideas of good governance, which are now the prime directives for voluntary organisations."

He said that putting emphasis on accountability undermined the reasons non-profit organisations exist.

Innovation in accountability should be encouraged in the charity sector, he said. He advocated demonstrating the academic Jonathan Koppell’s "five dimensions of accountability": transparency, legitimacy, controllability, responsibility and responsiveness.

"It should be acknowledged that full accountability is beyond what non-profits can and should do," said Anheier. "New forms of self-regulation and smart reporting should be encouraged.

"Lobby against new directives for ever great accountability requirements – let’s not overdo it."

UK not for profit leader warns against adopting private sector models

Deborah Allcock Tyler who is the CEO of the UK based Directory of Social Change is a regular vsitor to Australia and always has important and insightful things to say about the Not-for profit sector

Last time she was in Australia she slammed the idea that Not for profits should be more business like arguing that it is offensive how much is written about how NFPs need to be run better and behave more like the business world.

Debra Allcock Tyler addresses the 2010 Think Innovation Summi

Allcock Tyler argues that the constant comparison between practices in the business and Not for Profit sectors is ironic, as it was the failure of corporate governance and banks that plunged the world into a recession.

Allcock Tyler has recently visited Australia again as a guest of the Victorian Department of Communities to speak about the experience of the big society and its impact in the UK, social finance and the role of the voluntary sector in social change.

One of her messages (one that I and many others have been arguing for years) needs to be stated over and over-  private-sector models are not the solution to deeply entrenched, long-term social problems and complex human and community needs.

Allcock Tyler is a strong critic of competitive tendering and contractual approaches arguing that the move to competitive tendering for government contracts creates a view of NFPs as just another delivery vehicle for social services. It creates a system where NFPs are forced to behave more ruthlessly like businesses, in a competitive manner.

 Allcock Tyler argues that competitive tendering creates a psychological shift about who the client is – with a contract the client is whoever is paying, instead of the grant system, where a NFP determines a solution to a problem and takes it to government for funding. It also this means the big organisations get bigger, and the medium and small organisations are left behind.

Allcock Tyler has warned the Australian not- for- profit sector of the dangers of adopting untested and in many cases failed market- based policies, including social finance, social enterprise and payment by results, which are increasingly popular here in Australia among Governments and which are fiercely promoted by academic think tanks like the Centre for Social Impact and the growing number of corporate funded  and business oriented NFP advocacy groups.

Allcock Tyler writes here:

It was a great trip, even though I came away worried that the Australians are following the UK's lead in government engagement with the voluntary sector - which, let's face it, is not going well. I did point out that they really shouldn't follow our example because we're buggering it up badly (they're Aussies - they like a spade to be called a spade, and an expletive to emphasise the point always goes down well).

You won't be surprised to hear that I was particularly scathing about social impact bonds and payment by results. One rather important sort of chap then asked me how I explained the success of the "Peterborough experiment". I was flummoxed. I'd never heard of it and said that if it was that successful people would have been shouting about it loudly.

Amazingly, on my first day back in the UK I was listening to Today when said 'experiment' was referred to by Chris Grayling, the Secretary of State for Justice. The absolute shocker was his statement that the payment-by-results model used in the social impact bond being pioneered at Peterborough prison was hugely successful - although he hadn't yet had the report with the evidence to back up that assertion. It seems the government is so confident this market-based, capital-intensive model is right that it doesn't need the evidence to prove it.

What really riled me was the bare-faced hypocrisy of this. We in the sector are constantly exhorted to provide evidence of need and success in order to get funding - but the government is allowed to get away with rolling out a controversial, highly contested model of funding the sector without providing evidence. How hypocritical is that? Well, it won't work. Private-sector models are not the solution to deeply entrenched, long-term social problems.

Not for profit aged care provider Baptistcare protests Federal Government funding cuts

Always pleasing to see large Not- for- profit organizations like Baptistcare willing to make a stand  and protest against Government policy that disadvantages the people they serve.

