The charity sector faces an "intelligence deficit" because of a rise in "no-advocacy NGOs" which just deliver services, an audience of charity leaders heard yesterday.

Maurice Wren (pictured), chief executive of the Refugee Council, said his organisation “lost its edge and sense of purpose”.

Wren said institutional charities - and the Refugee Council in particular - have been “shrinking” over recent years – with its own turnover declining from £20m to £4.5m over a five year period.

“It wasn’t just about losing funding. We lost our edge and we lost our sense of purpose. That was a narrative inside the organisation as well as outside the organisation, with funders asking, what exactly are you for these days? It’s not clear to us,” he said.

A simultaneous rise in "no-advocacy NGOs", and in new commercial providers taking over the role that charities once played, caused an “intelligence deficit”, Wren said.

“We need to be emboldened and redouble our advocacy work but we’ve got to pick our fights on our terms,” he said.

Wren also called for greater collaboration between the voluntary sector and the government.

“We’ve got to work smartly and that means not just cooperation but also the need to build relationships with the government. There’s a lot of confusion about it on their part – they can’t understand which angle they are getting at any one time. But they know they need us – both to deliver services and to provide critical intelligence.

“As advocates, our credibility, our legitimacy, our authority to speak are as important and perhaps more important than our independence.

“We’ve got to invert the voluntary sector pyramid to start understanding that the real work and the real intelligence is gathered on the front line,” he said.

Wren was speaking at the launch of Civil Exchange’s report into the independence of charities, called Independence in Question: the voluntary sector in 2016.