Wednesday, 5 November 2008

After the excitement of the US election, David Fitzpatrick arrived at this morning’s meeting with celebratory coffee and cakes. Good chap.

There are also some good people at Capacitybuilders and the ChangeUp programme has some laudable aims. But it is hard to think of a recent government policy initiative where implementation has been more comprehensively botched. New CEO Matt Leach will certainly have his work cut out.

Large sums of money were initially made available with little time to think through sustainable strategies. In Hertfordshire, we had overcome these problems and up to six months ago our consortium was broad, inclusive, growing and beginning to make genuine gains: the step change in quality support that ChangeUp envisaged. But then Capacitybuilders arbitrarily (and as far as I know without consultation) reduced core funding for the Consortium. Then they pooh-poohed our carefully planned programme proposals. The Consortium has been reduced to a shadow of its former self – a barebones consortium comprising a core of groups with a strong commitment to joined-up working and the wherewithal to sustain their engagement. Jacquie Hime (of N Herts CVS, the Lead Body for funding) and Ian Richardson (Consortium Chair) are doing an excellent job try to hold the centre. Capacitybuilders agreed to fund just one project in Hertfordshire – and this transformed from our original proposals. Of course we did bid for the revised project and any funding has to be good, but it is hard to escape the feeling that Capacitybuilders somehow foisted the project on us.

This morning I travelled to Letchworth to discuss how this one project can best be delivered. The project is to support twenty front-line organisations to develop ICT strategies plus a few additional outcomes, and for this we receive £50k pa and Capacitybuilders want this to be sustainable through a new social enterprise. Is it sustainable to expect front-line voluntary organisations to spend £2,500 getting advice on their ICT strategies? We will see.