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Voluntary Action Westminster has accused Westminster City Council of breaching the Compact code of practice for funding and consulting with third sector organisations.

Voluntary Action Westminster (VAW) said it had reported Westminster City Council to the Compact Advocacy Unit, which is responsible for investigating potential breaches of the voluntary Compact agreement, after the council reduced the organisation’s core grant funding for 2010/11 by 50 per cent “without adequate consultation or notice”.

Bernard Collier, Chief Executive of VAW, said that Westminster had also breached the Compact by making 10 per cent cuts across the whole of its work with the third sector without informing the organisations concerned “until it was too late”, and by failing to carry out an equalities impact assessment of the cuts.

Mr Collier said he raised the claims in a meeting with the council and the Compact Advocacy Unit last week. He said the unit is writing to the council to explain how it believes its actions have breached the Compact.

Councillor Paul Dimoldenberg, Leader of the Labour Group, said:

“Voluntary organizations carry out a massive amount of front-line service delivery and these latest cuts will hit local people hard. VAW does a valuable job in advising, encouraging and organizing Westminster’s army of volunteers and these latest Conservative cuts will damage community life in Westminster”

Labour Councillors have pledged to restore almost £600,000 of cuts to voluntary sector groups by axing Council waste. Labour say that they will restore grants to voluntary groups by cutting the following waste;

• Staff bonuses for the highest paid senior Council officers – £360,000
• Council hospitality, including food and wine for Councillors – £210,000
• Civic Dinner – £23,000

Nearly 80 voluntary projects have been refused funding, despite the fact that many of them are recognised by the Council as delivering important services. Some of the projects that have been refused funding are:

• St John’s Wood Adventure Playground: £19,300
• Youth Project for Lillington and Longmore Gardens: £12,000
• Queens Park Bangladesh Society: £20,000
• Friends of St Anne’s, Soho: £30,000
• Cardinal Hume Centre in Victoria: £28,000

Speaking at the Council’s Budget meeting on 3^rd March, Councillor Paul Dimoldenberg, Leader of the Labour Group, said:

“Next year’s voluntary sector budget has been slashed by over half a million pounds despite local voluntary groups playing a vital role in delivering services to the community, particularly to those who are vulnerable. We will cut of hundreds of thousands of pounds of Council waste so these groups can get the finance they need to continue the great job they do for local people.”

Do you think that the Council should ditch funding a children’s adventure playground and instead have a civic dinner at the Northumberland? WE DON’T!

Join us as we protest against this waste of public money outside the Northumberland in central London on the 9th March – at 6pm.

Email: vincenzo.rampulla@gmail.com for more details