Kevin Curley has moved to distance himself from those in the Community Sector Coalition who have criticised the Big Society, saying that Navca members would take the best elements and resist the worst.

His comments follow a meeting held this week by the Coalition, of which Navca is a member, at which several attendees reportedly condemned the Big Society as a “sham” and a threat to community groups.

Speaking to Civil Society, Curley was critical of “disproportionate and unfair” local funding cuts, but praised Community First grants, funding models such as social impact bonds and community shares, new powers for community groups in the Localism Bill and the prospect of more pro bono help from the private sector.

He said: “Navca's members are pragmatists. They lead the local sector in every part of England.

“Local leadership means taking from new government programmes those resources which will help voluntary groups to thrive and resisting those government actions which will damage the local voluntary sector.

“Nobody is helped by dismissing Big Society because of local funding cuts.”

Curley added that Navca is and will remain a member of the Coalition, but that “does not mean we support everything the Coalition says and does”.