CSC Letter to Hazel Blears MP (April 2008)

The Rt Hon Hazel Blears MP
Secretary of State for Communities & Local Government
Department for Communities and Local Government
Eland House
Bressenden Place
London SW1E 5DU

April 11th 2008

Dear Hazel

RE: Letter of concern regarding recent CLG handling of community programmes / expression of strong support for government championing of community led action

The Community Sector Coalition (CSC) has been very heartened by your strong championing of community-led action and community empowerment.  We share your passion and commitment to supporting local people to determine their local priorities in order to achieve positive outcomes for all of society. 

We recognise the scale of the challenge we all face in delivering change in culture, policy and practice at all levels across all sectors and we are deeply committed to realising this vision and to working with you to achieve it. 

However we are increasingly concerned by what we see as a lack of clarity and mixed messages emanating from your Department over recent months which we feel compelled to bring to your attention.

The Community Sector Coalition has been active since 1994 and currently has over 20 national members who meet regularly to coordinate actions and campaign around policy issues. 

It is widely understood to be the most authoritative voice in the community sector with a wider membership which runs to many thousands of grass roots community organisations, and it is precisely these people who will deliver the improved outcomes in local areas.

We are deeply disappointed and frustrated by your decision not to proceed with the Strategic Partners programme.  The way that the process has been handled has been incredibly unprofessional and inefficient; wasting precious time on both sides. 

It has also sent what we perceive as a very worrying message to the Sector about the regard given to voluntary and community groups and undermines the stated commitment to work constructively and strategically in partnership with us. 

We believe this is just one example of a much broader concern that we have with your Department’s current direction.  To this end, we are at pains to stress that our letter goes beyond the decision not to pursue the Strategic Partners programme, which by itself has generated a great deal of disquiet, to a more widespread concern over a range of policy and programmes including:

•    Working Neighbourhoods Fund (WNF) and the related loss of Neighbourhood Renewal Fund (NRF) - the narrow focus on worklessness risks undermining the broader cross cutting nature of empowerment. 

We would note that the worklessness theme has a useful purchase for Black & Minority Ethnic (BME) communities and in this regard, it is welcomed, however the setting of such a focus, in this case, by the centre appears to us to be inconsistent with devolution.  We would, however, advocate a retaining of the NR focus on the grounds of both its past success and also the wider purchase that it is able to engender across a range of themes. 

•    Unlocking the Talent document – our concern arises from an imbalance of content weighted heavily towards WNF with far less support presented for major topics such as accountability and active citizenship.  All of which raises concerns for us about the future content of the Empowerment White Paper.

•    Community Anchor programme has experienced considerable delay and there is a need to move urgently to ensure the programme contributes to the broader local government performance framework, for example around the ‘duty to involve’.  Likewise the idea of running the community anchors programme through local authorities suggests a lack of will to devolve downwards to communities themselves.

•    Single Group Funding guidance – evidence is emerging that this is already being used to remove funding from groups who are already marginalised in decision making.  We need strong leadership from CLG to ensure empowerment is inclusive. 

•    Third Sector Partnership Board – we have a concern about the lack of wider community sector and strategic partners represented on this partnership and would hope to see membership broadened out.

•    Community Empowerment Networks – the decision to allow local partnerships, and in effect local councils to in most cases, cut back or dispense entirely with CENs raises an acute concern that a whole layer of local infrastructure will be lost and require reinventing

•    Take Part, which was inherited from the Home Office, appears to have suffered from the reorientation in CLG, which has had the effect of diminishing the work contributed by community partners to date

•    Strategic Partners fund – as has already been stated, the vision and intent of this programme is vital in ensuring quality relationships and strategic input from our sector and the manner in which it has been handled has run counter to the principles enshrined in the Compact.

We would also like to point out that some members of the Community Sector Coalition including the Federation of City Farms and Community Gardens (FCFCG) have been in receipt of funding from CLG which has come to an end on 31st March 2008. 

It would be helpful if interim arrangements could be put in place as soon as possible to enable such existing partners to plan with confidence.  It would be especially unfortunate if they were to become unintentional casualties of the recent changes and delays.  

The Empowerment White Paper is an opportunity to strengthen and further embed empowerment and the stakes are high – we need to get it right.  We very much support a number of recent empowerment initiatives, in particular around community petitions and participatory budgeting / community kitties where we feel CSC members have particular expertise which we are keen to share. 

We would like to restate our firm desire to work more closely with CLG to achieve common purpose around your vision and goals alongside those of our members.  To this end we hope our correspondence will be experienced as being constructive rather than as moaning.  With this in mind we are keen to meet up in the very near future with you to continue to build an excellent working partnership. 

Yours sincerely


Matthew Scott
(CSC Director writing on behalf of the CSC)

Sylvia Brown, Action with Communities in Rural England (ACRE)              
Steve Johnson, Advice UK                                   
Ben Hughes, bassac
Neil McInroy, Centre for Local Economic Studies                         
Amanda Greenwood, Community Development Exchange (CDX)  
David Tyler, Community Matters                                   
Steve Wyler, Development Trust Association (DTA)                        
Bernard Godding, Educational Centres Association (ECA)                        
Doreen Finneron, Faith Based Regeneration Network (FbRN)               
Janice Marks, Federation for Community Development Learning (FCDL)
Jeremy Iles, Federation of City Farms and Community Gardens (FCFCG)
Kevin Curley, National Association for Voluntary and Community Action (NAVCA)          
Phil Morgan, Tenant Participation Advisory Service (TPAS)                 
Toby Blume, Urban Forum