Nonprofit News and Comment

INTERNATIONAL

CHINA

“Special report: China and the internet; China’s internet, A giant cage.” Thirteen years ago Bill Clinton, then America’s president, said that trying to control the internet in China would be like trying to “nail Jell-O to the wall”. Economist. April 6, 2013. At the time he seemed to be stating the obvious. By its nature the web was widely dispersed, using so many channels that it could not possibly be blocked. Rather, it seemed to have the capacity to open up the world to its users even in shut-in places. Just as earlier communications technologies may have helped topple dictatorships in the past (for example, the telegraph in Russia’s Bolshevik revolutions in 1917 and short-wave radio in the break-up of the Soviet Union in 1991), the internet would surely erode China’s authoritarian state. Vastly increased access to information and the ability to communicate easily with like-minded people round the globe would endow its users with asymmetric power, diluting the might of the state and acting as a force for democracy. Those expectations have been confounded. Not only has Chinese authoritarian rule survived the internet, but the state has shown great skill in bending the technology to its own purposes, enabling it to exercise better control of its own society and setting an example for other repressive regimes. China’s party-state has deployed an army of cyber-police, hardware engineers, software developers, web monitors and paid online propagandists to watch, filter, censor and guide Chinese internet users. Chinese private internet companies, many of them clones of Western ones, have been allowed to flourish so long as they do not deviate from the party line.

FRANCE

“In France, Foreign Aid in the Form of Priests.” By Maia de la Baume. New York Times. April 7, 2013. In Togo, the Rev. Rodolphe Folly used to conduct exuberant Sunday services for a hundred believers of all ages, who sang local gospel music and went up to him to offer what they had. In this quiet town in Burgundy, he preaches to a more somber audience of about 40 gray-haired retirees in an unadorned 19th-century church that can accommodate up to 600 people. “In my country, we applaud, we acclaim, we shout,” said Father Folly, a Roman Catholic priest who spoke in the living room of his modern, modest house. “Here, even when I ask people to shake hands, they say no.” Father Folly, 45, has settled in this town of about 9,000 residents, assigned to replace an aging priest. He has brought his jovial smile and good heart to a place where religious practice is weak, as it is in many other areas of France. He is part of a battalion of priests who have come to France from abroad — from places like Benin, Burkina-Faso, Cameroon but also Vietnam and Poland — who now represent about 10 percent of France’s declining clerical ranks. The Catholic Church in Western Europe and the United States has been coping with a severe shortage of priests in the last few decades, as many abandoned the priesthood or passed away. So bishops in the developed world have been reaching out to their counterparts in the developing world to bring priests from Africa, Asia and Latin America, where the priesthood is still an appealing prospect and vocations are booming. The flow of priests from the developing world to wealthier churches in the West amounts to a brain drain within the church. The ratio of priests to parishes is just as bad, if not worse, in the developing world as it is in the West, but the Western nations have the resources to relocate and support these foreign priests. Bishops from Europe and the United States recruit priests from the global south in ad hoc arrangements with local bishops and religious orders, usually without any involvement from the Vatican. The flow of Catholic missionaries, who used to leave France, Italy, Ireland and the United States for the developing world, has now been largely reversed.

RELIGION

“Pope Francis Names Advisory Panel at Vatican.” By Gaia Pianigiani and Rachel Donadio. New York Times. April 13, 2013. In his first significant decision since becoming pontiff — and a radical step toward more democracy in the Roman Catholic Church — Pope Francis on Saturday named a group of eight cardinals from around the world to advise him in governing the church and overhauling the troubled Vatican hierarchy, which has been rocked by scandals. Although the group will not have legislative power, Vatican experts said the move was a strong sign that Francis was eager to consult widely and promote greater dialogue between the Vatican hierarchy and churches worldwide. The eight cardinals named include the archbishop of Boston and prelates from Australia, Chile, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Germany, Honduras, India and Italy. “It’s an epochal shift because it brings the Vatican closer to a more collegial governance,” said Paolo Rodari, a Vatican expert with the Italian daily newspaper La Repubblica. He was using a term meaning a greater sharing of power between Rome and local churches in governing the Catholic Church. That concept was central to the liberalizing changes of the Second Vatican Council in the 1960s, but critics said both Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI consolidated more control with the Vatican. Francis’ new advisory group reverses the trend.
Related story:
“Pope advisory group to ‘revamp’ church.” Sydney Morning Herald. April 14, 2013.

UK

“Three approaches to evaluating social innovation – which is right for you? However much you know about the environment you’re working in, there is a way to evaluate the effects of your intervention.” By Kieron Kirkland. Guardian. April 8, 2013. What is the best way to measure social impact? People love to argue about the best way to assess social impact. For example, whether you should have an external evaluator, or do a randomised control trial (RCT). So what is the best way to do an evaluation, especially if you’re working in social innovation?

“The Blue Peter thermometer is a savvy fundraising tool; The thermometer that never starts empty is just one superb persuasive technique that also works in professional fundraising.” By Rachel Collinson. Guardian. April 9, 2013. As a child of the late 1970s, my conscientious parents forbade me from watching ITV. I think they were concerned that I might have my cerebral development stunted by junk food adverts and spurious toy promotions. At the time, all I knew was that I resented them for making me miss Art Attack and Fun House. Looking back, I’m now glad that twice weekly, the relentlessly wholesome propaganda of Blue Peter influenced my value system to include philanthropy, craft and cultural understanding. A staple of this was the Blue Peter Thermometer, charting the viewers’ progress towards a fundraising goal. Whether it was collecting stamps or milk bottle tops, children throughout the UK scrambled to collect enough to reach the top of the thermometer. In some schools, being the one to collect the most became a badge of honour every bit as worthy as the Blue Peter badge. It’s only recently that I’ve come to understand why this device was so successful in spurring us on in our fundraising efforts. Growing numbers of psychologists are confirming (and debunking) various persuasion techniques. Nonprofit organisations are finally applying the knowledge from these studies to their campaigning efforts on the web. There are some very good reasons why we’re still seeing the thermometer everywhere.

“Donations to universities hit record high; Charitable gifts soar to £774m as universities adopt US-style approach to fund-raising.” By Richard Garner. Independent. April 11, 2013. Philanthropists provided record levels of funding to British universities last year, as institutions increasingly tap wealthy alumni and corporate sponsors for donations. A study of charitable giving to universities reveals they have received £774m in donations in the past year – a rise of 14.4 per cent on the previous year’s figure, itself a record, and 33 per cent up on two years ago. Researchers say universities are adopting a US-style approach to fund-raising. In the States, Ivy League universities such as Harvard rely heavily on donations from former alumni and sponsors. The lion’s share of this year’s increased funding – 45 per cent – is going to Oxford and Cambridge universities, both of whom have reached £1bn targets for fund-raising in the past two years. Other members of the Russell Group, which represents 24 of the most research-intensive higher education institutions, were also prominent among those raising the most cash. A breakdown in the report – prepared by the Ross Group in conjunction with the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (Case) – reveals that, in addition to rising corporate donations, the number of individual donors (former university alumni) increased 5 per cent to 170,000.
Related story:
“Come on, graduates. Give back.” Independent. April 11, 2013.

“Social impact measurement: time to admit defeat?” Guardian. April 11, 2013. Albert Einstein’s great breakthrough came when he put known measures to one side. The notion that time and space were regular and linear was entrenched in science, and had led to an impasse which prevented it from making sense of the universe. By seeing that time and space might flex led to the Theory of Relativity, and led Einstein into a realisation that philosophical steps must be taken if breakthroughs were to be made. This philosophical context for his science led him to see that “not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts”. My wife and I recently took our children out of their local primary school to travel in the former Transkei for seven weeks. We thought that this would be a wonderful experience for them, experiencing life on the road in a completely different culture. Their school was programmed to see it differently. Its Ofsted rating could be adversely affected by the absence, and by the prospect of a six-year-old and four-year-old performing slightly less well in their assessments. The scientific culture of measurement risks so narrowing the concept of education that the system becomes unable to see any benefits (which cannot be directly measured) of such a trip. Social or ‘impact’ investors, such as Panahpur with whom I work, try to achieve their purpose by blending the art of achieving their social goals with the science of managing their funds. They make financial investments for social, as well as financial returns. The key challenge of doing this is understanding if, and how, the art of achieving social ‘returns’ can be measured in any scientifically robust way.

INTERNATIONAL

CATHOLIC SEX ABUSE SCANDAL

“Woodburn priest sentenced to 75 months in prison on sexual abuse charges.” By Everton Bailey Jr. Oregonian. April 01, 2013. A Woodburn priest accused of sexually abusing a 12-year-old boy during an overnight stay, then chasing him down the street in his underwear in August 2012 accepted a plea agreement Monday and was sentenced to more than six years in prison. The Rev. Angel Armando Perez, 47, pleaded guilty in Marion County Circuit Court to charges of first-degree sexual abuse, driving intoxicated and furnishing alcohol to a minor. Accusations of using a child in a display of sexually explicit conduct and tampering with evidence were dismissed. He will serve six years and three months in prison for the sexual abuse charge, the mandatory minimum for that Measure 11 crime. He will serve the penalty for the other charges concurrently.
Marion County Circuit Judge Courtland Geyer also ordered Perez to register as a sex offender. Perez is the first priest of Mexican descent in the Archdiocese of Portland, which represents Roman Catholics in western Oregon. The native of Mexico holds a green card for legal residence as a minister of religion.

“Wisconsin: Church Will Release Files on Abuse.” By Laurie Goodstein. New York Times. April 3, 2013.The Archbishop of Milwaukee, Jerome E. Listeki, announced on Wednesday that he has authorized the release of thousands of pages of documents on sexual abuse by Catholic priests, including cases that date back 80 years. His announcement came one day before a judge was scheduled to hear a motion from abuse victims asking for the documents to be released. The files, which will be posted on the archdiocesan Web site by July 1, include the legal depositions of former Archbishop Rembert Weakland and Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan, now the archbishop of New York.
Related story:
“Milwaukee Archdiocese Sex Abuse Files To Be Released.” Huffington Post. April 4, 2013.

“Catholic Church once again at center of abuse inquiry; Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard called the inquiry into sexual abuse a ‘moral moment’ for the country and warned of “very uncomfortable truths.’” By Andrew Taylor. NBC News. April 4, 2013.
Related stories:
“Church heads ‘ostracised victims‘.” Sydney Morning Herald. April 5, 2013.
“Churches don’t want to know, abuse inquiry told.” Sydney Morning Herald. April 5, 2013.

“Argentina Bishops Delayed Abuse Plan; Under Pope Francis, Then Top Cardinal, Country’s Clergy Missed Vatican Deadline to Create Guidelines.” By Stacy Meichtry. Wall Street Journal. April 5, 2013. As the new leader of the world’s 1.2 billion Roman Catholics, Pope Francis pledged Friday to forge ahead with measures aimed at stemming sexual abuse in church ranks. But as the church’s most powerful official in Argentina, he didn’t comply with a Vatican call to create guidelines for handling sexual-abuse allegations in the country. The delay, which hasn’t been previously reported, opens new questions about the new pope’s record of addressing the issue of sexual abuse by priests, even as the Vatican vowed anew to address the issue.

“The Vatican: Pope Seeks Decisive Action to Resolve Church’s Sexual Abuse Cases.” New York Times/ Associated Press. April 5, 2013. Pope Francis on Friday directed the Vatican to act decisively on sexual abuse cases involving members of the clergy and to punish pedophile priests, saying the Roman Catholic Church’s credibility was on the line. The pope pushed for action during a meeting with the prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith, the office that shapes and enforces policy on what to do about any abuse allegations and what happens to the abusers, the Vatican said in a statement. In the meeting, Francis said he wanted to promote measures to protect minors and help victims of sexual violence and take necessary actions against perpetrators, the statement said. It was the first announcement by the Vatican that Francis had made dealing with clergy sexual abuse a priority of his papacy. But some victims’ advocates dismissed the announcement as just more talk. “Actions speak louder than words,” said Barbara Dorris of the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests.

EGYPT

“Government using increasingly loaded language in welfare debate; DWP speeches and press releases on benefits show rise in words such as ‘dependency’, ‘entrenched’ and ‘addiction’.” By Peter Walker. Guardian. April 5, 2013. The government is increasingly using value-laden and pejorative language when discussing benefits and welfare, a Guardian analysis has found, something poverty charities warn is likely to increase the stigmatisation of poor people. The findings show that the work and pensions secretary, Iain Duncan Smith, has spoken of a mass culture of welfare dependency in every speech on benefits he has made in the past 12 months. The analysis comes after complaints that the government is using exceptional cases such as that of Mick Philpott, the unemployed man jailed this week for the manslaughter of six children, to justify its programme of changes to the benefits system. An examination of Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) speeches and press notices connected to benefits in the year to April 1 shows a significantly increased use of terms such as “dependency”, “entrenched” and “addiction”, when compared with the end of the Labour government. Fraud, which accounts for less than 1% of the overall benefits bill, was mentioned 85 times in the press releases, while it was not used at all in the final year of Labour, which was itself accused of sometimes using intemperate language on the issue. In the 25 speeches by DWP ministers on welfare over the year, “dependency” was mentioned 38 times, while “addiction” occurred 41 times and “entrenched” on 15 occasions. A comparison of 25 speeches on the subject by Labour ministers saw the words used, respectively, seven times, not at all, and once. Some charities warn that such language fuels a distorted portrayal of benefits in parts of the media, which in turn perpetuates widespread myths about the welfare system.

PHILANTHROPY

“Private Foundations Start To Edge Out Some Countries In International Aid Donations.” All Things Considered/ National Pubic Radio. April 3, 2013. A new report on global giving shows there has been a big shift in recent years in who is giving and receiving international aid. The U.S. remains the largest donor, giving out more than $30 billion each year. But now large sums of money are coming from private foundations and corporations and even countries who only a few years ago were recipients themselves.

SOMALIA

‘In Somalia, Mother And Daughter Are ‘Keeping Hope Alive’; One Woman: 90,000 Lives Changed.’ All Things Considered/National Public Radio. March 29, 2013. The collapse and rebirth of rebirth of Somalia have been a long battle, and women like Dr. Hawa Abdi have been on the front lines. Back in 1991, when the Somalian government collapsed, Abdi was a young doctor operating a small clinic on her farm with her family south of Mogadishu. As the conflict raged on, Abdi’s clinic grew into a 400-bed hospital — and ultimately, a refugee camp. At the height of the war, 90,000 displaced Somalis made their home around Abdi’s hospital. Abdi, who has been nicknamed “the Mother Teresa of Somalia,” has a new memoir called Keeping Hope Alive: One Woman, 90,000 Lives Changed. As she told NPR’s Audie Cornish, her camp and hospital — dubbed Hawa Village — became an island of peace she defended from militants, and an oasis she fought to maintain for people who had lost everything.

UK

“‘I feel brainwashed – a robot of Scientology’; Jenna Miscavige Hill endured a youth of child labour, family separation and bullying – and all at the hands of the religious sect led by her own uncle. Spencer McCarthy hears her story.” By Spencer McCarthy Independent. April 2, 2013. Jenna Miscavige Hill lives a quiet life in San Diego with her husband, Dallas, and their two children, three-year-old Archie and 11-month-old Winnie. But the beginning of her life was anything but ordinary and only now, having written a book about how she lost her childhood to Scientology, is she coming to terms with growing up in a church filled with child labour, cruel punishments, family separation and bullying. Her revelations are all the more explosive as she is the niece of the movement’s leader, David Miscavige.

“The Great British Class Survey – Results; Is social mobility good? Does a narrow social elite run the country?” BBC News. April 3, 2013. People in the UK now fit into seven social classes, a major survey conducted by the BBC suggests. It says the traditional categories of working, middle and upper class are outdated, fitting 39% of people. It found a new model of seven social classes ranging from the elite at the top to a “precariat” – the poor, precarious proletariat – at the bottom. More than 161,000 people took part in the Great British Class Survey, the largest study of class in the UK. Class has traditionally been defined by occupation, wealth and education. But this research argues that this is too simplistic, suggesting that class has three dimensions – economic, social and cultural. The BBC Lab UK study measured economic capital – income, savings, house value – and social capital – the number and status of people someone knows. The study also measured cultural capital, defined as the extent and nature of cultural interests and activities.
Related story:
“Multiplying the Old Divisions of Class in Britain.”. New York Times. April 3, 2013.

“Malala Yousafzai foundation makes first grant; Funding given to Pakistan group for putting 40 girls through school, while actor Angelina Jolie pledges $200,000.” Guardian. April 5. 2013. Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani schoolgirl brought to England after being shot in the head by the Taliban, has announced the first donation from her new education charity with the support of Hollywood actor Angelina Jolie. Malala, who now attends Edgbaston high school for girls in Birmingham, said it was the happiest moment of her life in a video played at the Women in the World summit in New York. The 15-year-old set up the Malala Fund after the Taliban tried to assassinate her in October 2012 for asserting her right to go to school in her home country. She spent hours undergoing major surgery at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham where surgeons tried to repair the damage caused by a bullet that grazed her brain. The grant of US$45,000 (£29,500) will be given to an unnamed organisation in the Swat Valley in Pakistan to support the education of 40 girls aged five to 12 who would otherwise be forced into domestic labour.The organisation, which was not named for security reasons, will offer a safe place for the girls to study as well as financial support for their families. The Malala Fund supports the education and empowerment of girls in Pakistan and around the world and provides grants to civil society organisations and individuals focused on education. The fund is run by a board of trustees, including Malala and her family, with the support of the Vital Voices Global Partnership, founded by Hilary Clinton.

“Why trustees should be engaged in the fundraising process; Many charities and social enterprises are under-using their trustees when it comes to fundraising.” By Carlos Miranda. Guardian. April 5, 2013. The competition for philanthropic funds has never been fiercer. Every charity and social enterprise dependent to any degree on philanthropic donations is acutely aware of this fact. That’s why it’s counter-intuitive to see that most UK charities and social enterprises are under-using one of their key fundraising assets – their trustees.

