Navca chief executive Kevin Curley has issued a warning to Locality, prime contractor for the new community organisers programme, not to ignore or duplicate the work already being done by Navca members when it rolls out the £20m programme.
Locality was announced as the winner of the contract last week, ahead of a number of other bidders including Navca and Citizens UK, but Curley insisted there was no sour grapes behind his decision to voice his concerns.
“Of course we would have been the natural organisation to run the programme but now that the decision’s been made we are just concerned to make sure that it works," he said.
“There is no point in having all these new community organisers unless they talk to the 7,000 existing organisers who are already out there employed by CVSs, volunteer centres, rural community councils, BME forums, and other types of local community networks.”
Curley has written to Steve Wyler, chief executive-designate of Locality, to outline his concerns.
He said it would be “ludicrous and disruptive for 5,000 community organisers to be put to work in England’s urban estates and rural parishes without the full involvement of Navca’s members”.
Locality must ensure that any new services are planned and implemented in a coherent and co-ordinated manner with full consideration given to existing provision, if not to “annoy or seriously anger” the existing community activists who are already working hard in often difficult circumstances.
“We welcome the prospect of 5,000 more people to support neighbourhood action and groups, it’s a good thing, but we don’t want these new players walking into neighbourhoods without some understanding of what is already there. Because it would be a waste of money if they were to duplicate existing services.”
Curley said he did not think there would be an exodus of existing community organisers applying for jobs with the new programme, as he expected they would already be better paid.
Steve Wyler was unavailable for comment today.
Citizens UK laments losing bid
Separately, Citizens UK’s executive director Neil Jameson released a statement complaining that the decision to award the contract to Locality was made mainly on price.
He said: “We believed the contract was written for us…we are surprised not to have won the bid and believe this to be a missed opportunity by the coalition government.
“In the end the OCS scoring system indicated that our consortium (which included the Young Foundation and ReGenerate) lost primarily on price. We were more expensive than the two ‘preferred bidders’. Locality was one of the cheapest bidders so ultimately price determined the outcome, not experience or track record.”
