Kids Club - Camilla Batmanghelijdjh

Oops meant to post the link:

www.buzzfeed.com/alanwhite/kids-company-founder-accused-of-producing-verbal-ectoplasm-i#.db06259yb

Love the "verbal ectoplasm".

This write up of the hearing yesterday has some real "laugh out loud" moments, it's all pretty bonkers. E.g.:

"On occasion the pair fell into verbal traps of their own creation. One exchange was widely shared on social media:

Batmanghelidjh: 'On what basis do you describe this as a failing charity?'
Jenkin: “Because it’s gone bust.' "

Funny, I "bumped into" Alan Yentob in Bloomsbury the other day, just him and me and an empty road, he looked like he'd rather not be recognised (it was clear that I had clocked who he was).

There doesnt seem to me to be much of a doubt, that the charity should not have ended in that way.
There are procedures in place that should have stopped that happening.

The Charity Commission has probably got some explaining to do as well.
I thought they had legal and financial teeth, but now I am not so sure.

The government is cutting 40% more of l.a. funding

That isnt a definite is it? And it is up to 40% in some financial areas? Or have I got that wrong.

If the charity was running into financial difficulties which they would have foreseen with budget monitoring, why did it not have a 'planned exit'?

I am on the Board of a small charity (which operates hand-to-mouth as there is no funding) and a planned exit strategy is always on the table (using our reserves).

This is a very interesting interview with her.

www.theguardian.com/society/2015/aug/14/camila-batmanghelidjh-interview-im-actually-quite-rigorous

Apparently she has now opened a food bank and fifty of the staff are going to work with her.
What I find very interesting is that Deloitte's have let her set up her office space in their office block. Philanthropy in the City.

The Government has contributed, I believe, £30 million to Kids' Company over the years and the number of children helped has, allegedly, been depressingly few. That £30 million could have been better directed into local authorities.

I don't believe there is even a remote possibility that the current government will fund local authorities so clients left high and dry by Kid's Company's closure can be supported. The government is cutting 40% more of l.a. funding. Services for people / children with mental health/addiction/social/housing/child care neglect etc etc etc - all being slashed. Sure Start centres closing or reducing what they offer to vulnerable families, it's so depressing and in the longer term will cost us a lot financially and socially.

I have found this tread very interesting. Thank you Absentgrandma for pointing out that Harriet Sergeant is writing about Kids Company. I have read two of her books and have respect for her views, especially as I had already heard a few years ago, that some workers at Kid’s Company were not happy with how it was run and were not encouraged to communicate their concerns to management.

I believe that small local charities are desirable. That central government should contribute funds to local authorities tagged to the support of sections of society with specific social problems. I think this funding was known as SSA can’t remember quite what it stood for ?Spending Assessment. The millions that Kids Company received over the years will have been top sliced from the central pot meaning that there was less money for local authorities to spend. There are many less ‘popular’ causes loosing their funding at present and I hope government will turn their attention to these and that they will fund Local Authorities to pick up the clients left high and dry by the Kid's Company closure.

The article is much nearer the mark though about smaller charities. And smaller charities do indeed still have to have the different skills of people listed near the end, the costs of which make can them hard to keep afloat.

Some charities and government have become quite intertwined in some ways.
I am not sure when that started to happen.

Having said that, a lot of the bigger charities have a lot of money going through them, so no excuse at all for not having proper procedures.

I agree with the first commentator that that is a bad article.

I am glad that funders are reluctant to put money into charities that dont operate with a Reserves Policy.

The Reserves Policy, as I understand it, was put in place for the very reason of charities not suddenly having to shut down overnight.
It is there for fiscal prudence.

I actually didnt know it was possible to operate a charity without it, as I assumed funding from whatever source, would not flow in without it.

Hadn't realised there were any comments Bags

While the comments re KC may be valid, I still think there are massive concerns about the way successive governments have come to rely on charities to provide public services, and in doing so have placed bureaucratic constraints on them like bidding processes and tick-box accountability.

Good article, janea raising some important issues.

Did anyone else read the comment below the article? That puts a different slant on things. As usual, I'm left not knowing quite what to think.

