Charities struggling to survive
It has been revealed that more than a third of charities in the UK have no cash reserves to fall back upon and will need to introduce massive cost savings in the short term. Indeed there are fears that many charities in the UK will actually fold over next couple of years. However, plans by the UK government to "redistribute power" from the state to individuals could place more pressure upon the charities sector.
While the idea of the "Big Society" does have great merit there is some confusion as to where the funding for these particular plans will come from. At a time when the UK government is slashing budgets in every single governmental department it is difficult to see how they could increase spending on the voluntary and charitable sectors. So what can we expect for the future?
The UK government recently announced plans to use money "stuck" in dormant accounts to fund charitable organisations, social enterprises and voluntary groups although we have seen similar promises in the past which never materialised. Whether morally and legally the government has a right to transfer funds from "dormant accounts" to fund public operations is a totally different argument.
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