This report describes a protest by staff at Baptistcare's Rockingham aged care facility against Federal Government funding decisions in aged care that are resulting in $500 million being cut from aged care funding.

Baptistcare is extending the protest to 13 of its residential aged care facilities and three disability and community care sites from today, in protest at the Federal government's decision

The organisation has taken the step of launching the visual protest, which includes a call to action via social media, to raise greater public awareness of the government's 1 July adjustments to the Aged Care Funding Instrument (ACFI).


The protest is part of  a larger campaign being run by not- for- profit aged care providers through Aged and Community Services WA  which represents not-for-profit aged care providers which care for 100,000 of the state's most frail and vulnerable citizens.

Flags emblazoned with “Government Neglects Aged Care” flew outside the Gracehaven facility protesting reduced federal funds for aged-care organisations to deliver clinical care services to its residents.

Baptistcare CEO Lucy Morris said the Government had made it almost impossible for not-for-profit residential care providers, like Baptistcare, to provide appropriate care for the elderly and vulnerable.

“Through its adjustment of the assessment tool used to fund high-care services, the Government has stripped money from the services needed to care for older, sicker residents, who have more complex health needs and need higher levels of care,” Dr Morris said.

But Mental Health and Ageing Minister Mark Butler said subsidies would not be reduced and they would continue to grow by 2.7 per cent a year above indexation, per resident over the next five years.

He said early data for providers’ care funding claims made in July showed average subsidies increased from $133.96 per resident per day in June to $134.83 in July.

“Leading Aged Services Australia (LASA) and Aged and Community Services Australia (ACSA) have claimed funding will be cut by hundreds of millions of dollars in 2012 and beyond,” Mr Butler said.

“These claims are clearly untrue, as these early figures show. The Government’s aged care package will increase funding for residential care. This year’s subsidies will be $310 million more than last year.”

ACSA WA chief Stephen Kobelke said WA’s not-for-profit aged care sector had struggled for years to survive in one of the world’s most expensive cities.

“There has been unprecedented stagnation in the provision of aged-care services in WA, to the point that 3368 bed licences have now not been taken up since 2007,” he said.

He said ACSWA figures showed some aged-care providers would face cuts of over $14,000 per resident.

Regulator of the Australian not-for-profit sector is in doubt

Excellent and timely piece here by El Gibbs in New Matilda on the Federal Government's  plan to set up an Australian Charities and Not-for-Profit (NFP) Commission to improve regulation of the not-for-profit sector.

The Federal Government's legislation to set up up the Australian Charities and Not-for Profit Commission to  manage all aspects of NFP governance and require annual financial reporting by organisations across the country went through the House of Representatives last week and is due to come before the Senate in the next sitting of Parliament.

The relevant bills have been through an extensive consultation process, including a formal review by a Senate Committee. The Greens, who hold the balance of power in the Senate, support the legislation in broad terms, but intend to move amendments in the Senate and may block the legislation if their amendments are not adopted.

The Opposition Liberal National Parties currently oppose the creation of the Commission. and provided over 30 speakers against the Bill when it came before the House of Representatives last week.

As El points out the main industry bodies representing the not- for- profit sector in Australia have been calling for the streamlining and improvement of the regulation of the not- for- profit sector for some considerable time and there is widespread support for the Commission.

However, despite this level of support there remain concerns that, without support from the states and territories, the impact of the Commission will be to increase, rather than decrease, the administrative burden on NFP groups, particularly smaller agencies.

I have cited El's piece in full:

Will a Charity Commission cut Red Tape 
by El Gibbs

A proposal to regulate and oversee a section of the Australian economy that employs 8 per cent of workers and comprises over 600,000 different organisations went through the House of Representatives last week. It’s due to come before the Senate in the next sitting of Parliament.

The proposed legislation will set up a commission to manage all aspects of governance and require annual financial reporting by organisations across the country.

The Australian Charities and Not-for-profit (NFP) Commission is a long-standing goal of the NFP sector and has been recommended in a series of reports into the sector since 2001. Currently, charities and NFP groups report to a myriad of government agencies. They often have to report a number of times and in different ways, creating a great deal of red tape. 

