1.0 Introduction
1.1 The Social Economy Agency (SEA) welcomes the opportunity to respond the
Task Force report Pathways for change . Following its publication, the SEA
facilitated a consultation process among members of the Social Economy
Network (SEN) to discuss and debate the main themes coming from the
report. Members welcomed the opportunity to participate and were keen to
explore new ways of working between the sector and government in the
coming years. The SEA also encouraged social economy organisations to
make their own views known to the Task Force.
2.0 Specific Comments
The following comments will address the headings given in the Task Force
report.
2.1 How best should government departments & other public agencies
support community development work?
2.1.1 The proposed development of a programme to support community
development is to be welcomed and supported, however many community
development organisations would not be comfortable with this as their main
source of income. It needs to have a proper, clearly defined framework that
not only supports the model of community development, but also allows for
funding to be more long-term and stable.
2.2 How could we facilitate voluntary & community organisations to
participate more in the delivery of better public services?
2.2.1 Social economy organisations welcome an increased role in the delivery of
public services as this can help to deliver these services in a more responsive
and flexible way to meet public needs, however it should not diminish the
responsibility of government to provide such public services.
2.2.2 The SEN is currently working on a Northern Ireland supplement to the DTI
Public Procurement, a Toolkit for Social Enterprises paper. The aim of this
being that in the short-term it would raise the profile of procurement
opportunities. The supplement will incorporate a paper and case studies
specific to social economy enterprises (SEE s) in Northern Ireland.
2.2.3 It is important in this development that all government departments are made
more aware of the potential role of SEE s in relation to service provision and
also where appropriate, social objectives need to be written explicitly into any
contract specifications so that they don t loose their value in this process.
Crucially, inconsistencies across departments, for example, covering core and
administrative costs, equitable wages levels, and the ability to generate
reserves, all need to be addressed.
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2.2.4 Finally in the development of this theme the government should be
encouraged to highlight champions from the voluntary & community sector
and the social economy sector in their participation in delivery public services,
and this should be reported annually to the Social Economy Forum on their
achievements.
2.3 How can government ensure that the advocacy & campaigning work &
policy development role of the voluntary & community sector continues?
2.3.1 The advocacy and campaigning role of the sector is very important and a
feature of the sector that needs to be valued and properly resourced. The
government should look at the possibility of providing core funding to support
this work and ensuring a more long term commitment to this area. There
should also be a move away from the policy of re-imbursing costs incurred to
allowing for competitive bids for funding over a 3-5 year period.
2.3.2 Another feature that the government should be addressing should be to
improve the methods of consultation between government and the sector so
that sector members feel more adequately involved into policy making. Whilst
the process of public consultation is more advanced it can be difficult for
many organisations that have a limited research/policy capacity within their
work to get involved. There needs to be a more direct and efficient mechanism
that allows these small groups to be involved in this important area.
2.4 How can mechanisms for the delivery of funding to the voluntary and
community sector be improved?
2.4.1 There is a level of concern among the sector towards the local delivery of
funding, with a view that an inconsistency of approach exists across district
councils and Local Strategy Partnership s (LSP s). The SEA would agree with
the view out forward from NICVA in their response to the Task Force paper,
in that Intermediary Funding Bodies (IFB s), as developed under the two
Peace programmes, offer a much better route forward, but with the caution
that geographical and rural proofing be incorporated into IFB structures. The
SEA also supports NICVA s call for an innovation and social capital fund that
would fund new and innovative, sometimes short-term, work to meet newly
identified needs.
2.4.2 The NI Government also needs to recognise the role that community
development finance can play in the voluntary and community sector, acting
as a bridge between grant funding and private sector borrowing. Examples of
this type of funding include mortgages to purchase property, short-term
working capital loans to bridge delays between receiving letters of offer and
grants, quasi-equity investments managed on behalf of government agencies
and loans or leasing arrangements for machinery and equipment.
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2.5 How could joint working & collaboration between voluntary &
community organisations be encouraged & supported to optimise the use
of resources?
2.5.1 Considerable collaborative work is already going on within the sector, and any
moves within this measure should aim to support the sector financially and
through training. This would result in greater collaboration which will help to
improve service provision and to provide for a better use of sector resources,
not simply to reduce the number of sector organisations. The SEA also would
support the view of NICVA that there must continue to be room for new
voluntary and community organisations that address newly identified needs.
2.6 How could governance in the voluntary & community sector be
strengthened by drawing upon experience from elsewhere?
2.6.1 As organisations are operating in an environment that is becoming even more
competitive, where organisations need to be more professional and responsive
to the needs of their sector, the skills that an organisation and their
management committees require becomes a more prevailing issue, as many
lack skills/expertise/experience in specific areas of management.
2.6.2 A greater emphasis needs to be placed on ensuring that people employed
within the sector and indeed the voluntary management members of an
organisation are not put off from their involvement in the sector due to the
demands now placed on voluntary and community sector organisations.
2.6.3 The sector needs to uphold the volunteering ethos which makes it so strong
and the SEA would support the call for more financial support to be given to
the sector, so that the capacity of such organisations to govern themselves and
to address key governance issues is built upon and that they have the
opportunity to acquire the necessary skills and resources to manage the work
they undertake and which will not then act as a barrier to entering this
important type of work.
2.7 How could funders to the voluntary & community sector ensure that
public funding is administered more efficiently & effectively?
