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Spending cuts: have you had the snip yet?1

Finance | Robert Ashton | 20 Apr 2011

New blogger Robert Ashton likens statutory funding cuts to a financial vasectomy and suggests enterprise is the answer.

I’ve recently been helping a disability charity come to terms with having their funding lifeline cut. I likened it to a financial vasectomy; they had enough left to go through the motions but can no longer deliver any tangible results.

A deeper cut, financial castration, would in some ways have been kinder, because at least then they’d no longer be frisky and frustrated. They’re currently left like a vasectomised ram, surrounded by sheep and only rewarded when lambs arrive. "It’s not fair," they bleat, "as services are mothballed and staff redeployed or made redundant."

The man with the knife has also been making cuts at home. You now need to be at death's door, completely incapable of anything before Adult Social Services will lift a finger. He’s a real bruiser, having knackered the charity then created a situation where more people will turn to them for comfort and support. At least they can still offer advice and a cuddle, even if lasting solutions can no longer be delivered.

When you cross-examine the man with the knife, what he tells you should make everyone’s blood run cold. His decision to cut funding was not taken lightly; after all he’s a local politician.

He relied upon others to brief him and cast his own mind back to personal involvement in the voluntary sector some years ago. "We cut your money because you’ve said you want to be a social enterprise," he said, "so we’re giving you some real encouragement to move faster in that direction." It’s like withdrawing food aid from a famine zone to stimulate agricultural production.

Faced with this kind of logic, being given the snip is something every charity risks. The answer, of course is social enterprise. Not, you understand, some tokenistic café, serving crap coffee and stale buns to people unable to afford better, but real social enterprise achieved with others who know what business is all about.

Big Society is encouraging everyone to build new communities and that means collaboration. If you’re firing business blanks, you need help from someone with the wherewithal to fill the gap. Collaboration is the key so raise your sights, find new partners and make social enterprises that will grow to become self-sufficient.

Who's Who: Robert Ashton