The reports that they have had no Reserves Policy is what is ringing bells for me ,accounts wise.
If that is missing, what else is missing?
And who kept overruling having that. And why? And what else was overruled.

If they had had that, Kids Company may not have folded. It would have bought them time, finance wise, which might habe been enough for other things to have got sorted.

That is why the Reserves Policy was brought in for charities.

A good analysis of why charities struggle to provide public services which the state should be providing

I am not sure why there is a comment on 'average salary'being £50k. That will mean people on lower salaries and some on higher. The charity employed doctors/psychiatrists who would be paid professional salaries. I do not think that is unreasonable.

Having read today KC Annual Accounts for the past five years, financially they have been sailing very close to insolvency throughout that time. It appears they have no Reserves (mandatory for any charity, usually 3-6 months running costs) and the Annual Report is pretty meagre, with the same number of contacts each year (as has been reported elsewhere).
Alan Yentob is Chair of Trustees and apparently has therefore been accountable for the reporting to Charities Commission and Companies House.
These may have been audited, but that isn't necessarily independent of the organisation so easy enough to be 'creative'

There is no doubt that children who live in chaotic and abusive social circumstances are more likely to respond to an organisation like KC than to the statutory services, because of its informality, humanity and lack of bureaucracy. But the government is right to insist on proper scrutiny and to refuse to pour more money in, if it is not satisfied that proper management and financial scrutiny are in place.

But there will be children who will miss out on care now, and I can only feel sad for them. The statutory services are very unlikely to be able to fill the hole, and the children themselves are likely to be wary of them.

Thanks whenim for the interesting link.

I know very little about Kids Company apart from what I have read or seen on the TV. Camila B appeared to me to be genuinely and 100% committed to young people.

Having watched several interviews with her, I thought she made some very valid points. She read out an e-mail she received last year from Michael Gove which was most effusive in its praise of Kids Company - and yet apparently he has been one of her most vociferous critics. She also said that Kids Company's accounts have been audited every year and there was no suggestion of impropriety. She did not say that the allegations of child abuse were incorrect - only that neither she nor her staff had at any time been aware of such allegations, and that she had been given no time to examine the allegations.

I am not a great fan of charities being funded to carry out the duties of services that are already available in the public sector - especially when that means public sector services lose funding, and charities - which may be less accountable - gain it. However, there is an argument - and I don't know how valid it is because I don't have enough knowledge of social work/child protection issues - that organisations outside the traditional framework are often more able to respond quickly to issues such as child exploitation. The only organisation that came out well from the Rotherham Inquiry - Risky Business - was a small charity which seemed to have formed much more personal and responsive relationships with the young women who came to them for help.

I can't help but wonder whether CB's very critical statements about the way children - and particularly poor children from dysfunctional backgrounds - are treated in the UK might have led to her demise.

I'm with you on this MAME although I don't think it's all down to the Tories. They have done terrible things to make people who were already poor under previous govts. even poorer, which is unacceptable. I don't know enough about Kid's Company to make a definite decision about the running of it or about CB, but, from what I have heard and read in the past I have always been a big fan of the organisation. Councils, social services and some charities can go on ad infinitum about the poverty and neglect of children in this country and no government will take any notice - but Camila was noticed and now lots of people who 'noticed' her and KC are not exactly coming out of the woodwork to defend the charity.

I don’t think any of us can make a judgement without knowing the facts . I can only guess who did what , who did NOT do anything , how much supervision and support there was from the funders, how many young people were helped , how they were helped , how much money was spent on what , how much damage these young people had already had , how much provision there is , or is not for them , etc etc . The media , and the politicians don’t give us all the acts , so we run on rumour, innuendo , bias and ignorance . I have very little knowledge about the inside of this story , I just hope some-one can provide the skilled level of care and support for these vulnerable young people .

Great article whenim64 (see above)

They had too much cash, perhaps, enough to feel it could be splashed around. Having to watch the pennies does focus the mind on making every one count.

Maybe it will come back againBut no excuse for not getting its financial side in order.
The organisation wasnt exactly lacking in cash.