“Advice for charities that want to capitalise on major donor fundraising; A strong vision, mission and strategy are essential for success when fundraising from major donors.” By Sophie Hudson. Guardian. April 3, 2013. During a time of economic austerity it can be tempting for charities, and their trustees, to hope that their fundraising difficulties will be solved by a few large gifts from major donors. Indeed, research by the Charities Aid Foundation (CAF) has indicated that major donor fundraising is faring quite well compared to many other forms of fundraising at the moment. In its trustees report for the year ending 30 April 2012 it found that major donors using CAF Charitable Trusts gave 20% more to charity in 2011/12 compared to the previous year, increasing from £102.2m to £122.9m. In contrast, its UK Giving report, released last November, found that total donations in 2011/12 fell by 20%. But how easy is it for charities to capitalise on major donor fundraising? And what are the skills and systems they need in place to be successful?

INTERNATIONAL

AFRICA

“Charity reaches rainforest goal.” By Roger Harrabin. BBC News. February 28, 2013. A charity founded to save tropical rainforest the size of Wales has achieved its goal. It has raised £2m in three years to protect over two million hectares of forest, mainly in Africa. “Size of Wales” was founded by Welsh environmentalists annoyed that their country was often used in the media as a comparator to gauge the scale of rainforest destruction. Copycat campaigns are now being discussed in Denmark and Ireland. The project’s organisers say ultimately they’d like to see the people of Europe raise funds to protect an area of rainforest the size of Europe. Many Welsh people appreciated the positive spin placed on typical media phrases like: “A rainforest the size of Wales has been destroyed” or “a rainforest twice the size of Wales has gone”. Scotland and England never seemed to merit such attention.The public chipped in more than £1m and that has been match-funded by a Cardiff-base charitable trust, the Waterloo Foundation.

AUSTRALIA

“Christian schools want fine print of reforms.” By Daniel Hurst. Sydney Morning Herald. March 2, 2013. Christian schools have threatened to withdraw support for Julia Gillard’s education funding reforms if the Prime Minister fails to spell out the effects on individual institutions within one month. Christian Schools Australia also hit out at states looking to go their own way, saying premiers would be disregarding the national interest if they could not agree on a national plan to overhaul school funding. Ms Gillard’s hopes of striking a deal with the states at a meeting with premiers next month have suffered a blow in the past week, with Victoria and Queensland indicating they would develop their own alternative plans. A Senate committee is examining the Gillard government’s legislation designed to pave the way for the Gonski school funding reforms, which would see a set amount of funding allocated for each student to be topped up with ”loadings” recognising disadvantage and disability needs. The chief executive of Christian Schools Australia, Stephen O’Doherty, told the inquiry the sector was being asked to buy into a scheme that was not fully articulated yet, and had shown ”great patience” and ”tremendous goodwill” in its approach up to this point. The Australian Education Union federal president, Angelo Gavrielatos, told the inquiry Ms Gillard’s signature education reforms – set to deliver an extra $6.5 billion in funding to schools each year – were not dead so long as everyone displayed ”a degree of political maturity”. The deputy executive director of the Independent Schools Council of Australia, Barry Wallett, said 900 schools in the independent sector were in a non-systemic arrangement and several hundred of those could lose funding if the Gonski model was implemented in its pure form. The Catholic Education executive director, Stephen Elder, said the Victorian government had done modelling on the Gonski reforms, which showed about 30 per cent of schools would lose money. He said the process had been long and drawn out, and was causing ”enormous anxiety”.

CATHOLIC SEX ABUSE SCANDAL

“Top British Cardinal Faces Accusations of Committing ‘Inappropriate Acts’.” By John F. Burns. New York Times. February 24, 2013. Britain’s most senior Roman Catholic cleric, Cardinal Keith O’Brien, has been accused of committing “inappropriate acts” in his relations with three priests and one former priest, the newspaper The Observer reported Sunday. The accusations, which date back to the 1980s, have been forwarded to the Vatican. The newspaper said the four men had made their complaints to the pope’s diplomatic representative in Britain, Antonio Mennini, and that the complaints had reached Archbishop Mennini in the week before Pope Benedict XVI announced his resignation on Feb. 11. The timing of The Observer’s article, which was apparently drawn from church sources with access to the file that Archbishop Mennini had forwarded to Rome, became an immediate focus of attention. The Catholic Church has been besieged during Benedict’s eight years in office by scandals over pedophilia and other forms of sexual abuse by priests. But the time since he announced his decision to retire on the grounds of failing health has been marked by a surge of Italian news media reports, many of them speculative, of gay sex scandals in the Vatican and other allegations of sexual abuse by priests. These reports have been seen by some in the Vatican as intended to harm some contenders for the papacy, or to disqualify some of the cardinals expected to participate in the conclave. Some Vatican experts believe they might also be devised to manufacture a sense of crisis that would encourage the conclave to select a conservative cardinal as the next pope. Cardinal O’Brien, who is set to retire after turning 75 next month, is the only cleric from Britain who will be eligible to vote in the conclave.
Related stories:
“Vatican to investigate top Catholic cleric O’Brien over ‘inappropriate acts’.” Independent. February 24, 2013.
“Backdown as Catholic Church removes priest.” Sydney Morning Herald. February 24, 2013.
“Mahony answers questions under oath about clergy sex abuse cases; The former leader of the Los Angeles Archdiocese was reported to be ‘calm and seemingly collected’ throughout the 3 1/2 hour session stemming from a lawsuit involving a fugitive priest.” Los Angeles Times. February 24, 2013,
“Pope considering response to alleged ‘inappropriate acts’ by UK cardinal; Vatican confirms priests’ written allegations against Cardinal Keith O’Brien have been received and issue is in pontiff’s hands.” Guardian. February 24, 2013.
“Scotland’s archbishop contests “inappropriate behavior” claim.” CNN.com. February 25, 2013.
“Cardinal Keith O’Brien resigns as Archbishop.” BBC News. February 23, 2013.
“Scotland’s Archbishop Steps Down; Cardinal O’Brien Cites Ill Health, Doesn’t Address Abuse Allegations; He Won’t Vote to Pick New Pope.” Wall Street Journal. February 25, 2013.
“Cardinal Keith O’Brien departs with an apology but no admission as Pope forces him out over allegations of inappropriate behaviour; British Catholics reel as details emerge over claims of ‘unwanted advances’ towards clergy.” Independent. February 25, 2013.
“Senior Catholic Cleric Resigns After Allegations Of ‘Inappropriate’ Behavior Philip Reeves and Audie Cornish.” All Things Considered/National Public Radio. February 25, 2013.
“Benedict forced resignation of Britain’s most senior Roman Catholic in attempt to minimise the impact of allegations.” Guardian. February 25, 2013.
“For Cardinal Roger Mahony, social media is a powerful pulpit; Mahony’s online presence has continued to grow via Twitter and a blog, even as church leaders and Catholic groups continue to question his integrity over the sexual abuse.” cases.” Los Angeles Times. February 26, 2013.
“Cardinal Levada: Cardinal Mahony Should Help Select Pope.” Huffington Post. February 26, 2013.
“How next pope must tackle child sex abuse.” By Jeff Anderson. CNN. February 27, 2013
“Revealed: first claim against Cardinal Keith O’Brien; Cardinal Keith O’Brien stepped down with immediate effect on Monday.” Los Angeles Times. March 1, 2013
“Keith O’Brien, British Cardinal, Admits To Sexual Misbehavior.” Huffington Post. March 3, 2013.

INDIA

“Another temple theft in Kullu, cops clueless as ever.” By Suresh Sharma. Times of India. February 26, 2013. With thieves stealing idols, jewellery and donation boxes in temples without leaving any clue, millionaire deities of Kullu are no longer safe in temples as none of the stolen idols have been recovered in last two years. In yet another theft case, jewellery and donation box from Bhuvaneshwari temple of Kullu was found stolen on Saturday. Though police claim that all activities of thieves were captured by a CCTV camera installed in the temple, no arrest has been made so far. Temple priest Ambika Dutt Sharma said the temple gate was broken and silver ornaments and donation box were found missing. Idols and lingams from three temples have been stolen in a year but thieves are still out of reach of the police. On February 10, 2013, an idol, silver ‘chhatra’ and donation box of Raghunath temple of Garsa were stolen. Idols and jewellery of Takshak Nag of Bhanara village were found stolen in December 2012. A lingam and an idol were stolen from Ghatotkach temple in Manali in October 2012. Similarly, donation box of Siyali Mahadev temple was stolen few years back. Only articles stolen from Nashala temple could be recovered by police in recent years, while two thieves from Punjab were caught red-handed by villagers while stealing the idol of Kali Mata in Neuli village last year. Temples in Kullu are soft targets for thieves as due to the local belief system almost all temples in Kullu remain unlocked 24X7 without much security arrangements. Almost all villages in the valley have at least one temple and many of them have precious ashtadhatu idols and jewellery worth crores of rupees. Only few temples have installed CCTV cameras and their footage too fails to help police due to dark rooms. People here don’t believe in security in temples as it denotes people’s distrust in deities, who are supposed to provide security to its devotees.

HAITI

“What Happened To The Aid Meant To Rebuild Haiti?” By Jason Beaubien. Morning Edition/National Public Radio. February 28, 2013. After a devastating earthquake hit Haiti in 2010, governments and foundations from around the world pledged more than $9 billion to help get the country back on its feet. Only a fraction of the money ever made it. And Haiti’s President Michel Martelly says the funds aren’t “showing results.” Roughly 350,000 people still live in camps. Many others simply moved back to the same shoddily built structures that proved so deadly during the disaster. Martelly says the relief effort is uncoordinated and projects hatched from good intentions have undermined his government. “We don’t just want the money to come to Haiti. Stop sending money,” he tells Shots. “Let’s fix it,” he says, referring the international relief system.

IRELAND

“Irish Women Emerge From Shadows Of ‘National Shame’.” All Things Considered/National Public Radio. February 24, 2013 1:25 PM. In post-independence Ireland, thousands of women found themselves incarcerated in church-run laundries. For the first time, the state has apologized for their treatment. These women were a diverse group: former prostitutes, unwed mothers, orphans, homeless women, convicts and industrial school transfers put in the care of the Catholic Church. Nuns ran the facilities, known as Magdalene Laundries, on a commercial basis, doing laundry for the state, private companies and individuals. But the inmates were never paid for the work, and all profit went to the church. The first of such places opened in the 1930s, and the last laundry in Ireland closed in 1996. Until last Tuesday, these women never received any official recognition for their years lost in the system. “As a society, for many years we failed you. We forgot you or, if we thought of you at all, we did so in untrue and offensive stereotypes,” said Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny. “This is a national shame, for which I again say, I am deeply sorry and offer my full and heartfelt apologies.”

RELIGION

“British cardinal’s resignation underscores challenge to Catholic Church’s moral authority.” By Anthony Faiola, Washington Post. February 26, 2013. When Prime Minister David Cameron unveiled his plan to legalize same-sex marriage last year, Britain’s highest Roman Catholic cleric took to the national pulpit. Cardinal Keith O’Brien decried a “tyranny of tolerance,” calling gay marriage “grotesque” and saying no secular government had the moral authority to legalize such unions. On Monday, O’Brien, one of the church’s most strident voices against homosexuality, abruptly stepped down amid allegations of “intimate” acts with priests. His fall underscored perhaps the greatest challenge for the Roman Catholic hierarchy as it moves to elect a new pope: regaining its own moral authority. Nowhere is that more true than here in Europe, the continent where the global church is losing the most ground. The taint of scandal here was far fresher than in United States, with a new wave of revelations of sex abuse by European clergy emerging in 2010. Since then, evidence suggests that a long and gradual exodus from Roman Catholic pews has only accelerated, with tens of thousands of Europeans abandoning the faith.

“As it prepares to choose the next Pope, the Catholic Church must atone for the past before trying to shape its future.” Times of London. February 26, 2013. The four men who accused Cardinal Keith O’Brien of behaving inappropriately towards them as young priests have achieved their goal: he has resigned, and will not help to choose the next Pope. In the circumstances this is the right outcome, and Pope Benedict deserves praise for insisting on it.

SPAIN

“Spanish NGO uses blogging to link donors with Latin American recipients
Recession-hit Ayuda en Accion turns to social media in attempt to reverse sharp drop in sponsorship.” Guardian. February 27, 2013. Ayuda en Accion – Spain’s version of ActionAid – was an incongruous participant at a gathering of social media last week in Seville, EBE12. Now in its seventh year, EBE attracts bloggers and technology experts who network and swap ideas on the latest trends. Most participants were in their 20s, many carrying tablets and laptops – notepads and pens were a rarity. Mitchell Baker, chair of the Mozilla Foundation – which promotes openness on the web – was one of the big draws at this year’s event, which ended on a sodden Sunday amid unseasonable sheets of rain. So EBE is not the usual venue for a development NGO. Ayuda en Accion, however, is looking at ways to connect sponsors and beneficiaries in Latin America. It boils down to necessity being the mother of invention. The number of Ayuda en Accion’s sponsors has been falling in recent years and the NGO hopes to use social media to reverse the trend.

UK

“Postgraduate studies will be ‘domain of the wealthy.” By Richard Garner. Independent. February 25, 2013. Postgraduate studies risk becoming the preserve of the wealthy after a major slump in the number of students opting for the courses. Latest figures, obtained through a Parliamentary question, show an 8.5 per cent drop in take up of the courses between 2010/11 and 2011/12. The number of UK graduates opting to go on to further study fell from 171,210 to 156,600. The decline was most marked in the south-west where numbers fell by 20 per cent. In the north-west they fell by around 4,000 (or 16 per cent). Fees for undergraduate courses rose to as much as £9,000 a year last September. The figures, given by Universities Minister David Willetts, prompted a warning that Britain could be at risk of failing to compete on the economic world stage. Gareth Thomas, a Labour MP and a former higher education spokesman for the party, said: “The British economy needs its postgraduates more now than at any time before. “More and more of Britain’s future jobs are going to depend on cutting-edge research, imaginative new technologies and knowledge-based innovation. The drop in postgraduate numbers is a further sign of the crisis in higher education funding.”

“How the voluntary sector can save an overstretched NHS; There should be more discussion around the potential for voluntary organisations to complement the NHS.” By Paul Woodward. Guardian. February 25, 2013. In recent months, we have seen further evidence that some parts of the NHS are overstretched, struggling to cope with financial pressures and are sometimes failing to meet required quality standards. Many voluntary organisations have a detailed understanding of specific local needs, high levels of trust and engagement with local communities and the ability to work across multiple services to provide holistic care for individuals. Partnerships with the voluntary sector can be effective for the NHS, if trusts are open to working with other organisations to build specific services around the needs of their patients. This could enable the NHS to focus on the delivery of wider general services and avoid being overstretched due to the provision of resource-intense specialist care for specific conditions.

“What does professionalism mean in the voluntary sector?Coming across as professional can help charities to get funding and to attract the best employees and volunteers.” By Richard Cooper. Guardian. February 25, 2013. The term “voluntary” conjures up visions of well-meaning amateurs attempting to do good in a very British, slightly dysfunctional way. However, those working for charities know the reality of the sector is far from this, with some charities delivering services to those most in need far more effectively and efficiently than government bodies and other self-proclaimed professional organisations. In a recent survey conducted by the Charity Technology Trust and Microsoft, 69% of charities indicated that access to technology made them more professional at an organisational level, which they viewed as a positive benefit. So what exactly does professionalism mean in the voluntary sector? When I asked Andrew Jackson, director of social justice at the Kerith Centre, to describe what professionalism meant to him, he replied with another question: “Why shouldn’t the people we serve get the best?”

“Food banks surge leads to Defra inquiry; Research will study the effectiveness of emergency provision as fears increase over the impact of austerity measures.” By Patrick Butler. Guardian. February 24, 2013. Government officials have commissioned an investigation into the explosion in food banks, soup kitchens and school breakfast clubs as fears rise over the impact of austerity on the living standards of low-income families. The research will examine the extent and effectiveness of emergency food aid, amid concern that increasing numbers of low-paid and benefit-dependent households are forced to use charity food sources. The growth of food banks has become politically sensitive, with the Labour leader, Ed Miliband, citing them as a sign that the coalition’s austerity policies have left many low-income households in food poverty. Labour seized on the research, commissioned by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, as an admission that ministers and officials had been taken by surprise by the rapid growth in crisis food provision in Britain over the last three years. Labour’s food spokeswoman, Mary Creagh, said the investigation highlighted how behind the curve ministers were when it came to food poverty. “They have an awful lot of catching up to do on the reality of the nutritional recession affecting large numbers of people in the UK.” The research will explore what causes “at-risk individuals” to become “food aid users”. It will assess the impact of emergency food provision on recipients, including how much it alleviates the underlying causes of food poverty. It will look at the US, where charity food aid has become a core element of the welfare infrastructure over the past 30 years. An estimated 37 million people there receive charity food assistance, while in Canada an estimated 900,000 people use food banks each month.

“Live discussion: Crowdfunding; Join us on Tuesday 5th March from 1-3pm to discuss whether crowdfunding could be used to finance your charity campaign.” By Abby Young-Powell. Guardian. February 22, 2013. Barack Obama raised $137m during his campaign for US presidency by using crowdfunding. This method of fundraising is increasing in popularity in the voluntary sector, and many experts believe that it could provide an excellent source of finance for charities. Sites such as Buzzbnk, Solar Schools and Peoplefund.it allow organisations to raise money for a project online, through multiple donations or loans, from a number of donors, over a short period of time. This allows for more flexibility when donating and offers social loan options. Success stories include Cancer Research UK, which raised more than £1m through its My Projects platform – a site that allows donors to choose which particular research project they want to give to – and The Bicycle Academy, which raised £40,000.
However, charities need to ensure that they have a proper strategy in place in order for crowdfunding to be effective: “the [projects that] fail, fail very badly – they raise very, very little” Theresa Burton, chief executive and co-founder of Buzzbnk, has said. With that in mind, our Q&A will cover: • Whether crowdfunding could work for your charity or campaign; • The potential pitfalls; • The different approaches to consider. If you’d like to be on the expert panel, please contact Abby Young-Powell, and if you’d like to leave a question, please email or write in the comments section below.

