Agenda item

[Report of the Assistant Director for Commissioning. To be introduced by the Cabinet Member for Communities and Equalities.]

 

The report will set out the Council’s proposed support package to the voluntary and community sector in response to Covid 19.This will include the joint activities that it will be taking forward with the Haringey Bridge Renewal Trust, the Council’s strategic Voluntary sector partner to maximise access of the voluntary and community sector to external funding and facilitating collaboration between organisations.

 

The report will further seek agreement to vire £600k from the Council’s Emergency Response contingency to fund access to: a £250k VCS Hardship (Operating Costs) Fund for rapid allocation to the sector, a £250k VCS Hardship (Critical Support for those of Additional Value) Fund for rapid allocation to the sector and

extend the current 3 month rent holiday for organisations in Council buildings to 6 months at an estimated cost of £100,000

 

The report will seek approval to the key principles of the scheme which will enable access to this funding. Completion and publication of the final scheme will be delegated to the Director for Finance in consultation with the Cabinet Member for Communities and Equalities.

 

 

 

 

Clerks note: Councillor Seema Chandwani, Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Neighbourhoods left the meeting for the duration of the item.

 

The Cabinet Member for Communities and Equalities introduced the report which set out the impact of lockdown on the viability of voluntary and community organisations in Haringey. It also set out a draft package of support to the Voluntary and Community Sector (VCS).

 

The Cabinet Member thanked the Voluntary Sector in Haringey for their incredible efforts in supporting communities in this health crisis and noted their support in critical areas such as food distribution.

 

The Cabinet Member, referred to the previous agenda item report on the Council’s finances and reflected on the difficult funding pressures the borough were facing going forward. He expressed that it was regrettable that government were not providing the voluntary sector with the full funding support that it needed.

 

The package of Voluntary Sector support, put forward in the attached report, was felt to be fair in this context of uncertainty. He referred to section 4 of the report which outlined the Council’s commitment to £500k of funding to the voluntary and community sector. This was through establishing two hardship funds to access, one directed to supporting voluntary organisations in operating costs. The second fund was focused on critical support to voluntary organisations with additional value to the operations of the Council.

 

The Council’s role as a provider of last resort to support voluntary organisations was highlighted and Officers and Councillors would also engage with the sector on how the final scheme would be framed.

 

The Cabinet Member drew the Cabinet’s attention to paragraph 8.47, which outlined the long proud tradition of the voluntary sector in supporting a diverse borough. The Cabinet Member expressed that Covid-19 had highlighted glaring levels of inequalities faced across the borough and it was hoped that the recommendations in the report would work to enable organisations to support residents facing inequality and to continue in the delivery of vital services across Haringey.

 

In response to questions from Councillors Dennison, das Neves and Culverwell, it was noted that:

 

• The Assistant Director for Commissioning would provide a response in writing to Cllr Dennison on the number of voluntary sector organisations that had applied to the business grants funding. In addition the Assistant Director would provide information on organisations that were eligible to access the hardship fund.

 

• The £100k referred to in paragraph 8.1.1 would cover an extension in rent holidays from three to six months. The Council would not pursue organisations to recover the money but would review all rent holidays after six months.

 

 

• A member briefing would be provided on the final details of the scheme with a time frame for implementation.

 

• Providers delivering benefit advice were envisaged to be a critical focus for providing support. In addition to making this funding available to the main advice providers in the borough, the Council would look into stimulating other providers in the advice space to access funding. This could include working with smaller organisations and encouraging them to compile consortiums to access funding.

 

• The aim of the scheme would be to support organisations carrying out frontline delivery in the borough to continue to do so. Financial sustainability of organisations was the key issue that Council would keep in mind when providing this funding.

 

• Noted the role of the council as a provider of last resort. This included flexibility to maintain diversity of the sector.

 

• Black Lives Matter was an issue that the Council was taking very seriously and statements made on this on website by the Cabinet Member and Leader. The Council were taking forward its influencing role with the Police. A meeting had been held with key VCS organisations and the Cabinet Member as the joint-Chair of the Community Safety Partnership had discussed this issue at a recent CSP meeting. The Cabinet Member was further keen to carry out joint work with the Health and Wellbeing Board to address the issues of inequality.

 

• The Chief Executive reiterated that addressing the issue of the impact of Covid 19 on BAME communities was very much part of Public Health’s team focus in Haringey and they were also part of a London network completing pieces of work on this area.

 

• The Chief Executive highlighted that Public Health for England, within the last two days, had published a report on understanding the impact of Covid 19 on BAME groups. This had been compiled following 7000 interviews and consideration of published evidence on the impact of Covid 19.The link to this information was as follows:
• https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/covid-19-understanding-the-impact-on-bame-communities

 

• The Chief Executive provided assurance that the Council would carry on having conversations on black lives matter with Councillors and partners.