"We are at the altar of the reforms we want and need and we ask for the support of our national parliament and of the states and territories to deliver for us better and smarter regulation. We don’t want to be jilted yet again," David Thompson AM, Director of the National Roundtable of NFP Organisations, told New Matilda. 

The Commission will also oversee future changes to the definition of what is a charity and which organisations are able to claim the lucrative Deductible Gift Recipient (DGR) status, that allows donations to be tax-deductible — this has an impact on the kind of fundraising an organisation can do. The Commission could also frame the unique place the NFP sector holds in relation to the government and business sectors. 

The CEO of ACOSS, Dr Cassandra Goldie has said:

"Our sector is overly but ineffectively regulated. For the reams of paper and hours of analysis that charities put in to reporting the same information to multiple funders and regulators, we know little about the activities, size or scope of this essential sector."

The proposed Commission will, according to Senator Ursula Stephens, have three main objectives.

"Its first object is to maintain, protect and enhance public trust and confidence in the NFP sector. Its second object is to support and sustain a robust, vibrant, independent and innovative NFP sector. The third object underlines the important role that the ACNC will have to promote the reduction of unnecessary regulatory obligations on the NFP sector."

In a statement from the State, Territory and National peak groups for the sector, Goldie states that "the creation of the Australian Charities and Not-for-profit Commission is the culmination of a long process and has broad support from the community and social services sector. 

UnitingCare Director, Lin Hatfield-Dodds, told New Matilda that the opportunities offered by the Commission could be of great benefit to the community and to the sector:

"It’s important that funders can quickly and easily get an objective and transparent look at the community groups they support. The Commission could also act as a ‘Report once, use often’ tool, so that community groups report to one agency across all government. When we are spending public money, we have to be transparent. However, there is a risk that we spend more time and administration on reporting, rather than delivering innovative services."

However, there are concerns that, without support from the states and territories, the impact of the Commission will be to increase, rather than decrease, the administrative burden on NFP groups. Currently, organisations can either incorporate, and be regulated by ASIC, or form an association, which is regulated by state-based Departments of Fair Trading. The addition of a Commission, with no corresponding reduction in state-based regulation, is of concern to many groups. COAG is due to consider these issues early in 2013. 

In the interim, the Commission could drive reform of red tape within the federal government by streamlining reporting requirements across departments and agencies. For example, each time a group applies for a grant, they have to start from scratch, rather than being able to register with the Commission once for all other agencies. 

The relevant bills have been available for public scrutiny for some months, and have been through an extensive consultation process, including a formal review by the Senate Community Affairs Committee.

 The current legislation is the result of many changes, however there are still concerns held by the Greens, who intend to move amendments in the Senate in the next sitting of Parliament. 
"As I outlined in my dissenting report on this legislation, the Greens remain concerned that there’s not enough detail about gag-clauses for advocacy groups, and we think there needs to be more consultation on the governance arrangements and independence for the sector to advocate on behalf of those they look after," Greens Senator Rachel Siewert told New Matilda:

"Not-for-profit groups are an essential part of civil society and it’s important that this legislation gives transparency in dealing with government. We also want to see the Commissioner given more power to drive the red-tape reduction agenda."

The Greens confirmed to New Matilda that they will consider blocking the legislation if their amendments are not adopted by the Government. However, they stated their commitment to working with the Government to improve the bills to address the remaining issues of concern to the NFP sector.

The LNP currently opposes the creation of the Commission. Despite the broad sector support, the LNP provided over 30 speakers against the Bill when it came before the House last week. Kevin Andrews, the Shadow Minister for Families, Housing and Human Services, stated  that "this is legislation which has been foisted upon the charitable sector in Australia which they do not want, which there has been no case made by the hapless minister at the table." 

"This is simply not true," said Thompson, who leads the sector’s peak body. "The evidence is in the thousands of words in submissions from the sector, calling for this reform. The Government has taken on board a significant number of issues raised in submissions." 