“Who was Diana Kurzman? Donor leaves £1m for classical music; Posthumous gift to Arts Council England comes 10 years after mysterious piano-lover’s death.” By Nick Clark. Independent. February 25, 2013. A posthumous £1m donation from a woman who lived alone in an unremarkable block of brown-brick flats in North London has left the art world stumped. A decade ago, Diana Kurzman died alone in a flat in Windsor Court, close to Brent Cross tube station in Golders Green at the age of 59. She was unknown in the arts world, and leaves little record behind. Yet her substantial donation to Arts Council England to back classical music will see her legacy marked later this year. At least one of the beneficiaries has attempted to dig up more information about Ms Kurzman’s life, but beyond her dates of birth and death, and the fact that she had a passion for the piano, little has come to light. The £925,000 donation, which took Arts Council England completely by surprise, was “to be used at its discretion for the benefit of orchestras and the performance of chamber music and opera,” according to her will.

“How to get ahead in … training in the voluntary sector; As more employees train outside of work, there is the danger that development will get pushed aside.” By Debbie Andalo. Guardian. February 26, 2013. On-the-job training and development for people working in the voluntary sector is disappearing, according to latest workforce figures. The number of people who have received in-work training fell by nearly a quarter to 24.8% – in the 12 months ending September 2012, according to an analysis of the labour force survey published by Skills – Third Sector , the National Council for Voluntary Organisations and the Third Sector Research Centre. Staff are instead investing in training in their own time; the number of employees admitting they have spent time on their own professional development outside of office hours rose by 40.9% in the same period, the statistics show. Keith Mogford, chief executive of Skills – Third sector says: “I think we certainly have a concern about the climbing percentage of people getting trained outside of their work time but it is difficult to know how much that training relates to their needs in their current role or their potential progress in the sector. I think the two figures suggest that training budgets are being cut.” Veronique Jochun, research manager at NCVO, says the organisation wants statistics to be highlighted because during “hard times” there is a danger that training and development will get pushed aside. She says: “Carry on developing your staff, it does not have to be expensive, maybe do it in a more creative way where you do not have to invest much money.” Guaranteeing value for money in return for investment is critical, says Mogford. “It’s not just about looking for things which are free. It’s about spending the money you have more wisely and having procurement which is effective.” So what recommended options are available to those responsible for developing their organisation’s workforce? ment will get pushed aside.”

“People give to the charities that show donations make a difference; Evidence of the difference a charity makes is one of the main things supporters consider, a new survey shows.” By Abby Young-Powell. Guardian. February 27. 2013. Evidence of the impact donations make, along with a personal connection to a cause, are the biggest influences in giving to charity, new research has shown.
The survey of more than 160 business leaders and philanthropists across England and Scotland, carried out by Pilotlight, found that nearly 60% of respondents felt that information on the impact of a charity’s work was a deciding factor in their decision to donate. A personal link to a charity was another major factor, with more than 70% of philanthropists and city executives citing it as an important influence. Three in ten people were motivated to donate because of the funding crisis facing charities, and just over a quarter felt that fundraising campaigns influenced their decision. Fiona Halton, chief executive of Pilotlight, believes the research reinforces the need for charities to measure the impact of campaigns and be more business-like. She said: “Clearly donors now want more evidence of the impact a charity is having on the communities they serve. It’s also important that they are told how their donation contributes to the charity. With donations falling, charities need to be actively measuring their impact and talking about it if they want to attract donations of both time and money.” The research also found that 90% of business executives who engaged with a charity did so to “give something back”, and 60% joined for their own professional learning and development. Volunteering led to almost 40% of people increasing the amount of money they gave to a charity.

“How charities can make better use of social media; Social media is a useful way to engage in two-way communication and engage with supporters.” By David Lawrance. Guardian. February 28, 2013. Social media is an increasingly effective strategy for charities that want to connect with supporters. A recent survey showed that UK charitable organisations have doubled their supporters on key social media channels in the past year. Yet, for many charities, the vastness of the social media landscape is too daunting to venture into. At The Clare Foundation, we encourage tenants at our Buckinghamshire charity centre to take advantage of all the opportunities that social media channels offer. Our approach is to encourage charitable organisations to bring established commercial methods, business expertise and entrepreneurism to the voluntary sector. Maximising the effectiveness of social media is one area in which many charities need to catch up with commercial businesses. Charities rely on public support and so need to find new ways to reach their supporters, potential donors and volunteers. Social media can be one of the most effective ways for charities to build supporters, boost donations, share success stories, network with like-minded organisations, encourage people to sign up to campaigns, recruit volunteers, or demonstrate the impact of their work. With 80% of 18 to 24-year-olds and 73% of 25 to 34-year-olds using Facebook and Twitter respectively, these platforms are especially relevant to charities keen to engage with a younger generation of supporters.

“The rise of peer-to-peer recruitment in the voluntary sector; Economic pressures and increasingly diverse online networks have led to more formal schemes becoming the norm.” By Anita Pati. Guardian. March 1, 2013. Word of mouth recruitment has always existed in the voluntary sector – experiencing a volunteer’s fizz and energy first-hand for a cause is one of the best ways to motivate others. Bringing friends or family along to events has long been a staple of major donor fundraising. Now more formal peer-to-peer volunteer recruitment schemes are starting to follow this model, while volunteer champions, recruited to engage other volunteers, are becoming a more familiar feature of charities. As charity resources dwindle and the peer-to-peer nature of social media becomes the norm, using volunteer labour to attract others is an increasingly viable option and one endorsed by the government. A Cabinet Office spokesperson says: “We know that people are more likely to volunteer when a friend or peer recommends that they get involved and we support this approach when trying to recruit volunteers.” But the sector is still proving a little cautious, according to consultant Rob Jackson, co-author of The Complete Volunteer Management Handbook. He attributes this to what he believes is the wrongly-held perception that peer-to-peer can endanger diversity.

INTERNATIONAL

CATHOLIC SEX ABUSE SCANDAL

“Lawyers Question New York Cardinal in Milwaukee Suits.” By Laurie Goodstein. New York Times. February 20, 2013. The lawyers deposing Cardinal Dolan represent hundreds of people who say they were sexually molested by priests in the Archdiocese of Milwaukee, which he led for seven years before his appointment as archbishop of New York in 2009. The lawyers want to know when Cardinal Dolan, as archbishop of Milwaukee, learned of allegations against certain priests, and how quickly he made those allegations public. Cardinal Dolan is one of two American cardinals who are being deposed in sexual abuse lawsuits this week, and who plan to travel to Rome next week in advance of the proceedings to elect the successor to Pope Benedict XVI, who announced last week that he was resigning Feb. 28. The other American is Cardinal Roger M. Mahony, the retired archbishop of Los Angeles. He is expected to be deposed on Saturday in Los Angeles, and he has been under fire since the court-ordered release last month of 12,000 pages of internal church files revealing his role in shielding accused priests from the law. A spokesman for the Archdiocese of New York, Joseph Zwilling, said that Cardinal Dolan had cooperated fully with the deposition.
Related stories:
“U.N. Faults U.S. For Failure To Prosecute Abusive Clerics.” Huffington Post/Religion News Service. February 21, 2013.
“Cover-up: the priest, the archbishop and a hurt 14-year-old girl.” Sydney Morning Herald. February 23, 2013.
“Church cover-up exposed by chance internet search.” Sydney Morning Herald. February 23, 2013.
“Priests claim cardinal was ‘inappropriate’; Britain’s most senior Catholic cleric is accused over his behaviour towards younger clergy.” Independent. February 24, 2013.
“UK’s top cardinal accused of ‘inappropriate acts’ by priests; Three priests and former priest report Cardinal Keith O’Brien to Vatican over claims stretching back 33 years.” The Observer/Guardian. February 23, 2013.
“Catholics Gather in California, Haunted by Cardinal’s Scandal.” New York Times. February 23, 2013

“How can charities attract young trustees to their boards? A diverse charity board with trustees of all ages can improve decision making and make the organisation much more effective.” By Sophie Hudson. Guardian. February 20, 2013. Research carried out last year by Trustees Unlimited found that 20% of trustees said their charity board lacked a diverse range of skills, and over half believed that a more diverse board would enhance their charity’s effectiveness. Charity boards have long been criticised for lacking young trustees. According to research released by the Charity Commission in 2010, only 0.5% of charity trustees were aged 18-24. The report, called a Breath of Fresh Air, also found the mean age of a charity trustee was 57. Neal Green, senior policy adviser at the Charity Commission, says it has not gathered statistics on the number of young people on boards since 2010, but that involvement in Trustees’ Week has been very encouraging. “There’s a sense of a bit of a buzz,” he says. “Some charities are starting to have more diverse boards, but not many.” But is it really that important for charities to include young people on their boards? And, if so, how can charities encourage this?

IRELAND

“Magdalene laundries: Ireland to apologise to survivors; Irish premier Enda Kenny to issue state apology to up to 10,000 women who were held in institutions and treated as virtual slaves.” By Henry McDonald. Guardian. February 18, 2013. The Irish premier will finally issue a state apology to up to 10,000 women who were incarcerated in Catholic-run laundries, where they were treated as virtual slaves. Enda Kenny’s statement comes after the Fine Gael-Labour government in Dublin faced withering criticism from support groups for survivors of the Magdalene laundries, angered over his initial unwillingness to apologise to them a fortnight ago. This followed the release of a report that detailed the suffering the women endured in the nun-run institutions from the 1920s. The report compiled by Senator Martin McAleese found there was state involvement in sending the women to the laundries, simply in many cases because girls came from broken homes or were unmarried mothers. Kenny’s apology is expected to go along with fresh compensation for about 800 women who were held in the mostly industrial institutions across Ireland. The compensation deal will include counselling services, healthcare and individual payments the Irish government hopes can be implemented without the involvement of lawyers and hefty legal bills.

PHILANTHROPY

“Philanthropy: Globalising giving.” Economist. February 19, 2013. The mission led by Warren Buffett and Bill Gates to make large-scale philanthropy the norm among the super rich has just won a dozen new converts. For the first time, those taking the Buffett-Gates “Giving Pledge” come from outside America, according to the announcement on February 19th. The total number of billionaires pledging to give away at least half their wealth by the end of their lives now stands at 102.
The new signatories are an interesting mix of rich and emerging-economy money.

RELIGION

“The Pope’s Muffled Voice.” By Frank Bruni. Opinion. New York Times. February 18, 2013. There were reports over the weekend that cardinals might tweak the rules and begin the conclave to choose Pope Benedict XVI’s successor sooner than March 15, which had been the earliest date mentioned. That would be a blessing. Already in the American news media it’s all pope all the time, a tsunami of papal coverage, and until a new pope is named, the tide won’t quit. You’d be forgiven for concluding that he’ll actually have significant sway over Catholics in this country. He won’t, not over the majority of them, not in any immediate sense. And it’s worth pausing, amid this hoopla, to remember that. In large parts of the Roman Catholic world, certainly in North America and Western Europe, most Catholics don’t feel any particular debt or duty to the self-appointed caretakers of their church. They don’t feel bound by the pope’s interpretation of doctrine or moral commands. And many regard him and other Vatican officials as totems, a royal family of dubious relevance, partly because these officials have often shown greater concern for the church’s reputation than for the needs, and wounds, of the people in the pews.

“Church Helps Fill a Void in Africa.” By Adam Mossiter. New York Times. February 23, 2013. The young woman slept soundly on the cool marble floor before the altar, a break from the chaos at home. In the courtyard, neighborhood teenagers filled giant jerrycans with purified water from a stone fountain. In an aisle, a rail-thin young woman from a nearby slum said she had not eaten since yesterday but was expecting sustenance here. Behind its high spiked iron gates in this frenetic megalopolis of anywhere between 11 million and 21 million, the church of Christ the King is protector, feeder and healer. With 16 percent of the world’s Catholics now living in Africa, the church’s future, many say, is here. The Catholic population in Africa grew nearly 21 percent between 2005 and 2010, far outstripping other parts of the world. While the number of priests in North America and Europe declined during the same period, in Africa they grew by 16 percent. The seminaries, clerical officials here say, are bursting with candidates, and African priests are being sent to take over churches in former colonial powers. Untainted by the child sexual abuse scandals, the church here draws parishioners, many in their 20s and 30s, who flock eagerly to services, which can last hours, with no complaints.

UK

“Charities must talk about their failures as well as their successes; Charities should be more willing to come forward when experiencing problems.” By Becky Slack. Guardian. February 18, 2013. “To err is human; to forgive divine” wrote Alexander Pope in the 18th century. Unfortunately, this pearl of wisdom is oft forgotten when it comes to the work of charities. These days donors want to see more bang for their buck and can be less than forgiving when things don’t go according to plan. Take international development. In less than 1,000 days time, the deadline by which the millennium development goals are supposed to have been achieved will expire. Amid coverage of the international community’s failure to meet these very public goals, non-profit organisations will have their work cut out to prove to donors their efforts have not been wasted. So how exactly should charities handle communications when things haven’t gone to plan?

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“Advice on cutting through red tape; Experts share advice on how voluntary sector organisations can minimise bureaucratic procedural delays in the first of our two part series.” Guardian. February 21, 2013. Kazia Knight is the chairwoman of Friends of Sandringham Park in Wetherby. After two years of cutting through the red tape created by two governing authorities, she gives her advice. Get organised for your risk assessment. Download a risk assessment template, fill it in and save it. This will provide you with the information you need to look at what risks there are. This can be used every time a risk assessment form is needed. Just remember to keep it updated. This template brings together your risk assessment, your health and safety policy, and your record of health and safety arrangements into one document to help you get started and save time.
Related story:
“Advice for charities on cutting through red tape – part two; Charities must consider finances and monitor who uses facilities in order to minimise bureaucratic procedure.” Guardian. February 22, 2013.

“Live discussion: Crowdfunding; Join us on Tuesday 5th March from 1-3pm to discuss whether crowdfunding could be used to finance your charity campaign.” By Abby Young-Powell. Guardian. February 22, 2013. Barack Obama raised $137m during his campaign for US presidency by using crowdfunding. This method of fundraising is increasing in popularity in the voluntary sector, and many experts believe that it could provide an excellent source of finance for charities. Sites such as Buzzbnk, Solar Schools and Peoplefund.it allow organisations to raise money for a project online, through multiple donations or loans, from a number of donors, over a short period of time. This allows for more flexibility when donating and offers social loan options. Success stories include Cancer Research UK, which raised more than £1m through its My Projects platform – a site that allows donors to choose which particular research project they want to give to – and The Bicycle Academy, which raised £40,000. However, charities need to ensure that they have a proper strategy in place in order for crowdfunding to be effective: “the [projects that] fail, fail very badly – they raise very, very little” Theresa Burton, chief executive and co-founder of Buzzbnk, has said. With that in mind, our Q&A will cover: • Whether crowdfunding could work for your charity or campaign; • The potential pitfalls; • The different approaches to consider. If you’d like to be on the expert panel, please contact Abby Young-Powell, and if you’d like to leave a question, please email or write in the comments section below.

INTERNATIONAL

CATHOLIC SEX ABUSE SCANDAL

“L.A. Catholics Want Next Pope To Address Sex-Abuse Scandals.” By Shereen Marisol Meraji. Morning Edition/National Public Radio. February 12, 2013. The Archdiocese of Los Angeles is the largest in the U.S. and Latinos make up a majority of its parishioners. Latino Catholics there are hopeful a new papacy will bring an end to the child sex-abuse scandals that have rocked the archdiocese. The Pope’s departure comes as the largest Catholic diocese in the United States is struggling with recent revelations from newly released records about sexual abuse by priests. Now, the man in the middle of that scandal, Cardinal Roger Mahoney, will be among the cardinals who elect a successor to Pope Benedict. Latinos make up 70 percent of the Los Angeles Archdiocese. NPR’s Shereen Marisol Meraji reports on their reaction to the pope’s resignation.
Related stories:
“Mahony voting for a new pope rankles some Catholics; Cardinal Roger Mahony was relieved of all public duties amid revelations about his handling of the sex abuse scandals. But now he’s one of 117 cardinals who will elect a successor to Benedict XVI.” Los Angeles Times. February 11, 2013.
“Pontiff’s mission clouded by sex abuse scandal; Efforts to foster traditions, faith split Catholics.” Boston Globe/Associated Press. February 12, 2013.
“Brother accused of child abuse left unsupervised.” Sydney Morning Herald. February 14, 2013.
“L.A. Archdiocese adds priests’ names to abuse list; The archdiocese declines to release information about the complaints, including the number of accusers and the parishes where the men worked.” Los Angeles Times. February 13, 2013.
“The End of a Catholic Moment.” By Ross Douthat. Opinion. New York Times. February 16, 2013.

