Charities are too regularly excluded from early discussions to formulate government policy, a former civil society minister has said.
Stuart Andrew, now a backbench Conservative MP, spoke at the party’s conference in Birmingham on Monday to argue that charities should be prominent voices from the outset.
Andrew, charities minister under Rishi Sunak from 2022 to 2024, said: “Having a strong civil society is incredibly important for the fabric of our country.
“Where I think it goes wrong is that too often […] it feels to me that charities are invited around the table by government when it suits the government and not at early stages.
“It would be better for government as well to have those civil society organisations around the table when we’re talking about the development of policy that may affect them."
Sam Ward, deputy chief executive at the Royal Voluntary Service (RVS), reinforced this view and stated that charities should be treated as a “true partner” to government.
“Let’s be around the table from zero and not when you’ve already decided what to do,” she said.
Ward added that charities of all sizes were suffering from procurement exercises and urged the government to trust the expertise of voluntary organisations.
“You’re on this one-year hamster wheel of funding,” she said. “If you’re lucky, it’s three and that’s the maximum you will ever get.
“Let’s stop going down this route of a very high proportion of procurement of cost-value and actually go: ‘We are the experts, leave it with the experts.’”
The current Labour-led government produced the Civil Society Covenant last year, with a view to “resetting” the sector’s relationship with government, including a focus on partnership and collaboration.
Nick Cook, head of public affairs at the Postcode Lottery, praised the covenant and the “independent minds” on the council set up to oversee its implementation.
“If you look at the quality and the nature of the individuals that the government has recruited for the civil society council, which is really intended to be the deliverer of tangible change, the early signs are pretty good,” Cook said.
Better fundraising conditions needed
Andrew, among others on the panel, urged for better fundraising conditions in the charity sector.
When asked by event chair Ryan Shorthouse, Bright Blue think tank CEO, whether civil society needs to think more creatively about funding, Andrew said: “Yes is the honest answer.
“It’s incredibly hard when times are tough and you’ve got this money that’s just sitting there because it’s ring-fenced for a certain project.
“I think that’s a real challenge to the wider sector.”
Andrew added that the UK was “nowhere near as good” as countries such as the United States in incentivising philanthropy.
Cook praised the prior Conservative administration’s attempt to bring a culture of philanthropy to Britain, but said current economic conditions have made this difficult.
“Some of these things are going to be quite unpopular on the doorstep because you have to look at further incentivising the tax system for high-net-worth individuals,” he said.
“Good luck selling that on the doorsteps during a cost-of-living crisis.”