Other LNP members quoted a range of charitable and NFP groups’ concerns about the Bill. However, some of these quotes were from submissions about a much earlier version of the legislation and many of these concerns have now been remedied. Several sources have confirmed that there has been considerable disquiet among those groups named by LNP members in the debate. 

One, the Australian Institute of Company Directors, is quoted as having concerns regarding the impact of the legislation on board members, most of whom are volunteers. In a recent statement, the AICD said: "if suitable amendments giving effect to these changes were to be made to the current Bill, and subsequent to our review of the revised Bill wording, we would support its passage through Parliament." They support the amendments that the Greens will be putting to the legislation. 

The Bill has been introduced into the Senate and is due to be debated in the next sitting, starting 9 October. If the legislation is not passed, Thompson says "it will be back to the drawing board in the quest to get the regulator we want. We have waited a long time and an enormous effort has been put in to get it this far."

The paradox of the Paralympics

Excellent piece here by Amelia Gentleman on the paradox of the Paralympics- the disconnect between the positive attitudes to disability on display inside the Olympic stadiums and the experience of people with disabilities in the wider British society where intensive Government cuts are creating immense suffering for disabled people and increasing hostility towards people with disabilities is resulting in a soaring of hate crimes.

Many radical and activist groups such as Disabled People against Cuts have campaigned and protested against aspects of the Paralympics such as corporate sponsorship by large corporations such as Atos and cuts to services for people with disabilities. Atos who was a major sponsor of the Paralympics is contracted by the UK Government as administrators of assessments that rob disabled people of their benefits.

In this piece on the website of Disabled People against Cuts disability activist Dave King argues that the Paralympics are the precise opposite of the values of disability liberation. King writes

But with the Paralympics we have seen the addition into this cocktail of a supremely powerful and toxic ingredient, the opportunity for liberals to feel good about themselves for supporting the underdog and ‘progress in the fight against prejudice’. It is this thick coating of syrup which has confused even radical disability rights advocates, and is making it almost impossible for critics to speak out, except about the blatantly obvious outrage of Atos as sponsors. But the truth is that, despite all the hopeful talk about how the Paralympics are going to revolutionise people’s ideas about disability, the ideas and values at the core of the Paralympics are the precise opposite of the values of disability liberation. (I write this as a disabled person, one who has undergone one of Atos’ medical assessments and been found wanting, and who is suffering financially as a consequence.

In the Guardian Amelia Gentleman writes:

There has been a clear reluctance among officials this week to sour the happy atmosphere by talking about the Paralympics paradox – the difficulty of reconciling the amazing excitement around the Games, which has portrayed Britain globally as a place where positive attitudes to disability reign, and a bleaker reality that kicks in beyond Stratford.

The guide for journalists covering the event is explicit in its instructions that disability and any issues around it should not be the focus of reporting. It stipulates that reporters should concentrate on "performance, sporting ambition, training, competition and the emotions associated with winning and losing". Most athletes contacted to discuss the broader issues of disability for this piece declined to be interviewed. But many disabled visitors were quick to comment on the disconnection between their experiences within the park and their everyday lives at a time when in addition to cuts to services and benefits payments, charities such as Scope have been documenting worsening attitudes and official figures show that incidents of disability hate crime have soared to their highest ever levels.

Kalya Franklin, a disability campaigner whose Benefit Scrounging Scum blog has charted the rising problems faced by disabled people at a time of cuts to services and benefits, was amazed at the ease of her journey to Stratford from Birmingham, describing it as "the smoothest journey I've ever done on public transport". "People were there waiting to offer help – that's very unusual. There were much higher levels of staffing. That's not typical, nor is seeing lots of portable ramps around," she said.

She was delighted to be at the event, but like many, she was struggling with the Paralympics paradox.

"It's a utopian fantasy of where we need to move towards as a society," she said, pausing for a moment at Stratford station (interrupted on two occasions in the space of five minutes by transport staff asking if she needed assistance). "It's brilliant, because this has shown that with the right attitude, will and financing, it can be done."