CHAD

“French charity workers jailed for trying to smuggle ‘orphans’ out of Chad; “Arche de Zoé founder and partner planned to hand over 103 children to would-be adoptive parents who paid up to €6,000.” By Angelique Chrisafis. Guardian. February 12, 2013. A former fireman and a circus performer have been sentenced to two years in prison for attempting to smuggle 103 children out of Chad claiming they were Darfur war orphans and then hand them to would-be adoptive parents in France who had paid large sums to “save” children in crisis.
Eric Bréteau, who founded the charity Arche de Zoé (Zoe’s Ark), and his partner Emilie Lelouch were described by a Paris judge as “megalomaniacs”, which caused them to laugh as they sat in court. They had not been present at their trial in December, preferring to stay in South Africa where they ran a guest house, tourist flight tours and a circus troop. But they unexpectedly arrived in court for sentencing amid speculation that an international arrest warrant would have been issued. Bréteau and Lelouch were arrested with 13 others in October 2007 at Abéché airport, on Chad’s eastern border with Sudan. Local authorities had become suspicious after a charter plane with a Spanish airline crew landed at the remote airport. Police pounced when the French charity workers arrived and tried to board with a crowd of children ranging from toddlers to 10-year-olds who were wearing fake bandages to make them look ill and who had not been declared to officials. Dozens of families, mainly French, had paid between €2,800 and €6,000 to the charity to house a child from wartorn Darfur. The would-be parents, recruited on online adoption forums, waited at an airport east of Paris with warm clothing for the children, having prepared bedrooms and new lives for them.

COOPERATIVES

“Co-ops, Not Cogmasters, Offer the Innovation We Need.” By Taliesin Nyala. Interpress Service (ipsnews.net). February 13, 2013. Negative comments at the end of an article or blog are nothing new. However, after recently reading a story about a local co-op group that my worker-owned cooperative is part of, I was struck by the mentally lazy vitriol of the first commenters. The article was about a new loan fund to help small co-ops, which is not exactly ire-raising news. Within a couple of hours of its posting, two commenters stated that this was “useless crap” and that those of us in worker co-ops spend our time singing Kumbaya.
This is not the first time I’ve come across negative responses to articles about co-ops and cooperative endeavors. The problem is not that these comments are critical of co-ops. The problem is that they are superficial, ignorant, and lack nuance. These comments take a complex idea and try to simplify it, bypassing meaningful discussion along the way. There are certainly things to critique about co-ops, but too often people don’t have that conversation. Those who are making these simple critiques have loud voices, and it seems that the strength of their voices are directly correlated to the weakness of their arguments.

MEDIA

‘Q&A: Community Radio Reflects Levels of Democracy.” George Gao interviews MARCELO SOLERVICENS, Secretary-General of AMARC.” Interpress Service (ipsnews.net). February 15, 2013. In 1983, producers of popular radio, alternative radio and educational radio convened in Montreal to define a new genre of radio: community radio. Those dialogues led to the formation of the World Association of Community Radio Broadcasters (AMARC). The ethos behind community radio, says Marcelo Solervicens, secretary-general of AMARC, is that it extends the public sphere to ordinary citizens, reducing the distance between those who speak and those who listen. Through this service-oriented platform, community radio has empowered a variety of practitioners, ranging from farmers in rural villages, to university students and trade union workers. “Community radio came from the need for people to express themselves at local (and national) levels… but from their own perspectives,” said Solervicens. He cited the use of community radio by U.N. and civil society organisations in various aspects of development: by providing information for farmers facing climate change; by informing populations threatened by HIV AIDS; and by organising cholera-ridden communities in Haiti. In the spirit of World Radio Day on Wednesday, Solervicens spoke with IPS correspondent George Gao. Excerpts from the interview follow.

RELIGION

“Europe Remains Challenge for Church.” By Stacy Meichtry and John D. Stoll. Wall Street Journal. February 12, 2013. As Pope Benedict XVI prepares to relinquish his office, church leaders planning for a new pontiff are sure to deliberate over one of his longtime goals: replenishing Europe’s deserted pews. From the start of his pontificate in 2005, the pope focused on the decline in Christianity across the Continent, saying religious faith had been pushed to the margins of public life in the church’s historic home. The pope aimed to reverse this trend by taking his message on the road in countries such as Germany, France, Spain and Italy, where many people are nominally Catholic but fewer actually practice. Speaking before massive crowds, the pontiff took European leaders to task, saying they encroached on religious freedoms such as the right to display Christian symbols in public schools. He called on Catholics to defend their church customs publicly. Pope Benedict also launched a new Vatican department charged with finding ways to re-evangelize Europe and other regions where secular trends were spreading, including the Americas. Vatican analysts say there is little doubt the next pope will pick up where Pope Benedict left off in his “new evangelization” mission to lure lapsed Catholics back to the fold, with secular trends tugging at the church’s foundations in Europe perceived as a threat to the entire global flock.
Related story:
“Catholics Need a Pope for the ‘New Evangelization’; The next pontiff must nurture Catholicism where it is growing and revive it where it is not.” Wall Street Journal. February 12, 2013.
“A Laboratory for Revitalizing Catholicism.” New York Times. February 14, 2013.

“Inside the Vatican: The $8 billion global institution where nuns answer the phones.” By Alastair Jamieson. NBC News. February 15, 2012. As the Catholic church prepares to choose its second leader in a decade, the world’s eyes are once again focused on the complex and secretive ways of the Vatican. In mid-March, 117 cardinals will be locked inside its walls until they decide who should next attempt to govern one of humankind’s most enduring, yet bewildering, institutions. Their new pope must not only provide spiritual leadership to followers in more than 180 countries around the globe, but also reconcile deep divisions within the two-and-a-half square miles of the Vatican itself, on the left bank of Rome’s Tiber river. In his homily at Mass late Wednesday, Pope Benedict XVI spoke of “sins against the unity of the Church,” hinting at the office politics of an organization worth at least $8 billion but which features a switchboard operated by nuns. Each day, some of the Vatican City’s 1,900 lay workers leave the cacophony of traffic-choked Rome and step across the white lines that mark the state boundaries. Inside, they assist up to 2,800 global employees of the Holy See – including cardinals and archbishops – to the sound of choirs and the leading of prayers. “It’s only a normal workplace if having a Raphael fresco on the office wall is normal,” said George Weigel, NBC News Vatican analyst and author of “Witness to Hope,” the best-selling biography of Pope John Paul II. More than 5 million tourists see inside the Vatican’s grounds and museums every year – almost as many as New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art – but the power lies away from the cameras. One of the possible candidates for the papal role, Canadian Archbishop John Michael Miller, gave an insight into this very private world.

“Pope Benedict XVI’s leaked documents show fractured Vatican full of rivalries.” By Jason Horowitz. Washington Post. February 16, 2013. Guests at the going-away party for Carlo Maria Viganò couldn’t understand why the archbishop looked so forlorn. Pope Benedict XVI had appointed Viganò ambassador to the United States, a plum post where he would settle into a stately mansion on Massachusetts Avenue, across the street from the vice president’s residence. “He went through the ordeal making it very clear he was unhappy with it,” said one former ambassador to the Vatican, who attended the Vatican Gardens ceremony in the late summer of 2011. “And we just couldn’t figure out, us outsiders and non-Italians, what was going on.” There was no such confusion within Vatican walls. Benedict had installed Viganò to enact a series of reforms within the Vatican. But some of Rome’s highest-ranking cardinals undercut the efforts and hastened Viganò’s exile to the United States. Viganò’s plight and other unflattering machinations would soon become public in an unprecedented leak of the pontiff’s personal correspondence. Much of the media — and the Vatican — focused on the source of the shocking security breach. Largely lost were the revelations contained in the letters themselves — tales of rivalry and betrayal, and allegations of corruption and systemic dysfunction that infused the inner workings of the Holy See and the eight-year papacy of Benedict XVI. Last week, he announced that he will become the first pope in nearly 600 years to resign. The next pope may bring with him an invigorating connection to the Southern Hemisphere, a media magnetism or better leadership skills than the shy and cerebral Benedict. But whoever he may be, the 266th pope will inherit a gerontocracy obsessed with turf and Italian politics, uninterested in basic management practices and hostile to reforms.

UK

“Secret Social Entrepreneur | Many social enterprises are critically ill. Social enterprises and charities have become politically untouchable. But is their governance good enough?” Guardian. February 11, 2013. I had stepped down as director several years before. The administrator’s form was short. A dozen questions, a date here, a tick there. After I’d signed off, the pen lingered in my hand. The last question asked, in accountancy terms; in your opinion, why did this enterprise fail? I didn’t lie. I wrote one of several reasons why it failed, but I didn’t share my opinion. I suppose this series of articles is about the things we don’t say, that we think about, that we know should matter. From the beginning of my career, I saw the characteristics of what I am writing about. As a newbie to the sector I was informed by the influential perspectives and with which the sector chooses to represent itself. I didn’t realise immediately that some of the charming characteristics could actually be symptoms of an illness, because the sector generalises in positive tones. Some enterprises have very sick governance and most social enterprises are carriers of a disease that could kill them, surviving on artificial life support. There is not enough public failure – what there is actively hidden and ignored. Where is the useful criticism of the sector?

“Exclusive: Cash for academies: Michael Gove ‘bribes’ schools to change their status; Claims taxpayers’ money is being spent on ‘buying off’ critics of the Education Secretary’s pet project.” By James Cusick and Richard Garner. Independent. February 13, 2013. Officials from Michael Gove’s department are offering £65,000 “bribes” to convince reluctant headteachers to convert their schools to academies. The sweeteners are being offered to schools which drop their opposition to academy status – sparking claims that taxpayers’ money is being spent on “buying off” critics of the Education Secretary’s pet project. Teaching leaders described the incentives as “questionable” and “disturbing” at a time when overall education budgets are being cut. The Independent understands £40,000 in payments have been offered to 32 schools in Lancashire alone, with similar sums offered to schools in other parts of the country. Some schools have also been offered £25,000 towards legal fees. In a letter to Mr Gove’s department obtained by this newspaper, Tony Roberts, from the NAHT headteachers’ union, criticises two “brokers” – officials from the Department for Education (DfE) tasked with converting state schools to academics – for offering payments to win over a reluctant group of state schools in Lancashire. The DfE did not deny that incentives were being deployed, but said the additional cash was for “improvements” to be made in schools where it was necessary. The sanctioned use of cash to persuade state school to make the switch to academies will be another embarrassment for Mr Gove. The news has emerged after a leaked memo last week revealed the Education Secretary, pictured, is considering the outright privatisation of academies and free schools, enabling them to abandon their charitable status and become profit-making.

“What is Britain’s contribution to social enterprise? Roundup of expert advice from our live Q&A on Britain’s unique selling point in the social enterprise world.” Guardian. February 13, 2013.

“Live discussion: Leadership in the voluntary sector.” Join us from 1-3pm on Tuesday 19th February to discuss voluntary sector leadership. Guardian. February 14, 2013. Concerns about loss of voice and cuts to services make it more important than ever for the sector to speak with a strong voice. Research from the Third Sector Research Centre points out the importance of field specific leadership, such as umbrella bodies for those working in mental health, housing or criminal justice. However, there is an important role for national leadership. Many organisations do not have the time or resources to influence the policies that affect their organisations or beneficiaries, and national leadership plays an important role in influencing policy and public debate. As concerns are raised about the ability of organisations to speak out on behalf of their beneficiaries, leadership may need to focus more on campaigning. There may be an increased need for leaders to protect the voice and interests of voluntary organisations and those they represent. With that in mind our discussion will ask: • How will voluntary sector leaders of the future differ from the leaders of today? • How can organisations develop leadership from their own ranks? • Are existing leadership structures in the sector fit for purpose, or do we need something different? • Is there a London bias in third sector leadership – and does this matter? If you’d like to be on the expert panel, please contact Abby Young-Powell, and if you’d like to leave a question, please email or write in the comments section below.

“Tips on recruiting student volunteers; Jennie Mann advises on the best way to engage and recruit student volunteers.” Guardian. February 14, 2013. Student Volunteers are already making a huge impact across the UK; if you are not engaging with them already then you are missing a trick. The facts: In 2011/2012 there were 1,411,975 undergraduates and 309,425 postgraduate students studying in the UK, contributing an estimated 3,459,653 hours of volunteering each year and providing a £42m boost to the UK economy. Organisations that already engage with student volunteers will be well aware of the positive difference students can make. Student volunteers are no different from any other volunteers, in that they wish to carry out meaningful work and see tangible benefits from the time they donate. Many are highly conscious of their employment prospects, seeing volunteering not only as a worthwhile activity, but also as a way of developing their skills for their future careers.

“Making sense of charitable giving statistics; When surveys produce contradictory findings about donations, it can be difficult for charities to glean any insight from them.” By Sophie Hudson. Guardian. February 13, 2013. When the Charities Aid Foundation and the National Council for Voluntary Organisations (NCVO) released their UK Giving 2012 report in November, the findings were met with a fairly high degree of cynicism. The research found that donations in 2011-12 fell by 20% to £9.3bn – a fall of £2.3bn in real terms. Many in the sector, including the Institute of Fundraising, publicly questioned the long-established report, saying the findings did not reflect experiences on the ground. Soon after, fundraising software company Blackbaud released its Donor Perspectives: an investigation into what drives your donors to give report, which found that almost a quarter of donors said they had increased the amount they had given to charity in 2012. It found that 60% of respondents said they had given the same amount as in the previous year, and 17% said they had given less. Over the past year, countless other surveys have been released by various organisations – all presenting varying pictures of the state of giving in the UK.With so many, often contradictory, statistics on offer, how exactly can fundraisers build an accurate picture of the public’s propensity to give, in order to help inform their own strategies?

“Arts cuts so deep even the Tate may charge; Britain’s galleries may charge for entry again, warns Tate trustee, as councils trim their budgets even further.” By Chris Stevenson and Natasha Bowler. Independent. February 17, 2013. A trustee of the Tate galleries warned this weekend that if cuts to the arts continue at their current pace, it is “likely” the Government will allow museums and arts spaces to start charging for entry in what he called a further “brutalising” of the culture sector. As councils around the country lay out their budgets for the coming three years, most seeking to slash the money they spend on the arts, contemporary artist Bob and Roberta Smith – the professional name of Patrick Brill – vented his anger at the “irresponsible” attitude of council leaders, and lamented that he could foresee entry to museums and galleries being put out of the reach of many people by the reintroduction of admission charges. Labour abolished these for national collections in 2001, since when attendance figures have soared. Brill believes the Tate is “100 per cent committed” to free entry. A spokeswoman confirmed: “Tate has no plans to change this.” And while the trustee does not believe the Government could mandate charging, because many institutions are more “autonomous than they used to be”, he is concerned. “I think there would be a lot of pressure for organisations to make up their own minds about that. If [the Government] whip up public opinion against the arts in the way that they have done, then suddenly the tables change and I think it is quite likely that they will say that.” As for the leaders of councils across the UK, the artist believes that they are using the arts as a means of representing how tough they are being on budget reductions but are misrepresenting their constituents.

INTERNATIONAL

AUSTRALIA

“Donations to Queensland flood appeal fall short of expectations.” Sydney Morning Herald. February 5, 2013. The head of Queensland’s flood appeal says donations are so low they won’t go anywhere near helping those who have lost all their possessions. Terry Mackenroth said only $6 million had been raised, including $1 million each from the state and federal governments. ”For the amount of devastation I’ve seen just through watching television, it is not going to go anywhere near paying the sorts of claims we will receive,” he said. ”When someone’s house has been flooded, they probably don’t even have a toothbrush. They’ve lost everything.” Mr Mackenroth said just to make emergency payments, the committee would need to raise between $15 million and $25 million. He cited the flood appeal two years ago that raised $250 million, and the cyclone Larry appeal, which raised $25 million. The Queensland Flood Appeal Committee met for the first time on Monday at the Red Cross Queensland headquarters in Brisbane. Mr Mackenroth said members would be briefed on how many households would need help, begin outlining eligibility criteria and decide when applications could open. The first emergency payments would not be means-tested, but larger payouts are expected to require some proof of eligibility. Mr Mackenroth said he was conscious of criticism from the appeal two years ago about how long it took for payments to be made.

“One man’s gift highlights our poor form; Graham Tuckwell’s $50 million donation has raised the bar, writes Deborah Snow.” Sydney Morning Herald. February 9, 2013. Graham Tuckwell is a former state-school boy who describes his time at the Australian National University in the 1970s as ”life-transforming”. So transforming, in fact, that it helped him make a fortune in electronically traded commodities and shot him to the status of national treasure this week when he made a $50 million donation to his alma mater for a scholarship fund. Citing lifelong indebtedness to his lecturers (who tutored him in economics and econometrics) Tuckwell said he was publicising his extraordinary generosity in part to send a signal to other financially well-upholstered Australians. Some, he said pointedly – without naming names – had ”not put the majority of their wealth behind strong philanthropic causes” and instead had passed it down to ”later generations who have behaved badly … I think that’s a really bad example”. Tuckwell’s grand gesture is one that critics of the notorious parsimony of Australia’s upper crust hope to see as a tipping point for philanthropy here.
There have been other multimillion-dollar donations from a small group of high-profile Australians in recent years – businessmen Simon Mordant, John Kinghorn, John Kaldor and John Grill to name a few. But on the whole, Australia has markedly lagged the US, and to a lesser extent Britain and Canada, in the culture of giving. Peak advisory body Philanthropy Australia says tax statistics show that it remains the ”exception rather than a norm” for so-called ”high-net-worth” and ”ultra high-net-worth” individuals to make substantial donations. About a third of those earning more than $1 million a year were not claiming any tax deductions at all for charitable giving in 2004-05. And Australia’s moneyed elite gave at a ”lower level than their counterparts in the USA, Canada and the UK despite comparable wealth levels,” the organisation found.