2.7.1 The SEA welcomes the move by the Task Force to bring about more
proportionate accounting systems for the sector. The Agency also agrees with
NICVA s proposals on the following issues: that there needs to be more
standardised application forms across government departments; in cases where
a project has more than one funder, a lead funder is agreed and a single audit
and monitoring process is undertaken; payments should be made in advance
rather than arrears. SEA also agrees that there needs to be an emphasis on
ensuring robust systems of accounting within organisations which can be spot
checked as necessary, but do not require every receipt to be verified.
2.7.2 It is important that in any assessment model that social capital indicators are
taken into account thus ensuring that an organisations objectives are being met
and that assessment is not in pure economic terms, as this helps an
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organisation to evaluate its work and to develop all areas of its work, not
simply those that are of economic success/importance as this will limit
learning and organisational development as a whole.
2.7.3 There also needs to be a move away from pure reimbursement of cost, where
there is no incentive to minimise costs and no capacity to build up financial
reserves.
2.7.4 A debate on guidelines on public sector capital investment in buildings and
equipment- when is this necessary, when part-investment helps to lever in
other investment, when it is squeezing out other funding- should be
conducted among the sector.
2.8 How could innovation and entrepreneurial thinking be encouraged across
the voluntary & community sector?
2.8.1 The SEA supports NICVA s call for a social innovation fund as this would
finance groups to identify and work on new issues and help to build on them
over a number of years.
2.8.2 Government should also back off from over-intervening in the management of
voluntary and community organisations. For example, Housing Associations
can make a profit on contracts if they can build their projects at a lower cost
than government estimates. On the other hand, they can lose money if they
run them inefficiently. This encourages innovation and entrepreneurial
thinking.
2.9 Should Government Ministers be actively involved in the Joint Forum
and how should the Joint Forum be developed to improve relations
between government and the voluntary & community sector & other
partners?
2.9.1 The SEA supports the Joint Forum and believes it should be developed as it
could improve relations between government and the community and
voluntary sector, and that the Minister should be actively involved in the
Forum.
2.9.2 The involvement of government ministers would also act as a sign of their
level of commitment. Given the disparity in size, funds and power between
government and the sector, this level of partnership can bring about more clout
for the sector as a whole.
2.10 Have we too many partnership structures and how could they work
better?
2.10.1 The SEA endorses NICVA s call for a mapping exercise to be undertaken of
partnerships in Northern Ireland, thereby helping to identify what partnerships
currently exist, what partnerships are beneficial for different organisations and
also to look at roles and responsibilities surrounding this.
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2.11 Were do you think there are gaps or overlaps in the provision of support
services to the voluntary & community sector and how could joint
working and collaboration be encouraged?
2.11.1 The SEA recommends that the mapping exercise of partnerships should also
include support organisations so that overlap and gaps in infrastructure might
be identified.
2.12 How should support services be resourced and should performance
standards for a consistent provision of support services be introduced?
2.12.1 The SEA endorses NICVA s proposal for the provision of core long-term
funding for an agreed standard of infrastructure provision based on
benchmarks and standards for services.
2.13 Does the social investment approach to government funding of the
voluntary and community sector fit with your particular circumstances
and, if so, what should be the short-term priorities for change to lead
towards such an approach?
2.13.1 The SEA feels that there needs to be more clarity about what exactly the social
investment model will involve. Whilst the idea is very interesting and exciting
it is important to know what the practicalities of such an approach would be
for the groups on the ground.
2.13.2 The SEA would urge caution on linking payments to outcomes rather than
outputs. Once an organisation is successful in achieving funding for a project
the funder must/should accept the programme logic that their outputs may
reasonably lead to the intended outcomes.
2.13.3 There also needs to be open and transparent funding arrangements to achieve
government objectives, so that the process is open to all new entrants. There
also is a need for agreement on an evaluation framework when a 3-5 year
funding contract is signed and for a single reporting structure to all funders.
2.13.4 The SEA also calls for the slow, well signalled implementation of social
capital indicators across the sector and the need for joined up thinking between
DSD on funding the voluntary and community sector and DETI on funding the
social economy.
3.0 Conclusion
3.1 The SEA has welcomed the opportunity to take part in this process and to
contribute to the ideas on how the future resourcing of the voluntary and
community sector should be managed.
3.2 There needs to be a proper framework for long-term and stable funding of the
sector.
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3.3 There should an increased role in the delivery of public services by voluntary
and community organisations as this can help to deliver these services in a
more responsive and flexible way to meet public needs.
3.4 The government should look at the possibility of providing core funding to
support the sectors advocacy and campaigning work
3.5 The government should improve its methods of consultation between
government and the sector so that sector members feel more adequately
involved into policy making.
3.6 There should be an innovation fund.
3.7 The NI Government needs to recognise the role that community development
finance can play in the voluntary and community sector.
3.8 There needs to be more standardised application forms across government
departments.
3.9 There needs to be an emphasis on ensuring robust systems of accounting
within organisations and payments should be made in advance rather than
arrears.
3.10 There needs to be a move away from pure reimbursement of cost, where there
is no incentive to minimise costs and no capacity to build up financial
reserves.
3.11 It is important that in any assessment model that social capital indicators are
taken into account.
3.12 Government should undertake a mapping exercise of partnerships in Northern
Ireland.
3.13 There needs to be more clarity about what exactly the social investment model
will involve.
3.14 There is a need for joined up thinking between DSD on funding the voluntary
and community sector and DETI on funding the social economy.
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