Charities must collaborate or face failure in the current economic climate was the key message to emerge from an in-depth discussion chaired by Jon Snow of Channel 4 News.
Sporting a trademark ridiculous tie, Snow recounted his personal experiences of running homeless shelters in London to illustrate just how tough it is for small charities to survive at the moment.
His sentiments were echoed by the rest of the panel, who agreed that the sector is undergoing a seismic shift, from the behemoths like RNIB down to small local organisations.
Some were worried about public spending cuts resulting in fewer commissions from local government, but all are suffering from a sharp decline in personal donations. How they deal with these changing circumstances will be key to getting through the next couple of years.
Andrew Hind of the Charity Commission and Baroness Pitkeathley, who chairs the government's advisory body on the third sector, were keen to advise the representatives of various charities in attendance that support was available from the government, but that few charities had taken it up so far.
This echoed what third sector minister Angela Smith had said the day before, so it was hardly news. What was news was the fact that over 90 per cent of charities have not considered collaborative working or a merger, according to Andrew Hind. This failure to modernise, he argued, would be their downfall.
Some charities have modernised though, with many smaller charities merging or being subsumed into larger national organisations. Lesley-Anne Alexander explained how the RNIB's almost federal structure allowed it a bigger cushion against the impact of the recession, with many local services being carried out by local charities rather than the RNIB itself.
But by far the most well-received advice of the session came from Snow, who explained how many private sector organisations are willing and able to allow their staff to provide pro bono services to charities as their own workload falls off. Picking up on the earlier point that many charities struggle to access money available to them from the government, he suggested that professional help from the private sector may be the key to sharpening up the operations of many charities.
Unsurprisingly, he was promptly swamped by the crowd as the meeting closed, with attendees keen for further pearls of wisdom.
Fringe details
Subject: Crunch time for charities - collaborate, compete, collide?
Tuesday 29th, 1300-1400
Glyndbourne Room, Holiday Inn
Host - Charity Commission
Chair - Jon Snow
Panel - Baroness Pitkeathley (Chair, Third Sector Advisory Body), Kevin Curley (Chief Exec, NAVCA), Lesley-Anne Alexander (Chief Exec RNIB and Chair, ACEVO), Andrew Hind (Chief Exec, Charity Commission)