CATHOLIC SEX ABUSE SCANDAL

“Sexual Abuse Scandal Grips and Divides Hispanic Parishioners in Los Angeles.” By Jennifer Medina and Ian Lovett. New York Times. February 3, 2013. t Dolores Mission Church in Boyle Heights, there was no shrinking from the news reverberating through the pews. The Rev. Scott Santarosa spent time usually reserved for the homily talking instead about what he called “really painful stuff.” After Mass, over menudo and pan dulce, parishioners tried to make sense of the events that cascaded at the end of last week. First, the release of thousands of documents detailing decades of sexual abuse and cover-ups, then the current archbishop reprimanding his predecessor, Cardinal Roger M. Mahony, who responded with an angry missive of his own. Known for his outspoken views on immigrants’ rights, Cardinal Mahony was seen as a tireless ally here among Latinos, who make up about 70 percent of the four million Catholics in the country’s largest archdiocese. He could celebrate Mass in flawless Spanish, and was at times affectionately referred to as “Rogelio.” But with the release of documents that make it increasingly clear that Cardinal Mahony shielded priests accused of child abuse from investigations by law enforcement officials, his legacy as a champion of immigrants may soon be overshadowed. Conversations with dozens of parishioners at three largely Spanish-speaking churches here illustrate how divided the faithful still are over the abuse and the way church officials have handled the scandal. There is internal conflict even among the parishioners themselves: Is Cardinal Mahony the hero they once thought, or is he someone who deserves to be punished? Is abuse a thing of the past, or does the church need to make even more radical changes? And, many added with a visible wince, what will happen to the victims?
Related stories:
“Los Angeles Archdiocese Is Accused of Failing to Release All Abuse Records.” New York Times. February 4, 2013.
“L.A. Archdiocese considers $200-million fund drive amid scandal; A consulting firm has been hired to study the feasibility of a campaign. The funds could be used to erase debts brought on by the priest sex abuse scandal.” Los Angeles Times. February 5, 2013.
“California: Archdiocese Will Release More Files.” New York Timeshttp://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/07/us/california-archdiocese-will-release-more-files.html?ref=todayspaper. February 6, 2013.
“The Priest That Preyed.” Op-ed. New York Times. February 6, 2013.
“California: Detectives Examining Church Documents.” New York Times. February 5, 2013.
“The Archbishop Rebukes the Cardinal.” New York Times. February 8, 2013.
“Politics and pop in California and on campus; Sexual Abuse and Cover-up in the Catholic Church: A Q&A With Filmmaker Alex Gibney.” Nation. February 8, 2013.

“Cardinal Mahony used cemetery money to pay sex abuse settlement; The Archdiocese of L.A. took $115 million from its cemeteries’ maintenance fund in 2007, nearly depleting it. The move seems legal, but it was not announced, and relatives of the dead were not told.” Los Angeles Times. February 9, 2013.

“Suspected child molester left L.A. archdiocese for L.A. schools; The former priest, Joseph Pina, did not work with children in his district job, L.A. schools Supt. John Deasy said. L.A. Unified is looking into Pina’s hiring..” By Howard Blume. Los Angeles Times. February 4, 2013. A former priest and suspected child molester left employment with the Los Angeles archdiocese to work for the L.A. Unified School District, officials confirmed Sunday. The former clergyman, Joseph Pina, did not work with children in his school district job, L.A. schools Supt. John Deasy said. He added that, as a result of the disclosures, Pina would no longer be employed by the nation’s second-largest school system. Over the weekend, Deasy was unable to pull together Pina’s full employment history, but said the district already was looking into the matter of Pina’s hiring. “I find it troubling,” he said of the disclosures about Pina. “And I also want to understand what knowledge that we had of any background problems when hiring him, and I don’t yet know that.” L.A. Unified itself has come under fire in the last year for its handling of employees accused of sexual misconduct. Pina, 66, was laid off from his full-time district job last year, but returned to work episodically to organize events. One event he may have helped organize was a ribbon-cutting Saturday for a new education facility. School district officials over the weekend, however, could not confirm that. Pina did not attend the event, and the district could not confirm payment for any help he may have provided. Pina’s name emerged in documents released by the archdiocese to comply with a court order. His case was one of many in which church officials failed to take action to protect child victims and in which first consideration was given to helping the offending priests rather than their victims, according to the documentation.
Related story:
“Ex-priest remained in L.A. Unified despite red flags; Joseph Pina remained employed by the L.A. school district for more than a decade despite warnings about his sexual history, according to interviews and records.” Los Angeles Times. February 4, 2013.

IRELAND

“Irish Apology on Workhouses.” By Jeanne Whalen. Wall Street Journal. February 5, 2013. Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny apologized for the harsh conditions suffered by generations of women forced to work in so-called Magdalen Laundries, after a report found that the state helped finance the church-run workhouses and steered women into them. Roughly 10,000 women spent time in the laundries between 1922 and the closing of the last one in 1996, working in “harsh and physically demanding” conditions for no pay, the report said. State institutions, including courts, hospitals and social services, were involved in referring about a quarter of these women to the laundries, the report found. “To those residents who went into the Magdalen Laundries through a variety of ways—26% of them from state involvement—…I am sorry for those people that they lived in that kind of environment,” Mr. Kenny told Ireland’s Parliament on Tuesday. “I admire their courage for speaking out” to the committee that compiled the report, he said. The report played down perceptions that women in the laundries were physically or sexually abused. “However, the majority of women described the atmosphere in the Laundries as cold, with a rigid and uncompromising regime of physically demanding work and prayer, with many instances of verbal censure, scoldings or even humiliating put-downs,” Mr. McAleese wrote. The state was aware of conditions inside the laundries, through various inspections and visits by social workers and others, the report concluded. State institutions also were customers of some of the laundries. Other customers included hotels, schools and individuals.
Related stories:
“Irish Premier’s Apology Fails to Appease Workhouse Survivors.” New York Times. February 5, 2013.
“Panel: Ireland Confined Young Women In Workhouses.” Morning Edition/ National Public Radio. February 6, 2013.

UK

“Tackling negative attitudes towards fundraising costs; Educating donors about the true costs of fundraising is key to maintaining public confidence in charities.” By Becky Slack. Guardian. February 4, 2013. There’s nothing like a discussion about a charity’s costs to get the public feeling hot under the collar. Comments such as “charity chief executives are paid too much”, “I can’t stand those chuggers. Can you believe they’re paid?,” and “It feels like my donations disappear down a black hole,” have been part of many a pub, dinner table and online conversation. Why does this matter? As the latest nfpSynergy report into public trust in charities points out, although the sector currently enjoys high levels of confidence, it is a volatile situation with attitudes influenced by what people think and hear. “Our only ability to assess the value of our donations is through what the charity tells us and by our experience of our interactions with that charity. If trust in charities is undermined, the basis of the relationship is undermined,” states the report. Speaking to various fundraisers about their views on how to tackle negative attitudes, some core themes emerge.

“Who’s in charge of the charity sector? The voluntary sector has to get better at managing the balance between internal and external drivers for measuring impact.” By Tris Lumley. Guardian. February 7, 2013. When I asked David Robinson – founder of Community Links, chair of the Early Action Task Force, and one of the sector’s great gurus – to give a keynote speech at a conference on impact leadership, I was pretty sure he’d deliver. I was right. He gave an inspirational speech that challenged the 350 people in the room to rethink their whole approach to leadership. David told them to question relentlessly, change continuously, fail thoughtfully, collaborate ruthlessly and evaluate fearlessly – to focus on mission before organisation. As a charity leader, it’s easy to become focused on your organisation’s brand, funding or profile. Those things are important: they enable you to achieve your mission. But they aren’t the end in itself. As well as challenging the assembled leaders to focus firmly on mission rather than organisation, David threw down the gauntlet on impact measurement. As a practice it is led by funders, he argued, and charities engage in it more to meet funders’ requirements than to learn about and improve what they do. But is this true, and if so what are the implications?

“Secret memo shows Michael Gove’s plan for privatisation of academies; Fresh from his GCSE U-turn, Education Secretary wants to start selling off state schools.” By Jane Merrick. Independent. February 10, 2013. The full extent of Michael Gove’s plans to revolutionise education are revealed today in a secret memo showing he is considering outright privatisation of academies and free schools. All academies and free schools in England, which are the Education Secretary’s personal obsession, would be free to become profit-making for the first time, and be entirely decoupled from Whitehall control. Leaked documents of the minutes of a meeting of top Department for Education officials on the future of funding the academies programme have alarmed teaching unions and the Liberal Democrats. Nick Clegg last year ruled out any expansion of the private sector in state schools. Last week Mr Gove abandoned his controversial plans to replace GCSEs with an English Baccalaureate after protests from regulators, teachers and the Lib Dems. But the memo revealed today shows that Mr Gove’s officials are considering “reclassifying academies to the private sector” to cut government costs. Mr Gove is considering the radical step because massive expansion of academies and free schools is costing government too much money. The minutes, seen by The Independent on Sunday, state: “it is difficult to see how we could manage expansion of the academies and free schools programme much beyond 5,000 without increasing central resource.” The document acknowledges “risks” in the move – including “decreased ability to overcome resistance at local level, and more nasty surprises arising from not managing projects as closely as we have up to now”.

“Shocking figures reveal the growth in UK’s wealth gap; Inequality has risen sharply since the 1990s, according to a report by the Resolution Foundation thinktank.” By Heather Stewart. Observer/Guardian. February 9, 2013. Buying essentials in London’s West End: Britain’s super rich have seen their slice of national income grow from 7% to 10% since the 90s. The super-rich – the top 1% of earners – now pocket 10p in every pound of income paid in Britain, while the poorest half of the population take home only 18p of every pound between them, according to a report published this week by the Resolution Foundation thinktank, which reveals the widening gap between those at the very top and the rest of society. Inequality has grown sharply over the past 15 years, according to Resolution’s analysis: the top 1% of earners have seen their slice of the pie increase from 7% in the mid-1990s to 10% today, while the bottom half have seen their share drop from 19% to 18%.

INTERNATIONAL

CATHOLIC SEX ABUSE SCANDAL

“The Cardinal and the Truth.” Editorial. New York Times. January 27, 2013. No member of the Roman Catholic hierarchy fought longer and more energetically than Cardinal Roger Mahony of Los Angeles to conceal the decades-long scandal involving the rape and intimidation of children by rogue priests. For years, the cardinal withheld seamy church records from parents, victims and the public, brandishing endless litigation and fatuous claims of confidentiality. The breadth of Cardinal Mahony’s cover-up became shockingly clear last week with the release in court of archdiocese records detailing how he and a top aide concocted cynical strategies to keep police authorities in the dark and habitual offenders beyond the reach of criminal prosecution. It was the cardinal’s obligation under the primacy of secular law to instantly notify authorities of any priest’s criminal behavior. Instead, he invoked a nonexistent church privilege to hide miscreant clergy and shield the church and his own reputation. Cardinal Mahony has repeatedly apologized in recent years and insisted that the archdiocese was mending its ways. A lawyer for the archdiocese insisted that the scandal and the cardinal’s cover-up were “part of the past.” Not really. While statutes of limitations on possible criminal charges may have run out, Cardinal Mahony and his former aide could be deposed in civil suits. Monsignor Curry also managed to advance up the hierarchical ladder and would seem to merit instant removal from his current post as auxiliary bishop for Santa Barbara.
Related stories:
“Catholic priest, teacher convicted in child-sex case.” By Matt Rourke. NBC News. January 31, 2013.
“Priest files will include key names; Los Angeles archdiocese appears to back away from a plan to black out identities of Mahony and others in future releases.” Los Angeles Times. January 30, 2013.
“Retired LA cardinal relieved of some church duties in fallout from sex abuse scandal.” Washington Post/Associated Press. February 1, 2013.
“Retired L.A. Cardinal Relieved of Duties as Files Are Released.” Wall Street Journal. February 1, 2013.
“Cardinal in Los Angeles Is Removed From Duties.” New York Times. January 31, 2013.
“Cardinal Mahony relieved of duties over handling of abuse; L.A. Archbishop Jose Gomez takes action against his predecessor for his role in the priest sex scandal; another top church official resigns from his post.” Los Angeles Times. February 1, 2013.
“LA Catholic Archdiocese Releases Priest Abuse Files.” Huffington Post/ Reuters. February 1, 2013.
“Catholic cardinal stripped of duties as LA diocese child abuse files released
Retired Roger Mahony is said to have shielded priests accused of child abuse in Catholic archdiocese of Los Angeles.” Guardian/Reuters. February 1, 2013.
“L.A. Church Leaders Knew of Abuse.” Wall Street Journal. February 1, 2013.
“L.A. Cardinal Removed From Position For Role In Sex Abuse Scandal.” All Things Considered/National Public Radio. February 1, 2013.
“Mahony defends actions in abuse cases; He says he turned over an archdiocese ‘second to none’ in protecting children.” Los Angeles Times. February 1, 2013.
“Diocese Papers in Los Angeles Detail Decades of Abuse.” New York Times. February 1, 2013.
“Priests’ ecclesiastical missteps treated more sternly than abuse; Files detail cases in which L.A. Archdiocese officials displayed outrage over a priest’s violation of canon law while doing little for victims of his sexual abuse.” Los Angeles Times. February 1, 2013.
“Mahony defends actions in abuse cases; He says he turned over an archdiocese ‘second to none’ in protecting children.” Los Angeles Times. February 1, 2013.
“Former L.A. archbishop disciplined over handling of sex abuse allegations.” CNN. February 1, 2013.
“A sudden fall for Cardinal Mahony’s former right-hand man; As church files revealed this week, Bishop Thomas J. Curry chose again and again to conceal clerics’ crimes and put priests’ welfare ahead of helping victims.” Los Angeles Times. February 2, 2013.

DAVOS WORLED ECONOMIC FORUM

“Dubious Awards Presented at Davos.” By Ray Smith. Interpress Service (ipsnews.net). January 28, 2013. Only a stone’s throw from the Davos World Economic Forum meeting, a group of non-governmental organisations presented the annual Public Eye Awards this week to Goldman Sachs and Royal Dutch Shell. Every year in late January, a pilgrimage of a special kind can be observed in Grisons, Switzerland’s easternmost canton. Limousine after limousine, SUV after SUV and helicopter after helicopter head to Davos, the highest city of Europe. At the local congress centre, the preciously dressed pilgrims unite to renew their belief in unregulated, free market capitalism and to “improve the state of the world,” as the World Economic Forum (WEF) proclaims. This year, ‘Resilient Dynamism’ is the motto of the global leaders’ gathering. Besides the official programme though, many participants will use the platform to hold informal meetings. Business and political interests mingle behind closed doors. Only a ten-minute walk from the Davos congress centre, a few dozen people attended the presentation of the Public Eye Awards, a critical counterpoint to the WEF since 2000. “On the occasion of the WEF, we annually put the spotlight on corporations who cause problems, violate human rights, destroy the environment, act corruptly and push people into poverty and misery,” says Andreas Missbach on behalf of the organisers. In order to take the wind out of the Public Eye sail and to slightly open up to the public, the WEF started in 2003 to organise its own counter event, the Open Forum. Nevertheless, the Public Eye has survived and this year once again presented two recipients for their ‘awards’.

INDIA

“TOI Social Impact Awards: An evening to honour India’s changemakers.” Times of India. January 28, 2013. They took the path less travelled, and on Monday it will lead a group of remarkable men and women to the stage for the second Times of India Social Impact Awards in association with J P Morgan. The awards are being given to changemakers within NGOs, corporates and the government who have quietly worked to transform the lives of millions of marginalized Indians. President Pranab Mukherjee will be the chief guest at the awards function. Joining him, and a power-packed audience consisting of top achievers from diverse fields, will be beneficiaries of the organisations selected for the awards. For some beneficiaries, this visit to the capital will mark the first time they have travelled beyond the boundaries of their district. Awards in 17 categories will be presented by the beneficiaries. The awardees and beneficiaries collectively represent the very best of India in all its fascinating diversity. They range from nine-year-old Jyoti Prajapat from Ajmer district to 83-year-old Thokchom Ramani Leima from Imphal. Jyoti will join 10-year-old Ujala Kumari from Delhi to present the award for educat8ion in the NGO sector to Room to Read India, whose libraries gave both girls an abiding love for reading. Leima will take the stage with four other women members of Meira Paibi, the fearless group of women from Manipur who will share the Lifetime Achievement Award with the Naga Mothers Association. The two groups have battled social evils like alcoholism and drug abuse, and spearheaded peace efforts in the insurgency-ridden region.
Related story:
“‘It’s celebration of goodness’.” Times of India. January 31, 2013.

“Saibaba trust got Rs 275 crore donation in 2012.” Times of India. February 1, 2013. The Saibaba Shirdi Sansthan Trust received a donation of Rs 274.71 crore from devotees last year, a senior trust official said. Devotees also donated 36 kg of gold in various forms in 2012, estimated to be worth Rs 11 crore, Sansthan’s executive officer Kishor More said yesterday. However, the Sansthan received 373 kg of silver in the last calendar year, even as it received 440 kg of the metal in 2011, More said. The Sansthan had recently melted the treasure’s 37 kg gold and 513 kg silver for making coins while it still has about 300 kg gold and 4,000 kg silver with it, he said. In 2011, the trust had received Rs 225.55 crore cash, while last year the cash donation increased by about 20 per cent, he said. Out of the Rs 274.71 crore cash, Rs 57 crore was earned through the Sansthan’s donation counters, Rs 180.74 crore through cash boxes and Rs 40 crore was received through cheques, online and money orders, More said. Sansthan’s fixed deposits with various nationalised banks in 2012 were worth Rs 803 crore, while deposits in 2011 were of Rs 580 crore. Last year, there was also an increase in foreign exchange worth Rs 8.30 crore, while in 2011 it was Rs 6.28 crore, he added.

PHILANTHROPY

“Migrants’ billions put aid in the shade; Money transfers from workers abroad to family back home have tripled in a decade and are three times larger than global aid budgets.” By Claire Provost. Guardian. January 30, 2013. For decades it was a largely unnoticed feature of the global economy, a blip of a statistic that hinted at the tendency of expatriates to send a little pocket money back to families in their home countries. But now, the flow of migrant money around the world has shot up to record levels as more people than ever cross borders to live and work abroad. It’s known as remittance money, and in 2012 it topped $530bn (£335bn), according to the latest World Bank figures. The amount has tripled in a decade and is now more than three times larger than total global aid budgets, sparking serious debate as to whether migration and the money it generates is a realistic alternative to just doling out aid. If remittances at the level recorded by the World Bank were a single economy, it would be the 22nd largest in the world, bigger than Iran or Argentina. And according to World Bank officials, the real figure could be much larger. Dilip Ratha, of the migration and remittances unit at the World Bank, said that billions more in remittances were not being recorded as many people were continuing to bypass the banks and big money transfer companies that are relied on for data. A number of countries, including the Philippines, Bangladesh and Senegal, have set up initiatives or even government ministries to manage cash sent from overseas.

