Kids company - what a cock up!

[Northernlurker]

So I understand from the bbc that kc got the three million they were waiting for and which was given to support restructuring of the charity and promptly spent 800 grand of it on the months salary bill! What on earth were they thinking? Looks like it's totally done for now.

I don't know about 'documented outcomes' when it comes to this type of work. What would a positive outcome look like?

Still alive ?

Not yet in prison?

Self-harms less often?

Able to talk about abuse they've suffered?

Not hungry today?

Less frightened?

Funders want nice little outputs. Work with X for a period of Y months then they are all better and out. If X still requires support, or still leads a chaotic lifestyle, or doesn't have a job after 6 months they don't want to know.

A better question would be why it is left to a charity to work with these children and families? Most councils jettisoned their youth workers years ago. Whose going to do this work now. Nobody

'A better question would be why it is left to a charity to work with these children and families? Most councils jettisoned their youth workers years ago. Whose going to do this work now. Nobody '

This is the scandal of the whole thing. When it was under public control, ministers and staff and bosses were accountable and it had political repercussions.

What I think will happen is that Big Society 'third sector' charidees will be set up by metropolitan mates from Eton and Oxbridge and hedge funds, and public money will be given to them and the audits won't be up to scratch and public money will be wasted and end up God knows where? I expect the BBC and the rest, apart from the Daily Mail, to praise these charidees and award them knighthoods and Damehoods etc as more and more public money finds its way out of public control.

Corbyn, of course, will stop the whole circus and put it back under public control where it belongs.

Able to ensure continuity of services for next 12 months would be a start.

KC would probably have run for a long time without question if it wasn't financially chaotic.

Corbyn, of course, will stop the whole circus and put it back under public control where it belongs

If he ever gets elected.

I don't disagree that the state has a responsibility and that leaving it to charity is precarious and irresponsible for all involved but that is a separate debate. Where there is a charity running and accepting money to provide services there have to be outcomes and these have to be evidenced and monitored. That's just basic charity regulations as well as common sense.

Nobody has said the outcomes have to be high or ambitious but I would think "served X number of meals in last 12 months which prevented Y children aged between P-Q going hungry", provided "N hours of counselling delivered to children aged between P-Q who have suffered abuse in last 12 months" are good outcomes. So is more people being alive than would have been without the intervention. Of course all of those outcomes must be backed up with evidence that there is a) an actual need and b) your actions help ease that need.

I don't disagree that the state has a responsibility and that leaving it to charity is precarious and irresponsible for all involved but that is a separate debate. Where there is a charity running and accepting money to provide services there have to be outcomes and these have to be evidenced and monitored. That's just basic charity regulations as well as common sense.

Nobody has said the outcomes have to be high or ambitious but I would think "served X number of meals in last 12 months which prevented Y children aged between P-Q going hungry", provided "N hours of counselling delivered to children aged between P-Q who have suffered abuse in last 12 months" are relevant actions. To evidence outcomes you must establish there is a) an actual need and b) your actions help ease that need.

I'm sure I saw somewhere that she said months ago when the gov said she had to step down for KC to access more funding, that she did resign, but the trustees did not accept her resignation...

"The bit of gossip Miles missed out on is that I did resign to make sure that the organisation could be protected, but the philanthropists said that they wouldn’t put their money in if I went. So the trustees didn’t accept the resignation."
blogs.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/2015/08/revealed-how-kids-company-is-dealing-with-the-allegations-against-it/

From what CB has said, she blames the charitiy's failure on there being too many children who need help.

That sentiment is fine from her as a figurehead (although not a ceo), but at some point somebody - a financial controller, a trustee - has to enforce a budget and stick to it or things like staff salaries, PAYE and rent can't be paid.

CB might be 'flamboyant', 'charismatic' and 'eccentric', but where was everyone else? (Alan Yentob)

But that's wibble really. There are thousands of charities, they don't all exist to solve every case and eliminate every problem in their remit.

Cat rescue charities for example can't rehome every single stray cat. They do what they can with their budget and facilities. Cancer support charities don't have to fold because "there were too many people with cancer". They help who they can. They don't overstretch themselves in a way that would lead to bankruptcy/not being able to pay salaries, because that would be the end of them.

If most charities can manage that, it's a crappy argument.

CB has just been on the Jeremy Vine Show on Radio 2. She said she believes the allegations against her and the charity are politically motivated to silence her and that she will produce evidence about this.

Exactly Syvanian. Being the CEO means making the tough decisions.

Oh dear CaveMum. That does sound a bit mad.

she did resign, but the trustees did not accept her resignation...

"They didn't accept my resignation" is, as with politicians, self-serving. You can always resign from a job, and in practice even serving out notice periods is not enforceable other than by withholding of pay. You may have contractual terms which make it difficult to get a job elsewhere, but that's a separate issue.

She said she believes the allegations against her

If the intent were to silence CB, they've not done a very good job, have they? You can't turn your radio on without her being there.

If she has evidence about children being abused, she should give it to the police. Sitting on it to use it as a token in her arguments over funding is just vile.

Basically, CB sincerely believes that she is a magic messiah, and being conspired against by The Establishment (despite the vast amounts of money, praise and support they have given her before they saw through the bullshit/rn out of money/realised they couldn't cover up what a disaster her 'charity' was any longer) is part of her magical journey. To an extent, her intentions were always good in that she felt pity for her 'clients' and wanted to help, but it was and is all so bound up in her need to be recognised as not only wonderful but special, different and more magic than anyone else, that she was never going to be able to do it properly.

