News
Budget Agreed 24 February
At the full Council meeting on 24 February a budget was agreed. The cut to the VCS was reduced from £300k to £250k allowing £50k to be used as a contingency for those organisations which might otherwise have slipped through the net. In addition £10k was allocated to each of the three Areas to enable individuals to apply to the Council for funding.
Budget goes to the wire
At the meeting on February 10 2010 the full Council was unable to agree a budget for next year. The members rejected the proposals presented. Now all depends on the meeting of February 24 where it is hoped the minority administration can make a deal with one of the other opposition Parties. The current proposals cut £300,000 from the voluntary & community sector. This means that some sub-sectors face reductions of 30%.
Funding Cuts reduced then reversed by Executive 29 January 2010
The County Council's Executive announced that they planned to half the proposed cut to the VCS thereby making it nearer 10% rather than the massive 19% orginally planned. But within minutes this decision was reversed, an apology given for raising our hopes as well as a confirmation that the original cut of £300k stands.
Survey Monkey Results December 2009
The VCS Consortium conducted a survey of over 350 voluntary and community organisations in Northumberland to establish the likely impact of the planned Council cuts. Over 170 responded and the findings make depressing reading. The survey also invited respondents to indicate where they obtained support and what the impact would be to them if it was withdawn. Click here for a summary of the results.
Funding Cuts announced - 19 November 2009
At the meetings to discuss the VCS review on November 19th and 20th, Kirsten Francis, who heads up the Council's Locality Team, made the shock announcement that £300,000 would be cut from the sector's budget in 2010-11. Please follow link to read the Review Paper and the VCS funding proposal. It relates to grant and Community Chest funding - currently amounting to £1.57million. So £300k off that would mean a reduction of over 19%. The overall saving required by the council ranges from 7%-10% depending on whether central government agrees to "capitalise" nearly £10 million of the cuts. So this targets the sector disproportionately and would have huge consequences to the sector and the people served by it. Watch this space for more details and what we can do to oppose it. Actions so far include: communication with: Response to the NCC's proposed spending reduction; Area Committees; response to Executive, Response to VCS spending plans
The Perfect Ten
Find out about the plans for the start of a revamp of Northumberland's sustainable community strategy. This is the bible of the county's partnerships priorities so it is important that we get it right. Information about a series of meetings over the next few months, and a description of the process, is available towards the end of the latest edition of People & Places. Remember it's not the County Council's strategy, it is all of our's. Last month's edition of People & Places can also be downloaded.
LAA News
Local Area Agreements are agreements between local areas and central government. They set out the targets which the areas hope to achieve with the help of the public money they receive. The partnerships in Northumberland have committed to a new LAA for the period 2008-11.
The LAA is sometimes described as the delivery arm of the Community Strategy. Both the strategy and the current LAA, together with much more information, can be downloaded from www.nsp.org.uk/page.asp?id=871
The reason why the LAA impacts on the VCS is because the sector makes such an important contribution to the lives of us all. No sensible package of policies can be formulated without taking that into account; no indicators of progress selected and no targets set without seeking the views of the sector.
Regional Meta Plan
The Regional Infrastructure Development Group (RIDG) is made up of representatives from the five VCS consortia in the north east region - Northumberland, Tyne & Wear , Durham, and Tees Valley and those VCS organisations providing support services throughout the region (BECON, FINE etc) known as the Regional Consortium (RIC). In the summer of 2008 it developed a Meta Plan which brought the common elements of all 5 strategies and business plans together. This is up for review in early 2010. 
meta plan final web.pdf 26.10.2008