SOUTH AFRICA

“South Africa’s only black billionaire donates half his fortune to charity
Patrice Motsepe follows Bill Gates and Warren Buffet in giving wealth to philanthropic foundation he launched with his wife.” By Sipho Hlongwane. Guardian. January 31, 2013. When South African billionaire Patrice Motsepe announced that he would be making an important announcement, the speculation was that he would be buying himself some newspapers. He was in Davos, and at the same time, Independent News and Media’s biggest shareholder Denis O’Brien met President Jacob Zuma. The Irish group owns several papers, including The Star, Cape Times and Pretoria News, and has been seeking to unbundle its South African assets. As it turns out, Motsepe’s announcement was of a different sort. The beneficiary will be the Motsepe Foundation, which was founded in 1999 by the African Rainbow Minerals chairman and his wife, Precious. It oversees the philanthropic work done by the family, which includes education and health; the development and upliftment of women, youth, workers and the disabled; churches; the development of entrepreneurs and social entrepreneurs; rural and urban upliftment; soccer including youth soccer development and music. The give-away is a part of the Giving Pledge, which encourages wealthy people to donate their fortune to charity. Microsoft chairman Bill Gates and Berkshire Hathaway chairman Warren Buffett (formerly the world’s wealthiest man) founded the campaign in 2010 and have both committed large chunks of their sizable wealth to charitable organisations around the world. As of November 2012, 91 billionaires – mostly Americans – have committed to the pledge.

UK

“When is a randomised controlled trial appropriate for your charity? It is crucial to compare the outcomes of people who receive a social policy intervention with those who do not.” By Nick Axford. Guardian. January 28, 2013. Whitehall is abuzz with discussion about randomised controlled trials (RCT) in public policy. The dark art has come to the water cooler. RCTs offer the best way of telling if a social policy intervention does or doesn’t work, because they compare the outcomes for people who received that intervention with those of people who did not. This is a crucial but tough and sometimes costly test to meet – so it needs to be seen as part of a longer-term evaluation strategy to move an intervention from innovation to proven impact. A lot of work is needed before an innovation is ready for this level of scrutiny. You need to be clear about what it is, what it expects to achieve, who it is for, the core components and, importantly, the underlying logic. There is no point in creating something if it can’t be delivered with consistency in a different place – it should be replicable. This is aided by having a manual, training, hands-on-guidance for practitioners and a way of keeping track of quality. You need strong indications that it is likely to work. So what’s involved in a long-term, sustainable impact measurement strategy?

“Leading universities ‘must go private to stay in global race’.” By Greg Hurst. Times of London. January 29, 2013. The LSE was an obvious candidate for private funding, Lord Baker said. The LSE was an obvious candidate for private funding, Lord Baker said. Leading English universities should be encouraged to go private and set unlimited fees, a former Education Secretary has said. Lord Baker of Dorking who, as Kenneth Baker, introduced the National Curriculum during Margaret Thatcher’s third term in office, said that the current fee, which is capped at £9,000, wasn’t enough to keep top British universities among the world’s best. To remain competitive they should be given a guarantee that research grants would not be withdrawn if they became privately funded and that their undergraduates would still qualify for student loans, he said. Admissions systems, such as those of Ivy League.

“Live discussion: Islam and social enterprise, 5 February, 12-1pm.” Guardian. January 29, 2013. Join our experts on Tuesday 5 February to discuss how the Qur’an’s teachings around business chime with the objectives of the worldwide social enterprise movement. In a recent article social entrepreneur Sheeza Ahmad highlighted how the Qur’an’s teachings around Islamic finance fall in line with the modern day social enterprise movement. Sheeza wrote: “Muhammad’s teachings and examples of business dealings were strongly linked to humanitarian values where the poor, the sick and orphans took precedence. He acknowledged the suffering of people in surrounding environments and continually created solutions for them while creating a system that would ensure their care long after his passing.” These ideas raise the question of whether Islamic business can play a significant role in shaping more ethical business practices and even a more ethical and sustainable capitalism. With this in mind, join our expert panel to discuss, the relationship between Islamic business practices, the social enterprise movement and the future of business. Do get in touch if you’d like to be a panelist – email Joe Jervis for more details. Also, if you’d like to leave a question please do so in the comments section below, or come back to ask it live – and follow the debate – on Tuesday 5 February, 12-1pm GMT.

“How to become a company’s Charity of the Year; Social media and attention-grabbing stunts have been used to win over corporates. Becky Slack looks at what works and what doesn’t.” “A giant turtle has breached security.” Guardian. January 29, 2013. This is not the type of call every business expects to receive but it is what happened at Deutsche Bank when it opened up its 2012 Charity of the Year (CotY) selection process to employee vote. The offending charity – the Marine Conservation Society – was so keen to win it sent not only a giant turtle, but sharks on stilts to charm the company’s 8,000 staff. Risky, perhaps, but worth it – MCS was eventually selected alongside Afrikids to benefit from a partnership worth more than £1m. The actions of MCS demonstrate the extraordinary lengths some organisations will go to secure a CotY partnership. With many thousands of pounds up for grabs – Tesco and Cancer Research UK, for example, are on track to raise a record-breaking £10m in just one year – it’s not hard to see why.
So what does the selection process for these highly sought-after opportunities involve and what do charities have to do to stand a chance of winning? Each corporate uses its own mix of application forms, presentations and employee votes when selecting a charity partner. Lloyds Banking Group, for example, develops a list of 10 potential charities, which are then invited to participate in a tough elimination process where the final decision lies in the hands of employees.

“Fears over school meal standards as children’s food charity loses funding; Children’s Food Trust, which monitors quality of meals served in schools, will receive no government funding after March.” By Peter Walker. Guardian. January 30, 2013. Childhood nutrition campaigners have expressed alarm after the government confirmed it will cut off all funding to the Children’s Food Trust, the main organisation which monitors the quality of meals served in schools, in the next few weeks. The Department for Education (DfE) told the trust in a letter that money would stop at the end of March. The trust will be invited to bid for government contracts but will otherwise be reliant on charging schools for advice or its own fundraising. Set up as a quango, initially called the School Food Trust, in the wake of TV chef Jamie Oliver’s 2005 series about the poor standard of food served in many schools the trust was hived of as a private charity in 2011 and has long faced the prospect of being cut off financially. However, the confirmation has worried campaigners already alarmed that the government’s exemption of academies from school nutritional standards could see the gains of recent years reversed. It was a Children’s Food Trust study last year which showed that many academies do not follow the guidelines, despite government assurances that they would. Last year the DfE set up an inquiry into school food, led by Henry Dimbleby and John Vincent, founders of the Leon chain of restaurants, an initiative dismissed by Oliver as a pointless waste of time. The trust said it aims to continue advisory work with schools over improving the quality of meals and the number of pupils who eat them, although some may now face charges for this. However, it will have to abandon its annual survey of school meals, the only such national snapshot. A trust spokesman said it had been planning for the end of DfE funding but warned that schools had “never been more in need of strong leadership and practical support for making sure every child can eat well”. He added: “While the government’s review of school food continues, we’ve urged the department not to allow school food improvement work to slip back in the meantime, and this does remain a concern.”

“Charity at heart of massive tax avoidance scam.” By Alexi Mostrous. Times of London. January 31, 2013. One of Britain’s biggest charities is a front for tax avoidance, The Times can reveal. Wealthy donors used the Cup Trust to avoid £46 million in tax in an extensive abuse of Gift Aid incentives designed to encourage charitable donations. The registered charity raised £176 million between 2010 and 2011. In 2010 it attracted more donations than the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, the British Heart Foundation or the Salvation Army.

“Charity Shield: Policing of charity tax avoidance must be tightened. The Charity Commission and HMRC have not been up to the job.” Times of London. January 31, 2013. Those who opposed George Osborne’s planned cap on tax relief for charitable giving in his March budget can now see what he was on about. The Times today discloses that one of Britain’s largest charities is a front for massive tax avoidance. Wealthy individuals have donated large sums to the Cup Trust to get Gift Aid tax relief and then have received the vast majority of their money back. Tax campaigners say that the Cup Trust is far from an isolated example.

“Getting ahead in charity fundraising: Live discussion. Join us from 1-3pm on Friday 8 February to discuss your career in charity fundraising.” By Abby Young-Powell. Guardian. January 31, 2013. How can you get ahead in charity fundraising? Recent reports show a decline in donations to charity, underlining the importance for non-profit organisations to recruit strong fundraising teams. Charities are constantly looking for new and innovative ways to raise money. Today’s fundraisers increasingly need a diverse range of skills, from negotiating corporate partnerships, to event organisation, to getting the most out of social media and technology. With that in mind our live discussion will cover: • What charities are looking for when recruiting senior fundraisers • How to build on your core skills • The best options for training and qualifications. If you’d like to be on the expert panel, please contact Abby Young-Powell, and if you’d like to leave a question, please email or write in the comments section below.

“Is David Beckham the future of social enterprise? Let us know what you think of the former England captain’s decision to donate his salary to a charity.” Guardian. January 31, 2013. David Beckham has joined French football team Paris St-Germain, and he has announced that he will be donating his salary to charity. Beckham has signed a five-month contract with the club, and his salary will be paid direct to a Paris children’s home. In a sense, Beckham’s initiative echoes that of social enterprise bottled water manufacturer Belu, which delivers its social impact partly through donating its profits to WaterAid, with a minimum guaranteed donation of £300,000. Is this a new model for social enterprise – where a celebrity or sportsperson’s salary is channelled into a social venture? Let us know what you think on the thread below.

“MPs to quiz charity chief over huge tax scam.” Times of London. February 1, 2013. The head of Britain’s charity regulator will be hauled before MPs next month to explain how wealthy investors were able to use a charity scam to avoid £46 million in tax. William Shawcross, the new head of the Charity Commission, will be questioned by the Public Accounts Committee about the Cup Trust, a charity exposed by The Times yesterday as a front for massive tax avoidance. MPs are also expected to ask him about other examples of charity rules being abused for tax purposes.

INTERNATIONAL

CATHOLIC SEX ABUSE SCANDAL

“Los Angeles Cardinal Hid Abuse, Files Show.” By Ian Lovett. New York Times. January 21, 2013. The retired archbishop of Los Angeles, Cardinal Roger M. Mahony, and other high-ranking clergymen in the archdiocese worked quietly to keep evidence of child molesting away from law enforcement officials and shield abusive priests from criminal prosecution more than a decade before the scandal became public, according to confidential church records. The documents, filed in court as part of lawsuit against the archdiocese and posted online by The Los Angeles Times on Monday, offer the clearest glimpse yet of how the archdiocese dealt with abusive priests in the decades before the scandal broke, including Cardinal Mahony’s personal involvement in covering up their crimes. Rather than defrocking priests and contacting the police, the archdiocese sent priests who had molested children to out-of-state treatment facilities, in large part because therapists in California were legally obligated to report any evidence of child abuse to the police, the files make clear. Cardinal Mahony said he came to understand that impact only two decades later, when he met with almost 100 victims of sexual abuse by priests under his charge. He now keeps an index card for each one of those victims, praying for each one every day, he said in the statement. In a phone interview, J. Michael Hennigan, a lawyer for the archdiocese, said that the documents represented the “beginnings of the awakening of the archdiocese of these kinds of problems,” and that the lessons learned in the intervening decades helped shape the current policy, under which all accusations of abuse are reported to the police and all adults who supervise children are fingerprinted and subjected to background checks.
Related stories:
“Files show how LA church leaders controlled damage.” San Francisco Chronicle/Associated Press. January 21, 2013.
“L.A. church leaders sought to hide sex abuse cases from authorities; Documents from the late 1980s show that Archbishop Roger M. Mahony and another archdiocese official discussed strategies to keep police from discovering that children were being sexually abused by priests.” Los Angeles Times. January 21, 2013.
“L.A. Prosecutor to Review New Church Files on Priests.” Wall Street Journal. January 22, 2013.
“New Sexual Abuse Files Cast Shadow on Legacy of Los Angeles Cardinal.” New York Times. January 22, 2013.
“LA Church Files Show How Cardinal Roger Mahony Shielded Pedophile Priest, Failed Child Victims.” Huffington Post. January 22, 2013.
“Church sex abuse files unlikely to lead to charges, experts say; Statute of limitations is the main stumbling block to prosecuting Cardinal Roger M. Mahony and aides in the sex abuse files from the 1980s released this week, experts say.” Los Angeles Times. January 22, 2013.
“Mahony’s efforts to hide abuse are deplorable but unsurprising; The calculated moves to shield molesters in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles may not be legally actionable, but when it comes to a moral judgment, the jury is already in.” By Steve Lopez. Los Angeles Times. January 22, 2013.
“Cardinal Mahoney Hid Child Sex Abuse Cases.” Morning Edition/National Public Radio. January 25, 2013.
“Mishandling of abuse cases threatens Mahony’s legacy with Latinos Revelations about how the retired L.A. archbishop dealt with two pedophile priests threaten to tarnish his legacy of fighting for immigrants, an effort he described as his calling.” Los Angeles Times. January 26, 2013.

“Friar accused of abuse in 2 states kills himself; Baker died from a self-inflicted knife wound; 11 men alleged Baker sexually abused them in high school. At least 3 other men from another school also alleged abuse.” USA Today. January 26, 2013. A Franciscan friar accused of sexually abusing students at Catholic high schools in Ohio and Pennsylvania killed himself at a western Pennsylvania monastery, police said Saturday. Brother Stephen Baker, 62, was found dead of a self-inflicted knife wound at the St. Bernardine Monastery in Hollidaysburg on Saturday morning, Police Chief Roger White said. He declined to say whether a note was found. Baker was named in legal settlements last week involving 11 men who alleged that he sexually abused them at a Catholic high school in northeast Ohio three decades ago. The undisclosed financial settlements announced Jan. 16 involved his contact with students at John F. Kennedy High School in Warren, Ohio from 1986-90. The Youngstown diocese previously said it was unaware of the allegations until nearly 20 years after the alleged abuse. After the settlements were announced, the Altoona-Johnstown Diocese in central Pennsylvania said it received complaints in 2011 of possible abuse by Baker at Bishop McCort High School in Johnstown, about 60 miles east of Pittsburgh. Bishop McCort High School hired an attorney to investigate after several former students alleged they were molested by Baker in the 1990s. Attorney Susan Williams said three former students had talked to her in detail about the alleged abuse. Baker taught and coached at John F. Kennedy High School in the late 1980′s and early 1990′s and was at Bishop McCort from 1992-2000. Bishop Mark Bartchak of the Altoona-Johnstown Diocese said in a statement that he was saddened by the news of Baker’s death, but declined further comment citing pending legal action involving the diocese.

“Child sex abuse link to celibacy.” By Barney Zwartz. Sydney Morning Herald. January 24, 2013. Many Catholic priests take a flexible approach to celibacy, tolerated by church leaders, and some believe sex with children or men does not count, a former Melbourne priest said on Wednesday. ”An enormous number of priests struggle with celibacy,” Philip O’Donnell told the state inquiry into how the churches handle child sex abuse. ”There’s a tolerance for imperfection in celibacy, and that may have led to a lessening of outrage at sex with children.” He said he had no training about celibacy in the seminary and that many priests were ill-equipped. ”Chosen celibacy is a gift, but mandatory celibacy is for many priests a millstone,” he said. Mr O’Donnell declined to speculate on what percentage of Catholic priests, who must vow to be celibate, were sexually active, but another Melbourne priest has separately suggested it is about half. Asked by committee member Andrea Coote whether priests believed only sex with women counted as real sex (breaking celibacy vows), and that homosexual and child sex did not, Mr O’Donnell said: ”Sometimes.”

EUROPEAN UNION

“Cautious Welcome for ‘Robin Hood’ Tax.” By A. D. McKenzie. Interpress Service. January 24, 2013. Non-governmental organisations across Europe welcomed the move by 11 European Union countries Tuesday to move forward with the introduction of a financial transaction tax (FTT), but they urged national governments to ensure that a part of the revenues would be allocated to development. Calling the tax a ‘golden anniversary’ present, because it came on the 50th anniversary of French-German friendship, a coalition of more than 70 NGOs appealed to French President Francois Hollande and German Chancellor Angela Merkel to spread a “public message of solidarity outside their borders” to guarantee that the FTT would be used particularly in the fight against poverty and HIV-AIDS, and to combat climate change. “We are happy to see that the process is moving ahead but we’re very worried that the issue of allocating part of the money to development is not going to be taken up,” said Friederike Röder, a spokesperson for anti-poverty group ONE, which was co-founded by rock musician Bono. “What can happen is that the countries will be so pleased to see additional revenues coming in that they might use the funds for their general national budgets and not be willing to earmark any for development,” she told IPS. So far, Hollande is the only head of state who has said the FTT will go partly for development. France and Germany spearheaded adoption of this “major milestone” for EU tax guidelines, as the European Union’s taxation commissioner Algirdas Semeta put it on Tuesday. The decision came after a meeting of the EU’s 27 finance ministers in Brussels, but France had long been pressing for the move. The measure will go now go before the European Parliament as a formality, to approve the European Commission’s proposal that transactions in shares and bonds be taxed at 0.1 percent, and trades in derivatives at 0.01 percent. Overall, by implementing a levy of this percentage on financial transactions, France could gain up to 12 billion euros a year, according to the International Monetary Fund. At the European level, about 50 billion euros could be raised annually, the IMF says.

