Hands Off and Give Us the Money

Dan Hodges. Wrong on AV. Right about the Big Society. His post at Labour Uncut is excellent:

The prime minister announced, with a flourish, his ‘big idea’. ‘Our purse is empty. But do not worry. The voluntary sector will shoulder the burden.’ The volunteers looked up with a start. ‘But we can’t. You’ve taken all our money as well,’ they cried. ‘Taken your money?’ replied the prime minister, ‘But I thought you were volunteers?’ ‘We are,’ they responded, ‘and we expect to be well paid for it.’

Hodges writes from experience:

I worked as a consultant to a number of charities. They all wanted two things. Total independence. And a shed load of taxpayer’s cash.

And he has a go at Sir Stephen Bubb, chief executive of ACEVO, the association of chief executives of voluntary organisations (above), who sounded like a gangster when he said: “We are trusted. Politicians are not. Attack us at your peril.”

David Cameron has manifestly failed to sell his big society vision to the country. The third sector should be careful it doesn’t do the job for him.

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• sceptic64

  Oh. When I saw the headline, I assumed it was another Rentoul blog about Tony Blair. What a disappointment.