The sporting event was for her, like any sporting occasion, a bit of escapism from daily problems, but she was anxious that attention to the pressing issues facing people with disabilities should not be deflected while the country basks in the international congratulations for having mounted a sellout Paralympic event. She pointed to a planned 20% cut in the disability living allowance (DLA), announced in the 2010 budget, in particular, arguing the that extra money, for employed and unemployed claimants to help with the extra cost of disability, had helped finance the extra cost of care and transport for many disabled visitors to the Games.

"What the public haven't realised about the Paralympians is how many of them are completely reliant on DLA. Although they are superfit athletes it doesn't mean they aren't also disabled and have mobility needs and care needs in their day-to-day lives," she said.

When progressive ideas are used to conceal market agendas

This piece from the UK Social Work and Action Network describes vividly how supposedly progressive reforms and ideas like social inclusion, social innovation and user centred services are deployed to conceal market based agendas and how, as a result, they end up destroying effective human and community services.

The piece also demonstrates that the use of market based approaches damages the most vulnerable and the most disadvantaged and undermines the capacity of human and communty services, thereby creating  the conditions for even more marketisation and privatization.

Sadly this situation also applies here in Western Australia.

I work for the NHS within Community Mental Health Services as part of a team whose remit was to enable service users to access educational and employment opportunities. We ran what I considered a unique and progressive service. We worked in a building not far from the city centre. We had an ICT suite where service users could gain qualifications and with our support create or update their CVs.
 

Within the centre we had a café where service users could gain work experience to gain relevant qualifications with currency in the catering industry. It was also a place where service users could come along for a hot meal, a coffee and a chat.

Our reception was also staffed by service users gaining work experience and relevant qualifications. We delivered in house courses in Building Confidence and Self Esteem. The team alongside ex service users also developed and delivered workshops to service users based on the Recovery Model.
 

We worked closely with local education providers delivering courses such as: Rights and Responsibilities at Work, Working in Retail, Working in an Office, Working in Customer Services and Working in the Public Sector. We also worked closely with Welfare Rights who regularly delivered workshops and advice sessions on benefits, debt and housing issues. We also had thriving Art and Drama projects which rebuilt the confidence of people who had endured a variety of mental health difficulties.

The whole project was person-centred, the idea being that it was a sort of stepping stone which gave them renewed self confidence and skills to move on with our advice, guidance and support into mainstream opportunities to enhance their life chances.

The whole project was person-centred, the idea being that it was a sort of stepping stone which gave them renewed self confidence and skills to move on with our advice, guidance and support into mainstream opportunities to enhance their life chances.

Then came the reorganization. The reorganization was pushed through using ideas and progressive language originally developed through the previous New Labour government’s Social Inclusion Unit. Day Centres we were told were bad, they simply institutionalized people with mental health difficulties. The whole new focus was to create services without buildings.

During my time working in Mental Health Services I have seen some pretty awful places. Day Centres which offered patronizing services that oozed with boredom with no real progression for service users. Our project was not like this.

The NHS Trust I work for was at the time of our reorganization looking at squeezed budgets and the cost incurred in leasing buildings. They do have a building programme for new inpatients units, but as yet not one brick has been laid and in some instances planning permission is not yet approved, yet they closed the only inpatient ward in the City.

Our project has changed beyond recognition. Some staff will be taking pay cuts in the reorganization which has had a massive impact on morale. We are now expected to record all service user contacts and outcomes from each appointment on 3 separate and different I.T. systems. But more importantly we can no longer deliver the range of opportunities to service users. Everything has to be accessed in the wider community. The café and service user reception has gone. We cannot make appointments to see service users in the building when we are offering advice, guidance and support. We now have to go out in twos to the service users home to ascertain from the service user what we can do for them to promote their social inclusion. The outcomes of the first contact with the service user are discussed at a team meeting and then a member of the team (an education worker, employment worker, volunteer coordinator, arts worker, sports worker) is allocated to the service user, depending on what kind of ambitions they have.