INDIA

“NRI initiative raises millions for educating India’s children.” By Madhavi Rajadhyaksha. Times of India. January 25, 2013. A group of Indian-Americans in New York attended an unusual black-tie dinner gala one November evening last year. Over a video link they chatted with students of a Pune slum school. This was one of many fundraisers hosted by voluntary organization Pratham USA. Its mission: Mobilize Indians in the US to get involved in its work. The dinner was a success. More than 400, mostly those of Indian origin, pledged support to Pratham USA. On a single night, they donated $1.4million to educate tiny tots in India’s impoverished pockets. Pratham USA is an overseas arm of Pratham (India), working to ensure that “every child is in school and learning well”. It’s created a circle of giving where NRIs chip in with funds and expertise to strengthen the parent body’s educational initiatives. One of the best-known names in education, NGO Pratham has been working with the government in 21 states to improve pre-school education, provide additional learning support to in-school and out-of-school children, mainstream school dropouts, provide vocational training and computer literacy to those from vulnerable backgrounds. It touches the lives of over 2 million students annually. What started out as an informal network with a few hands in 2000 has now grown into a formal initiative involving 10,000 people across 14 US cities. They collectively generate over $11mn annually towards Pratham’s work.

RUSSIA

“U.S. Quits Working Group At Core of Russian ‘Reset’.” By Gregory L. White. Wall Street Journal. January 25, 2013. The U.S. pulled out of a joint working group on civil society with Russia that had been a key element of the Obama Administration’s “reset” policy with Moscow, protesting what it called the Kremlin’s deepening crackdown on critics. Russian Interior Ministry officers detain gay-rights activists on Friday. The move, though mainly symbolic, is the latest sign of a deepening chill in relations between Moscow and Washington that has taken hold since Vladimir Putin returned to the presidency last year. While both sides insist publicly they want to continue cooperation, officials and analysts say Washington is likely to turn its focus away from an increasingly prickly and uncooperative Moscow. Tensions have built steadily over the past year or so, particularly since Mr. Putin blamed Washington for supporting anti-Kremlin protests that started in December 2011 and became the largest public challenge in his 12-year rule. Moscow’s unwillingness to step up pressure on Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad also has frustrated the U.S. Since Mr. Putin won re-election in March, his Kremlin has steadily squeezed opponents, pushing through new restrictions on protests, bringing criminal charges against rivals and imposing strict new rules on foreign-funded nongovernmental organizations. The Kremlin pushed out the U.S. Agency for International Development in the fall, saying it was trying to influence Russian domestic politics. U.S. officials say the group was simply helping support civil society. Some U.S. officials had expected the crackdown would slow after the election as the Kremlin sought to woo its onetime opponents. But the steps have intensified, particularly after President Barack Obama signed a law imposing visa and financial sanctions against Russian officials alleged to have been involved in human-rights violations. The law, named for Sergei Magnitsky, a whistleblower who died in a Moscow jail in 2009, triggered a fierce response from the Kremlin. Moscow went beyond initial threats to impose similar sanctions on U.S. officials and passed a law further limiting U.S.-backed nongovernmental groups and banning adoption of Russian children by Americans.

SPAIN

“Spain’s Strapped Towns Look To Churches For Cash.” By Lauren Frayer. All Things Considered/National Public Radio. January 25, 2013. The Catholic Church is Spain’s largest and richest landowner, though its nonprofit status means it is exempt from paying most taxes. But amid the current economic crisis, that may be changing. One college town just outside Madrid is leading an effort by some Spanish municipalities to serve the church an up-to-date property tax bill. Alcala de Henares is re-evaluating the status of hundreds of church holdings that have been exempt from paying property tax for hundreds of years. The Catholic Church owns more than just places of worship. It also owns apartments and retail buildings. “We’re studying whether any church properties that have long been listed as charities are actually being used for commercial activities. If that’s the case, they’ll have to start paying tax,” said city councilman Anselmo Avendano. Last summer, Avendano passed a motion to re-evaluate church holdings by square footage. So, if one out of 30 rooms in a convent is selling sweets, it’ll have to pay tax on that one room. That’s how the system is supposed to work already, but it’s not always enforced. The church may be Spain’s biggest landowner, but it’s also the biggest charity here — at a time when public welfare programs are being cut and unemployment tops 26 percent.

UK

“Charities afraid to challenge public policy amid retribution fears; Government must uphold voluntary sector independence or risk silencing most vulnerable members of society, warns inquiry.” By Patrick Butler. Guardian. January 21, 2013. Campaigning charities are increasingly fearful of speaking out on behalf of vulnerable people because of the widespread use of gagging clauses in contracts and attacks by ministers on voluntary organisations’ freedom of expression, an independent inquiry has found. Although the coalition government has promised a bigger role for charities in providing public services as part of its “big society” project, it has become increasingly contemptuous of those provider organisations which also speak out against injustice and inequality, the inquiry says. Its chairman, Sir Roger Singleton, a former chief executive of the children’s charity Barnardo’s, said the government must take action to uphold voluntary sector independence: “Without this we may see the voice of the vulnerable and marginalised being silenced, democracy being eroded and society. impoverished.” Charities told the inquiry they felt increasingly unable to challenge policy or speak out on minority issues at national or local level because they feared losing contracts or influence. Many were self-censoring because they feared retribution from funders. “Overall, we suspect there is an increasing unwillingness to speak truth unto power,” the report says. Charities most likely to be affected were smaller organisations working with “unpopular” disadvantaged groups including former offenders, people with mental health needs, drug addicts, homeless people, asylum seekers, and victims of crime. These charities are most dependent on state funding and because they are disproportionately based in deprived areas, are most likely to be affected by public funding cuts.

“Should you register as a charitable incorporated organisation? New legal structures mean that charities can register as CIOs. Anita Pati looks at the sector’s response to the new regulation.” By Anita Pati. Guardian. January 22, 2013. Charitable Incorporated Organisations (CIOs) finally arrived in time for Christmas. But it seems many charities have already left the party with dampened enthusiasm. Introduced in the Charities Act 2006 and mooted for more than a decade previously, some charities were finally able to apply from December 2012. The CIO, set out in the Charities Act 2011, will allow charities to become incorporated charities, and so able to enter into contracts in their own right. Their trustees or members will have limited or no liability and the organisation will need only to register once with the Charity Commission rather than also going to Companies House,, the aim of which is to reduce any administrative burdens. CIOs will also not be subject to company law. But the wait has irritated many. Barney Mynott, spokesman for the National Association for Voluntary and Community Action (Navca), says, “the delays in implementing the CIO were unacceptable. They caused confusion, frustration and additional work for charities wanting to start up as a CIO or wishing to convert”.

“Why collaboration is important for charities; Keeping a clear focus on the best outcome for beneficiaries and understanding pricing issues is the key to success.” Guardian. 1-23-13. There are pressures for organisations in every sector – including those in the voluntary sector – to team up with others to achieve common goals. In our experience at Impetus, small and medium-sized charities and social enterprises are often the ones coming up with the most innovative solutions to social problems. Whether two or more small charities collaborate to help them reach more people, or a large organisation collaborates with a small one because it recognises the special value the smaller organisation brings to clients, it is the partnership that allows them to make the greatest impact. Collaboration can be a relatively quick, though not always easy, way of bringing impactful solutions to more people. But collaboration isn’t always the answer. Messages such as “let’s all work together” and “the sum is greater than the parts” are often heard, but what is difficult to decide is when collaboration is right for your organisation. We believe collaboration is the right step when it can lead to significant growth for an organisation in terms of people helped, or income, and when it deepens the positive impact an organisation makes on its clients. In a new report we have produced with New Philanthropy Capital (NPC), called Collaboration for Impact, we examine what makes a good collaboration. The aim is to make it easier for organisations to spot the right opportunities and to clear the most common obstacles on the path to collaborative success.
Our research determined the key factors for a successful collaboration.

“Voluntary sector independence ‘under direct challenge’; Ex-Barnado’s chief executive says contracting and government procedures putting independence at risk.” By Roger Singleton. Guardian. January 22, 2013. The right of some voluntary organisations to campaign and criticise the government is under direct challenge, at a time when that independent voice is vital. It’s not just that engagement and trust in mainstream politics has declined and the political debate has narrowed. It’s also that the poorest in society are feeling the hardest effects, as real incomes fall and public services are cut, and charities often know from first-hand experience what the problems are and what should be done about it. So it was worrying to hear Save the Children being attacked last year by conservative commenters for its campaign to tackle child poverty in the UK. Even more so to see advice from the department of communities and local government to local authorities to stop funding what it calls ‘fake charities’ that ‘lobby and call for more state regulation and more state funding.’ That advice referenced publications that implied that it was wrong to fund charities like Alcohol Concern to help with public health campaigns or for charities like Relate and Oxfam to receive public money and give their views to Government about policy at the same time. Voices are being directly silenced in the work programme through so-called ‘gagging clauses’ that prevent voluntary sector contractors from doing anything to ‘damage the reputation’ of the department for work and pensions, or giving out their own data publicly – data that might highlight problems for specific groups. Is it right in a democracy to prevent whistleblowing about things that might be wrong with public services or public policy?

“Impact measurement is essential to winning public service contracts; A new approach by public-service commissioners shows that organisations demonstrating value are more likely to win contracts.” By Saba Salman. Guardian. January 24, 2013. Public-service commissioners employed by local authorities are often accused of being risk averse, opting for the cheapest deal and bypassing small providers in favour of the usual service delivery suspects. In Camden, north London, a few years ago, commissioners worked with the New Economics Foundation to, in the council’s own words, “develop outcome-based procurement that will support sustainable communities, and demonstrate the added community value from third sector service provision”. The Camden example, showcased on the NCVO website as good practice, aimed for an outcome based commissioning model which asked providers, among other things, how the services identified users’ strengths and how they supported clients in finding ways to help or support others. If your organisation relied on using traditional output-based evidence to measure success, what hope would you have of bidding for a Camden contract – and what hope would the council have in weighing up your services under its new approach?

“Treasury aims to widen payroll-giving schemes; Of £9.3bn donated to good causes in 2011-12, £118m was via payroll giving.” By Hilary Osborne. Guardian. January 23, 2013. Companies such as JustGiving and Virgin Money may be allowed to run workplace-giving schemes in an attempt to shake up the market and encourage more people to make regular charitable donations from their earnings. The schemes allow employees to make donations from pay before tax, meaning that higher-rate taxpayers who give £10 to charity see their monthly income reduced by £6. They are popular with charities, who receive a regular income, and allow 40% taxpayers to maximise donations without having to claim gift aid. However, just 2% of UK firms offer schemes and only 735,000 people, 3% of the workforce, are signed up. Of £9.3bn donated to good causes in 2011-12, £118m was via payroll giving. The only organisations allowed to run schemes for businesses are charities. Of 12 active payroll-giving agencies the largest, the Charities Aid Foundation, has 80% of the market. Charges for businesses are typically 4% of the money donated, which some firms pay themselves and others take out of employees’ contributions. The Treasury is consulting on opening the market to other organisations, which it said could drive down costs and raise awareness. It also wants workers leaving jobs where they are signed to receive “exit packs” including forms they can take to their new employer in order to continue their payments. Among those that could get involved are JustGiving, an online fundraising firm. It charges charities £15 a month plus a fee of between 2% and 5% on every donation after gift aid, while donors pay card transaction fees of 1.3%. It reported profits of £1.4m in 2011. Virgin Money Giving, which runs a rival non-profit-making operation, charges charities 2% on donations plus a one-off set-up fee, while donors face a fee of 1.45% on card payments.

“A look at charity pensions; How changes to the law introduced in October are affecting pensions for charity professionals.” By Claudia Cahalane. Guardian. January 25, 2013. Last October, Chester Voluntary Action (CVS) organised an event for its members to help them learn more about new legal requirements to automatically enrol staff into a pension scheme. The law, introduced in October, is being staggered. Large employers, for example those with more than 120,000 staff, had to enrol workers in a qualifying pension scheme from last October. But those with less than thirty staff will not have to start auto-enrolling employees until 2017 or 2018. Out of CVS’s 400 members, only 8 turned up to its pension event. There is a sense that because many charities are several years off their staging date, they aren’t yet factoring pensions into their budgets. Almost 70% of charities have less than 50 staff and won’t have a start date before 2015, but that doesn’t mean they can “put their feet up,” says Jane Tully, head of policy and public affairs, at Charity Finance Group. “Planning now can help smooth the costs, so that there isn’t a sudden shock to the finances at any point,” she adds. The Pensions Regulator says it can take larger employers up to 18 months to prepare for a scheme and is encouraging charities to determine their start date as soon as possible so they can at least work out when to start preparations. Tully comments: “Bigger charities are now working on organising a scheme or adjusting their existing pension scheme to comply with the new law, often using external resource.”

“1,000 postgraduates a year ‘too poor’ to take up Oxford place; University’s ‘wealth test’ said to discourage up to 15% of successful candidates as legal and political row grows.” By Daniel Boffey. Guardian/Observer. January 26, 2013. About 1,000 students a year turn down a postgraduate place won at Oxford on academic merit because of the financial demands of study there, university figures suggest. This amounts to 15% of the 7,500 students offered a place, according to the admissions office. The figure has emerged after the outcry last week over the case of Damien Shannon, 26, who is suing St Hugh’s College for “selecting by wealth”. Oxford demands that students who meet its academic targets for study must also prove that they have liquid assets to cover fees, which can reach £41,000, plus £12,900 in living costs. Students cannot factor in future earnings from evening or weekend work under a policy formalised across the university in 2010. There is also only one university means-tested scholarship to allow poorer students the chance of a postgraduate education. St Hugh’s denies that it discriminates against those from lower-income backgrounds or that it has contravened Shannon’s “human right” to an education by demanding that he show he had access to £21,000 for fees and living costs for his economic and social history course. St Hugh’s claims in its defence that the so-called financial guarantee is enforced to ensure students will be able to complete their courses without suffering financial difficulty and anxiety. Last week parliament debated Shannon’s legal case, which has received the backing of former Labour cabinet minister Hazel Blears, MP for Salford, where Shannon lives. She said the university’s demands were “unfair and shortsighted” because they blocked talented students from poor backgrounds. She said the amount of money the university demanded students have access to bore no relation to the real costs of study. She added: “I know that work has been done over the last few years to try to widen access to undergraduate degrees, but postgraduate qualifications are becoming increasingly expected if people are to [gain] access to some of our professions. That is why I am so exercised about this situation.”

INTERNATIONAL

ARGENTINA

“Alternative Media Fights Back in Argentina.” By Marcela Valente. Interpress Service (ipsnews.net). January 12, 2013. Sustained by editors and readers convinced that another kind of communication is possible, independent magazines are growing and strengthening in Argentina, offering a view different from the mainstream media coverage of political, cultural and advocacy issues. Overshadowed by more than 450 magazines belonging to 40 big publishing houses, some of them multimedia offerings, another 241 publications read in Argentina are devoted to literature, film, philosophy, humour, ideological and partisan discussions, history, music, visual arts, performing arts, design or gender issues. These are not endeavours taken up by editors in their free time, but a thriving industry with an estimated 1.4 million readers monthly, providing employment to small printers across the country. Publications such as Barcelona, THC, Alternativa Teatral (Alternative Theatre), El Ojo del Músico (The Musician’s Eye), Haciendo Cine (Making Films), La Garganta Poderosa (The Powerful Voice), Clitoris, El Teje (Weaving) and Diario de Poesía (Poetry Diary) are just a small sample of the diverse offerings of the alternative media world. These publications do not receive subsidies either from the government or businesses, and have little advertising. They live practically by the sale of each copy, something forgotten by commercial magazines, which have practically become advertising catalogues, satisfied with only being displayed or circulated among the public. Since 2011, the large majority of these alternative media have been united in the Association of Independent Cultural Magazines of Argentina (Arecia), demanding a bill that would help to strengthen a non-profit but sustainable sector. “The purpose of the association is to show that we are an economically active sector, providing decent employment conditions, living off sales and paying cash,” journalist Claudia Acuña, president of Arecia, told IPS.

CATHOLIC SEX ABUSE SCANDAL

“California: Archdiocese Loses Ruling on Records.” By Jennifer Medina. New York Times. January 7, 2013. A Los Angeles judge ruled Monday that the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles must release the names of high-ranking church officials included in some 30,000 pages of confidential records about priests accused of sexually abusing children. The decision reverses a ruling by a judge who said he worried that including the names could further embarrass the church. But in her ruling Monday, Judge Emilie H. Elias said the public’s right to know how the nation’s largest archdiocese handled molesting charges outweighed other concerns. The records include reports of abuse, letters to the Vatican and psychiatric reports and are likely to be released in the next several weeks, lawyers said. The Los Angeles Times and The Associated Press had filed an objection to the previous ruling that all names of church employees, including Cardinal Roger M. Mahony, would be blacked out.

“Judge orders archdiocese to restore names in abuse files “The public’s right to know how the church handled molestation allegations outweighs officials’ privacy rights, court rules.” By Harriet Ryan and Victoria Kim. Los Angeles Times. January 7, 2013. Church leaders who mishandled child sex abuse allegations will be named in a 30,000-page cache of internal Archdiocese of Los Angeles records set for public release in coming weeks, a judge ruled Monday. The decision by Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Emilie H. Elias reversed a ruling by a private mediator that the names of archdiocesan employees should be redacted from the documents to avoid further embarrassment to the church and “guilt by association.” Elias said the public’s right to know how the archdiocese, the largest in the nation, handled molestation allegations outweighed such concerns. She also reversed the ruling of the mediator, retired federal Judge Dickran Tevrizian, that priests who had faced a single allegation of abuse would have their names blacked out. “Don’t you think the public has a right to know … what was going on in their own church,” she asked a lawyer for the archdiocese. She said parishioners who learn from the files of a priest accused of abuse in their local church “may want to talk to their adult children” about their own experiences. The records — confidential personnel files that include psychiatric files, investigative reports, parents’ letters of complaint and Vatican correspondence — are being released as part of a 2007 settlement between the archdiocese and more than 500 victims.