Governments didn't actually give a toss whether her magic worked on the vulnerable (but noisy, smelly, impoverished and aggressive) teens or not - funding KC was cheaper than funding proper, state-provided youth workers, mental health resources, school meals, etc. And they could go, oh isn't she wonderful? And not have to think about troubled teenagers because Wonderful Camilla was saving them.

I wonder what the staff think about having their PAYE / NIC contributions pumped back into the charity rather than being paid over. In any other business this would be a huge red flag, yet more than a handful of people must have been aware that negotiations with HMRC were taking place and no one appeared to blow the whistle.

I worked in a senior position in a company in the City that at one point did a lot of fundraising and made corporate contributions to KC. CB was a fantastic public speaker but I was always left thinking that something was not quite right - too much spiritual woo and not enough data for me.

But that's wibble really.

Completely agree - but how did so many high profile supporters and funders let her get away with such wibble for so long?

I read something which made me think.
All this 'giving out money' seems to be based in London, with offices in Bristol and Liverpool, afaik.
Are 'troubled teens' oop North expected to live on the govt minimum but in London you just 'self refer' and collect.

My thinking on the civil servants who spent a year with the charity and could not find any money was becuase the children that self-referred were either already on social services radar and thus supported elsewhere or did not have sufficient issues.
How easy is it for a teen to make up a story for easy money on a weekly basis?

I find this really interesting.
Some background - I'm in Scotland so a bit different, different charity regulator. I do the accounts for a few small charities, much much smaller sums than in this case. In Scotland all charities have to submit their accounts and a report to the regulator on a yearly basis - so even one with an income of less than £500 - and the accounts have to have been independently verified. The largest one I deal with had an income of £60k last year - for that charity we pay for verification (not sure if we have to) but the smaller ones it can be more or less anyone. And it is verification - not a full audit. (I get paid a small amount to do the biggest one - the others it is voluntary).
Now for the biggest we get some council funding (say 2/3 of income) for that we are told we have to be prepared to submit our accounts for auditing by them on request. We have never (in 10 yrs) been asked to do so. We also get grants and have to send in a report of how we spent the money...but we have never been asked for proof.
I am assuming that they are trusting that if the regulator is happy there isn't a problem.
And for that the person who does the verification has to be happy - but all they do is a basic check for no obviously embezzlement, that is all they sign - there are no obvious irregularities. The whole process puts the responsibility onto the trustees. They are responsible to make sure the charity is above board.
But they in turn depend on the verification to turn up any problems. In short everyone is putting the financial responsibility onto someone else...no one really takes responsibility - so I can see how this can happen.
The regulator also does not seem to be routinely checking that charities stay within their constitution, their aims. They seem to depend on someone complaining to investigate.
The reason I don't think charities should get large amounts of government funding - unless there is a more robust system in place than the one I have experience of.

In this case I think ultimately the Trustees will be held responsible for any financial mismanagement (not sure of CB is a trustee) ...and may (depending on exact set up) be held financially liable for any outstanding debts.
The only thing that has surprised me is that we are supposed to keep reserves of at least 3 months running costs plus redundancy payments. KC doesn't appear to have had those reserves. I was warned by the person doing the verification when we were struggling a few years ago and making a loss year on year, reserves running short that the regulator may well start asking questions and to make sure we said how we were planning on dealing with it in the yearly report. The regulator could have suspended our charitable status. But they didn't - didn't query anything - and I know of another similar charity that did go under and had their annual report cleared by the regulator a few months before....
I think this whole shambles sheds a light on a 'problem' with the charitable sector -one that really needs addressing.

All this 'giving out money' seems to be based in London, with offices in Bristol and Liverpool, afaik.

Not London, in fact, but a fairly localised part of South London. Ali G's Staines Massive are out of luck.

This argument is not one that says that charities have to be national. But if the government turns out to have had a policy of funding a shadow benefits scheme in which the tired, poor, huddled masses of Peckham, Brixton and Tooting but not Dulwich as that's far too posh were given cash in hand that was not available elsewhere - let's face it, on current evidence about the only thing there is any evidence of KC actually doing is the handing out of cash - then the scandal may get bigger.

"To an extent, her intentions were always good in that she felt pity for her 'clients' and wanted to help, but it was and is all so bound up in her need to be recognised as not only wonderful but special, different and more magic than anyone else, that she was never going to be able to do it properly."

Do you know her personally SolidGoldBrass? (It certainly sounds as if you do from the above quote.) If not, surely that is pure speculation? If not, you can't be certain about her motivations.

I am close to someone who has worked with her in the charity sector and that person has never doubted her sincerity. Nor did they find her self-aggrandising or needy in terms of recognition. I remember them describing her as a robust advocate on behalf of her clients who, through necessity, played the media game without particularly enjoying having to do it.

I agree with you about proper state funding though (and basically what BarbarianMum said).

Interview of CB on Sky News.

She says the full story will come out and it is much more complicated than people think.

I don't think she is kidding. She seems very confident and is certainly not stupid.

I've heard 2nd hand from multiple people who've worked with her that she's a nightmare. She believes her own PR and has been a good advocate - but hopeless at management and clearly loves the spotlight.