This is followed by a telephone call to the service user and arrangements are made to meet them somewhere in the community. The advice from the trainers from the Social Inclusion Unit was that a café may be a suitable venue for the first appointment. Yes a public place when the service user may be disclosing personal and often quite distressing information.

As a team we are now finding that many opportunities in the community for our service users: colleges, arts projects, leisure centres, etc are few and far between because of the current round of cuts .The local council has made cuts to the passport to leisure scheme which helped people on benefits access leisure centres etc. The local colleges have changed the criteria for fee wavering for people on benefits meaning that many of our service users are unable to access educational opportunities. As the cuts start to bite deeper there will be fewer and fewer opportunities for our services users in the wider community.

To make staff morale worse our building may be given to different teams within the Trust. We have recently heard that we may be supplied with laptops and work from our cars, dropping into Trust buildings to use docking stations to send data to the I.T. systems. We will probably end up as lone workers apart from one afternoon per week when we attend a caseload allocation meeting. It seems to me that our service has now been slimmed down to such an extent it is ripe and ready for privatization.

Welcome to modern, progressive mental health day services in 21st Century Britain.

Abbott led opposition to adopt UK style Big Society policies

 Writing in the Sydney Morning Herald Lenore Taylor traces the influence of the UK Conservative Government's Big Society agenda on the Coalition Opposition's social policy agenda for the next election.

Coalition frontbenchers have been instructed to slice away federal bureaucratic oversight of aged care, childcare, employment and family services in a bid to devolve government power and deliver budget savings through public service cuts.

The Coalition, which needs to find more than $30 billion in spending cuts, will pledge cuts to the bureaucracy, but says it will not hit frontline services. The policy is in line with the controversial ''Big Society'' philosophy of British thinker Phillip Blond, who was in Canberra this week for meetings with Coalition leader Tony Abbott and most of his frontbench.

Coalition families spokesman Kevin Andrews told The Saturday Age he had developed the model for stripping unnecessary federal oversight of federally funded services delivered by community and private organisations.

But Big Society rhetoric provides cover for severe austerity measures and a fundamental transformation of the delivery of publicly funded human and community services. 
 
In the UK Big Society rhetoric was used to justify sweeping cuts to public services, to community services and even to the community and voluntary organisations it was supposed to nurture.
 
It has also produced the largest ever privatisation of human and community services in UK history with large swathes of the human and community services industry now under the control of private corporations.

Despite promises by the UK Government that local devolution would primarily benefit small community based not- for- profit, it has been large corporations who have been the real winners.

Taylor notes, correctly, that:

But in Britain, the outsourcing program that was supposed to benefit little community groups ended up giving enormous contracts to large corporations, such as Serco, which runs Australia's detention centres, and in some parts of Britain now runs all the government-funded schools.

The implications of the Big Society agenda for Australia are well documented in a recent report by the Centre for Policy Development titled Big Society: How the UK Government is Dismantling the State and what it means for Australia. 

The Report shows among other things that the reality of Big Society Agenda is vastly different to its rhetoric. The impacts of the Big Society programs in the UK have included:

• An £81 billion cut in public spending over four years including an average 19 per cent budget cut to government agencies, 60 per cent cut to the budget for new public housing and £7 billion cut to the welfare budget.
• The UK’s public service is expected to shrink by up to 710,000 public servants over six years.
• Corporations and the largest charities have dominated the commissioning process: 35 of 40 Work Programme (employment agency) contracts were awarded to corporations.
• Cameron’s budgets have dealt a £5 billion funding cut to the UK’s community sector and funding cuts of £110 million to 2,000 UK charities
• The number of people employed in the UK’s community sector fell by 70,000.
• Local government budgets were cut by more than a quarter in 2010-11 resulting in staff cuts of 10-20 per cent and widespread cuts to programs.
• During 2010-11, public sector employment fell by 4.3 per cent. Private sector employment increased by 1.5 per cent.