“German Bishops Cancel Study Into Sexual Abuse by Priests.” New York Times/Reuters. January 9, 2013. Germany’s Roman Catholic bishops on Wednesday canceled a study into the sexual abuse of minors by priests, prompting the investigator to accuse them of trying to censor what was to be a major report on the scandals. The independent study, examining church files that sometimes date to 1945, was meant to shed light on undiscovered cases after about 600 people filed claims against priests in 2010 following a wave of revelations of sexual abuse. The German scandals were part of a series of abuse scandals that also shook the Catholic Church in Ireland, Belgium, the Netherlands and the United States, forcing Pope Benedict XVI to issue a public apology. Bishop Stephan Ackermann, a spokesman on abuse issues for the German Bishops’ Conference, said that the hierarchy had lost confidence in the researcher, Christian Pfeiffer, a criminologist, and that it would look for another specialist for the study. “We will have to find a new partner,” Bishop Ackermann said in a statement that blamed Mr. Pfeiffer’s “communications behavior with church officials” for the breakdown. Mr. Pfeiffer told German Radio that the bishops wanted to change previously agreed-upon guidelines for the project to include a final veto over publishing its results, which he could not accept. Officials made “an attempt to turn the whole contract towards censorship and stronger control by the church,” said Mr. Pfeiffer, head of the Criminological Research Institute of Lower Saxony.

“The hell house: This country mansion seemingly offered an idyllic setting to educate Catholic boys, but behind closed doors, Rupertswood was anything but peaceful.” By Mark Russell and Jared Lynch. Sydney Morning Herald. January 13, 2013. At the end of a winding road overlooking Sunbury is Rupertswood, an ornate 1874 mansion that today serves as a boutique hotel. But the grand residence, where butlers and doormen wait on guests paying up to $500 a night, was for decades a house of horror. It is alleged that from 1960 to 1990, when Rupertswood was a Catholic boarding and day school, Salesian brothers, including two former school principals and a boarding master, routinely abused boys in their care. Over the past decade, four brothers have been convicted separately of multiple counts of indecent assault, while another will face trial in August. Two other alleged offenders have left the country. The story of Rupertswood is one of the most disturbing to emerge ahead of the royal commission on institutional child sexual abuse. Yet alleged victims and former students say the truth about what happened is yet to be fully revealed. They paint a picture of repeated assaults, both sexual and physical; of brothers habitually haunting dormitories and infirmaries for victims; and of beatings and acts of perversion that persisted for decades.

HAITI

“Despite Billions In Aid, Many Haitians Still Live In Squalid Camps.” By Jason Beaubien. All Things Considered/National Public Radio. January 11, 2013. Saturday marks the third anniversary of the powerful earthquake that destroyed much of the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince. The quake killed roughly 200,000 people and left 1.5 million Haitians homeless. Despite billions of dollars in international aid and pledges to help Haiti rebuild from the disaster, very little new, permanent housing has been built. And about 350,000 Haitians are still living in squalid, makeshift camps — where they face an array of health challenges. There’s been an epidemic of sexual assaults on women living in the camps. And residents complain that unsanitary conditions and numerous cooking fires in the cramped quarters have caused respiratory problems among the children. Jacqueline Syra has been living in the La Piste camp for three years. She says she has no idea when she will be able to leave. Fears, however, that cholera would spread rapidly through the overcrowded settlements never materialized. Aid workers say this was probably because of the treated water distributed in the camps. At its peak in 2010, this camp held roughly 50,000 residents, according to humanitarian officials. La Piste is less crowded now, but there are still tens of thousands of people here. Women bathe naked with buckets at the public water taps. Kids scurry along trash-filled ditches.

UK

“Your so-called Big Society is dead, charities tell Cameron.” By Jill Sherman.
Times of London. January 7, 2013. The heads of Britain’s biggest charities have accused David Cameron of abandoning the voluntary sector he once championed as the heart of his Big Society project. In a letter to the Prime Minister seen by The Times, charity bosses complain that they have been left out of policy consultations and had their funding slashed by local councils. They say that the vulnerable people for whom they care are having state help eroded and being labelled as benefit scroungers. The letter calls for Mr Cameron and Nick Clegg to spell out a new commitment to charities as part of their mid-term review of the Government’s progress, to be announced today.

“NHS being ‘atomised’ by expansion of private sector’s role, say doctors; Over 100 healthcare firms to be allowed to provide basic care, prompting fears local hospital services may go out of business.” By Denis Campbell. Guardian. January 6, 2013. More than 100 private firms will be paid by the NHS to treat patients as a result of the coalition’s first major expansion of the private sector’s role in the health service. Department of Health figures show that 105 healthcare firms have been granted “any qualified provider” (AQP) status, which allows them to provide basic NHS services including physiotherapy, dermatology, hearing aids, MRI scanning and psychological therapy. Some private firms, such as InHealth, Specsavers and Virgin Care have already taken advantage of the controversial extension of competition to establish new services. The Department of Health says that 87 providers of different kinds, 38 of which are private and 26 from the NHS, have recently begun treating patients with various conditions under AQP. But the scale of the private sector’s new incursion into the NHS has led senior doctors to voice fears that the health service is being “atomised” and that it will force existing NHS services to close. Private companies, some of which already earn up to £200m a year each from NHS-funded work, say AQP is a major opportunity to increase their role in the health service. Under the new rules, each NHS primary care trust in England must open up at least three health services to “any qualified provider”, whether they are from the NHS, private sector, charity, social enterprise or voluntary organisation.

“Nick Clegg joins protests over ‘shirkers’ tag; Tory rhetoric on welfare criticised and Lib Dems accused of indiscipline on day of coalition relaunch.” By Patrick Wintour. Guardian. January 7, 2013. Conservative efforts to single out the “undeserving” poor were attacked by Nick Clegg on Monday as a high-profile attempt to relaunch the coalition instead saw growing faultlines emerge over welfare reform. The launch of the government’s mid-term review was intended to bury differences in a display of coalition unity, but the Liberal Democrat leader issued a reprimand over Conservative rhetoric contrasting “shirkers versus strivers” – a tactic aimed at isolating Labour in Tuesday’s Commons debate over a three-year squeeze on benefits and tax credits. Tensions between the two parties were were also stoked On Monday by Lord Strathclyde, the Conservative leader of the Lords, making a surprise resignation to return to his business career, admitting frustration with the behaviour of his coalition partners. With the debate over welfare savings likely to form one of the central political battlegrounds of 2013, the deputy prime minister, speaking at a joint press conference with David Cameron at Downing Street, said: “I don’t think it helps at all to try and portray that decision as one that divides one set of people against another, the deserving and the undeserving poor, people in work and out of work.”

“The ‘big society’ means little when charities are suffering; Grand ideas set out in the coalition’s first flush of youth have been quietly dropped as charities have been cut, not cultivated.” By Stephen Bubb. Guardian. January 8, 2013. When the coalition government was formed in 2010, charities were well aware that tough times lay ahead. Its plan to tackle the deficit meant spending cuts that would undoubtedly affect us and our beneficiaries. We all had to face the fact that charities would have to do more with less if they were to meet rising demand for their work while adapting to the first fall in the sector’s income in a decade. However, despite this knowledge, charity leaders cautiously welcomed the new government’s emphasis on the importance of our role in its plans. The concept of the “big society”, described by the prime minister as his “great passion”, was promoted as central to both social and economic recovery. The government promised wide-ranging reform of public services, with greater opportunities for charities and social enterprises – essential to mitigate the impact of spending cuts on the most vulnerable. As the prime minister correctly argued: “It’s not that we can’t afford to modernise, it’s that we can’t afford not to modernise.” Since those early days, however, the picture has begun to change. It would be wrong not to credit the government for some notable achievements: the creation of the social investment bank, Big Society Capital; reforms to Gift Aid and inheritance tax relief that promoted charitable giving; the creation, via the Localism Act, of new community rights that allow people to take control over local services and assets. But many charity leaders now wonder if the coalition’s rhetoric has been matched by action. On public service reform, the pace of change has slowed to an imperceptible crawl. There is enormous potential for charities to deliver more effective public services on behalf of the state, making use of their close links to communities, their understanding of the needs and circumstances of their beneficiaries and their capacity for innovation.

“Exclusive: Revealed – Tory plan for firms to run schools for profit; Controversial proposal blocked by Lib Dems but is expected to appear in 2015 Conservative manifesto.” By Andrew Grice. Independent. January 10, 2013. Private companies would be able to run state schools for profit under a plan to be published by Conservative modernisers which could be introduced if the party wins the next general election. Michael Gove, the Education Secretary, has told friends he has no objections to “for profit” firms setting up the free schools independent of local authority control he has pioneered since 2010. The controversial idea has been vetoed by the Liberal Democrats, who fear it would be seen as back-door privatisation of the education system. It will not be implemented before the 2015 election, but is now seen as a front-runner for inclusion in the Tory manifesto. Bright Blue, a modernising pressure group regarded as David Cameron’s natural ally, will propose the move in a book to be published next week calling for the Coalition’s public service reforms to be extended through an injection of market forces. Although Mr Gove hopes that almost 200 free schools will be opened by September, the book argues that his revolution needs a boost to create more places in good schools. “The rhetoric does not match the reality,” it says, adding that only 24 free schools were set up in the last academic year. “Relying on not-for-profit organisations and parent groups, which have limited funds, when Government’s capital spending is constrained, is not enough,” Bright Blue says. “The for-profit sector can play a role here, providing the money to get new schools set up.”

“Academies use covert selection methods to skew intake, report finds; Holding social events for prospective parents or issuing lengthy admission forms among practices used to manipulate entry, Academies Commission claims.” By Peter Walker. Guardian. January 9, 2013. Academies use covert selection methods to skew intake, report finds. Holding social events for prospective parents or issuing lengthy admission forms among practices used to manipulate entry, Academies Commission claims. Christine Gilbert of the Academies Commission: ‘Academisation alone is not going to deliver the improvements we need.’ Some academy schools have been accused of manipulating admissions to improve results and using covert selection methods, according to a major report into the programme, which also warns that the government’s push to boost the number of academies is not leading to a consistent rise in standards. A number of academy chains are seemingly more focused on expanding their empires than improving their existing schools, the report concludes. The study, led by Ofsted’s former chief inspector Christine Gilbert, also notes an overall lack of transparency and openness, particularly over the way academy sponsors are chosen, and warns that too many school governors are not up to the hugely more significant role they play in academies. The report comes from the self-styled Academies Commission, which broadly backs the “aspirational vision” of academies and has links to the programme. The commission was set up by the Royal Society of Arts, which sponsors an academy in Tipton, West Midlands, and the textbooks giant Pearson. Among Gilbert’s co-authors is Brett Wigdortz, founder of Teach First, the charity that brings high-flying graduates into disadvantaged schools and is hugely popular with Michael Gove, the education secretary. The commission finds that some academies seem to be taking advantage of the ability to set their own admissions criteria by cherrypicking more more able pupils. This, says the report, has “attracted controversy and fuelled concerns that the growth of academies may entrench rather than mitigate social inequalities”. The commission says it has heard examples of some academies “willing to take a ‘low road’ approach to school improvement by manipulating admissions rather than by exercising strong leadership”. It says it has received numerous submissions suggesting that “academies are finding methods to select covertly”, such as holding social events for prospective parents or asking them to fill in lengthy forms when applying for a place.

“Debating whether outsourcing is good or bad is beside the point; To deliver the services their communities need in a climate of cuts, local authorities must look at the whole range, and different combinations, of delivery options.” By Anne Torry. Guardian. January 8, 2013. Local authorities enter 2013 with continued pressure to cut costs while providing services, and the question everyone is asking is whether to outsource or not. In 2012, there was great questioning about large-scale outsourcing for public service delivery, with some high-profile cases, including security contracts at the Olympics, generating widespread public scrutiny. Yet, in the autumn, the CBI issued a report concluding that the government could make savings of £22.6bn by opening up service provision to independent organisations. Some local authorities are forging ahead with existing plans, such as Barnet council, which has reportedly committed to outsource services in order to try to save £120m. Meanwhile, Cornwall council has scaled back its plan to partner with a private firm in providing both back-office and frontline services. However, focusing on questions of “should we” or “shouldn’t we” risks masking the core reason for the decision in the first place, which is delivering the right services for a local community in the best way. Successful outsourcing requires the right skills and capacity to succeed and continuous monitoring is essential to deliver the right outcomes. Many contracts are also long-term in their nature with little in-built flexibility to adapt to short-term shifts in regulation or changes in community expectations. To be effective these arrangements require a certain degree of future forecasting by local authorities and, unfortunately, this is a luxury many local authorities do not have. As the 2011 census showed, constant shifts in community demographics mean many organisations – public and private – are struggling to plan even a year ahead, let alone 10. The debate should not then simply be about whether to outsource or not. It is instead about a local authority finding the appropriate service arrangement for the needs of its organisation and community.

“Tony Blair’s old boarding school faces losing charitable status; Fettes college in Edinburgh has been ordered to increase access to poorer students within the next 18 months.” By Severin Carrell. Guardian. January 11, 2013. Tony Blair’s old boarding school, Fettes college in Edinburgh, has been told it may be stripped of its charitable status unless it greatly increases access for poorer students within the next 18 months. The private school, one of the most exclusive in Scotland, has been told by the Scottish charities regulator that its “substantial” and “unduly restrictive” fees, well above average for the sector, are a major barrier to most parents. In a highly critical report, the Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator (OSCR) said Fettes had made too little effort to increase access for low-income pupils, and so failed the main charity test of providing genuine public benefit. It has been told it has until July 2014 to increase spending on subsidised places and wider access policies. As it spent only 7% of its £15m annual income on offering means-tested bursary places or discounts for children of military personnel, fewer than 10% of its students came from less well-off backgrounds. It charges boarders up to £27,000 a year, while day pupils pay up to £20,000. The regulator stated: “The charity has not taken sufficient steps to mitigate those fees and therefore OSCR concludes that they are unduly restrictive. For these reasons, OSCR finds that the charity does not provide public benefit and it therefore fails the charity test.” The ruling is a significant embarrassment for Fettes, which was attended by Blair in the 1970s, with other alumni including the fictional spy James Bond; David Ogilvy, the advertising executive; General John de Chastelain, who oversaw IRA arms decommissioning; and the actor Tilda Swinton, who briefly studied there in the sixth form. In contrast, 10 other schools – including Dollar Academy in Clackmannanshire and Strathallan in Perthshire, which taught the current Scottish secretary, Michael Moore – have been cleared by the OSCR in the latest phase of its long-running investigation into the charitable status of 40 Scottish independent schools. The OSCR said it believed private schools were at higher risk of breaching charitable rules because of their high fees: achieving charitable status means they have significant tax advantages. They pay no corporation tax and only 20% of their normal non-domestic rates bill, while potentially qualifying for gift aid tax relief.

INTERNATIONAL

HAITI

“Needham foundation expands orphanage in Haiti.” By Brian MacQuarrie. Boston Globe. January 6, 2013. The idea was born from a firsthand look at the desperation that enveloped Haiti after the devastating earthquake in 2010: Build a home for a few dozen of the thousands of children orphaned by the disaster. That goal was met in late October by the Alliance for Children Foundation, based in Needham, which moved about 40 orphans from a squalid home with little supervision to a modern, fully-staffed building in Kenscoff, a remote mountain village south of the chaotic capital, Port-au-Prince. But now, inspired by the foundation’s success, hundreds of thousands of dollars in new donations mean that the group can finish an adjacent community center and a second, nearby orphanage to house infants and toddlers. The center will contain the only medical clinic in the region; vocational training for adolescent orphans and others; and a workspace where villagers can make crafts for sale in the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere.

UK

“Archbishop of Canterbury hails church volunteers.” By Tim Moynihan. Independent. January 1, 2013. Volunteers from the churches and other faith groups who help those in need are like the Games Makers who contributed to the success of the London Olympics and Paralympics, the Archbishop of Canterbury said today. In his final New Year Message, Dr Rowan Williams said: “If you have the good fortune to live in a community where things seem to be working well, the chances are that if you slip backstage you’ll find an army of cheerful people making the wheels go round – and don’t forget just what a huge percentage of them come from the churches and other faith groups.” Dr Williams, who left office yesterday, said the “extraordinary events” of the Olympics and Paralympics provided an unforgettable spectacle. “But everyone who visited the Olympic site or watched the broadcasts will have been made aware of the army of volunteers who cheerfully gave up their free time and worked away, without complaint, all hours of the day and night to make these great events happen. They were the key people who translated the Olympic vision into reality for the rest of us. “It ought to make us think a bit harder about all the other folk who quietly, often invisibly, turn vision into reality and just make things happen – especially volunteers.”
Related story:
“Archbishop hails volunteers in his final New Year message; Rowan Williams compared volunteers from the churches and other faith groups to the ‘Games Makers’ of the 2012 Olympics.” Guardian. January 1, 2013.

“Call for crackdown on all-party groups.” By Laura Pitel. Times of London. January 3, 2013. MPs and peers have called for tighter regulation of parliamentary interest groups after The Times revealed that such groups had received hundreds of thousands of pounds in funding from internet giants, pharmaceutical companies and weapons manufacturers.

“Lonely Roads: Our Christmas charities are saving lives, helping people, and deserve your support.” Editorial. Times of London. January 4, 2013. For most, the start of a fresh year brings a sense of renewal. The cracking open of a blank calendar carries a quiet promise of possibilities, and spurs an impulse to optimism for the months ahead. But for many, 2013 will feel indistinguishable from 2012 — another year unwinding before them like a grey ribbon, a year in which their lives will continue to be shaped by forces beyond their control, beyond their pocket and beyond the concerns of kindly strangers. With your help, it need not be.