 

RESOLVED

 

1.         To agree support access to external funding including central government schemes where appropriate, working with the Bridge Renewal Trust as the Council’s Strategic Partner.

 

2.         To agree the principles set out in section 6.2 as a framework for the scheme

 

3.         To create a £250k VCS Hardship (Operating Costs) Fund for rapid allocation to the sector in line with the principles agreed in 3.1.2 above

 

4.         To create a £250k VCS Hardship (Critical Support for those of Additional Value) Fund for rapid allocation to the sector in line with the principles agreed in 3.1.2 above

 

5.         To extend the current 3 month rent holiday for organisations in Council buildings to 6 months at an estimated cost of £100,000

 

6.         To agree an allocation of £600k from the Council’s Emergency Response Contingency (general fund) to fund these proposals

 

7.         To develop an in-kind support offer to the sector, working with partners

 

8.         To facilitate increasing collaboration between organisations in the sector, working with the Bridge Renewal Trust as the Council’s Strategic Partner.

 

9.         To delegate authority to the Director of Finance to establish and implement the detail of the scheme in line with the principles and in consultation with the Cabinet Member for Communities and Equalities.

 

 

 

 

Reasons for decision

 

The set of proposals being put forward here will support the Council, working with the sector, to respond quickly to the impact of the lockdown on the viability of voluntary and community organisations in Haringey. The lockdown had and continues to have an immediate and fundamental impact on the ability of the sector to operate effectively, to raise income and to continue to offer the broad range of services local residents need. It is the view of the Council that without an early offer of support to the sector as set out here, the impact will be more severe with a likely impact on increasing demand for wider Council services. However, notwithstanding this support, it is noted that a number of local organisations will remain at risk of closure.

 

Some community organisations in the borough will be eligible to apply external funding, both to support infrastructure costs and to meet service delivery costs, during the pandemic, including through central government business support schemes. The Council is keen that organisations are able to benefit from such funding and working with the Bridge Renewal Trust through a joint team, will therefore offer practical and individual support the sector to access external funds.

 

The Council recognises the challenges of delivering an equitable scheme when funds are limited and demand is high, and has therefore proposed the set of principles set out at 6.2 to underpin the details of the approach.

 

The Council proposes two separate funds to meet the financial pressures facing the sector – the first, the VCS Hardship (Operating Costs) Fund, is designed to meet unavoidable running and infrastructure costs which have arisen during the pandemic, the second, the VCS Hardship (Critical Support for those of Additional Value) Fund, is designed to address the risk that organisations of value to the borough may not be able to withstand the impact of the pandemic without additional financial aid. Each scheme will operate within the principles to be agreed at 6.2.

 

The Council has recognised the benefits of offering a rent holiday for three months to voluntary and community organisations in Council buildings and will extend this to 6 months to further ease the financial pressure of community organisations and in light of the continued constraints of the lockdown and subsequent restrictions on activity.

 

The Council recognises the need to ensure that this funding is available in the immediate term and will vire money from its Emergency Response Contingency Fund to enable this package to be put in place in a timely fashion.

 

The backdrop to this set of proposals is increasing collaboration between the Council and the sector and between organisations within the sector throughout the period of the pandemic. This support package builds on the reality of this collaboration and the fact that the most welcome and beneficial support is not always financial but may involve the sharing of other skills and assets.

 

Given the time frames required to ensure this scheme can be established to respond quickly to need, the full detail of the scheme is being worked up by officers, within the framework set out here and to achieve alignment with other business support schemes both in operation and being developed. The Director of Finance working with the Cabinet Member for Communities and Equalities will approve the final detail of the scheme.

 

Alternative options considered

 

The Council could agree not to set aside a budget to meet the unavoidable infrastructure and running costs of the local voluntary and community sector, incurred during the Covid-19 lockdown. It is anticipated that this, however, would have a severe impact on the VCS in the borough, which is critical to supporting vulnerable residents not only during the pandemic but at all times. This would be likely to lead to increased demand for Council services, which would turn out to be more costly for the Council in both the immediate and longer term.

 

The Council could agree to set aside a smaller budget to meet the unavoidable infrastructure and running costs of the local voluntary and community sector. This option was considered but discarded on the grounds that the Council would in any event need to respond to the increased levels of need in the community should voluntary and community organisations need to close and that this would bear a cost, potentially considerable, to the Council.

 

The Council could agree a different approach to seeking to meet the unavoidable infrastructure and running costs of the sector, incurred during the Covid-19 lockdown. Such approaches were considered but rejected on the grounds that they would not provide an equitable basis for responding to need and might adversely impact some sectors of the community.