Voluntary sector leaders are calling on Welsh Government officials to address sector concerns following months of political instability.
The Third Sector Partnership Council (TSPC) is a key mechanism for voluntary organisations to talk to, and hear from, Welsh Government. Together, TSPC members represent all areas of work for the voluntary sector in Wales.
The TSPC has today written to the First Minister and her new cabinet with an urgent appeal to reopen dialogues with the voluntary sector and establish a coordinated approach to addressing sector concerns across different departments.
OPEN LETTER FROM THE THIRD SECTOR PARTNERSHIP COUNCIL (TSPC)
TSPC congratulates the new First Minister and her cabinet on their recent appointments. We welcome the First Minister’s stated commitment to stability and continuity.
The voluntary sector is faced with an increasingly complex set of challenges. The cost of living crisis, the climate emergency, and division within our communities are issues too big for either the public or voluntary sector to tackle alone. We must work together to safeguard the most vulnerable in Welsh society and build a sustainable future by addressing critical causal factors, such as poverty and discrimination.
State of the Welsh voluntary sector
Voluntary organisations in Wales are dealing with record high service demand, there are substantial challenges with staff and volunteer recruitment and retention, funding from all sources is dwindling, and inflation is squeezing the existing budgets.
In January, Charities Aid Foundation reported 40% of charities in England and Wales are using reserves to meet operational costs. 50% of surveyed organisations were at full capacity and could not take any new clients. Last October, a small-scale survey of the sector in Wales showed 93% of respondents were subsidising the delivery of public contract services. In November, 90% of WCVA survey respondents reported volunteer recruitment issues, and 82% shared concerns about volunteer retention. Survey findings published in a May 2024 Building Communities Trust report point to 50% of Welsh community organisations experiencing increased service demand, whilst their income has decreased. Over half of the surveyed organisations stated they have set up new services, many in response to declining capacity in the public sector.
Welsh Government’s 2024/25 budget brought more bad news with cuts in the funding for virtually all voluntary sector activities. Despite strong evidence in favour of multi-year funding and existing Welsh Government guidance, multi-year grants for the sector are still rare. Organisations delivering a variety of annually renewed contracts are therefore ill-prepared to respond to sudden economic shocks. The simultaneous cuts in preventative spending across multiple portfolios left many organisations in a very vulnerable financial position. While services can be scaled back, to the detriment of the communities they support, rising overhead costs are significantly more difficult address in this financial environment. This uncertainty, coupled with the impact of inflation, puts substantial pressure on the sector’s workforce and staff are leaving in pursuit of more competitive pay and job security. Organisations are dealing with major viability challenges and this is putting all of their activities at risk. Beyond the immediate financial impacts, the sector was alarmed by the shift of policy direction which we find incompatible with the goals of the Well-being of Future Generations Act.
Policy and regulation should also be evaluated carefully to prevent unintended and disproportionate impact on voluntary organisations. Proposals, such as the ones to bring a wider variety of day care provision into regulation, or licence and levy all overnight visitor accommodation, would have a significant impact on parts of the sector. Sports, arts, youth, and religious organisations, among others, would be faced with difficult decisions as they are struggling to address expanding administrative and financial pressures. The vast majority of Wales’ smallest voluntary organisations are entirely volunteer ran and many struggle to recruit and retain volunteers. Introducing or increasing fees for service users is not an option for most in our sector.
Several years of challenging socio-economic circumstances have persistently pushed voluntary organisations across Wales to deliver more for less. This is no longer a possibility for most. An increasing number of organisations are forced to shrink their services and turn people away. Others are facing existential threat and we are seeing a concerning number of organisations, big and small, close their doors. Without a concerted effort from public officials at all levels of government, much of the voluntary sector will not be able to weather this storm. The impact, especially on the most vulnerable in Welsh society, would be devastating.
Our asks
In the spirit of the Third Sector Scheme and the Well-being of Future Generations Act:
- TSPC is calling on the First Minister to urgently discuss the priorities and concerns of the voluntary sector at a cabinet meeting
Our overarching priorities for the new cabinet are to:
- Engage in early and continuous dialogue with the voluntary sector, as equal partners in achieving wellbeing for all
- Protect and enable the voluntary sector in the 2025/26 Welsh Government budget through cross-departmental coordination, careful consideration of the value of preventative spending, and the social and environmental impact of insufficient investment
- Ensure that all public funders abide by the Code of Practice for Funding the Third Sector, with an emphasis on multi-year funding arrangements
- Carefully consider the impact new policies and regulations would have on the voluntary sector; taper requirements and implement exemptions where possible
- Embed the voluntary sector and volunteering within the policy and delivery discourse in your department, playing your part in building a new approach to volunteering in Wales
- Work together to progress Welsh Government’s Communities Policy in close collaboration with community-based organisations and the wider voluntary sector
TSPC members emphasise the utmost importance of an all-cabinet discussion and implementation of a co-ordinated approach across all portfolios. The voluntary sector will engage with individual cabinet members to discuss additional, portfolio-specific issues.
ABOUT TSPC
The TSPC network is made up of representatives of voluntary sector networks working across 25 areas of sector activity.
The main purpose of the TSPC is to make sure that the principles set out in the Third Sector Scheme are put into practice. It also provides an opportunity for the sector to raise issues of interest or concern.