The Ripple Effect

You probably know that children and young people's services run by the voluntary sector are amongst the hardest hit by local and central government cuts but do you know why? One of the reasons is that over half of the children's voluntary sector relies on some element of statutory funding and get only 1% of their funding from the private sector and less than 1% from the Lottery.

− 96% of the work is carried out at a local grass roots level.
– Faith organisations make up 11% of the children and young people's voluntary sector.
– Six organisations account for 20% of all paid staff in the sector (Spurgeons isn't one of them!)
– Only 37% of small organisations employ staff.

This comprehensive research from National Children's Bureau (NCB) and National Council for Voluntary Organisations (NCVO) gives an overview of the sector that we work in and the main developments over recent years which have changed its environment, including relationships with statutory agencies.

It includes a chapter on the value and impact of children and young people's charities, so you can get a feel for where your work fits into the bigger picture and find some useful facts, figures and ideas for planning, managing, evaluating – and funding bids!

Key characteristics of our sector are that we:

• hold specialist knowledge of communities and their needs
• reach diverse communities and successfully engage service users
• deliver services that are flexible, innovative and user-focused
• deliver services that are cost effective and provide added value
• fill gaps in terms of unmet needs
• achieve positive outcomes for service users

Read The Ripple Effect: the nature and impact of the children and young people's sector