Oxfam - tip of the iceberg?

Given the amount of terrible sexual misbehaviour and re still extremely powerful and wealthy, despite the many scandals that have beset them.illegality in many other organisations and professions, I think it is unfair that Oxfam is being so harshly singled out.

From my recollection, it is a charity which has kept administrative and salary costs to a minimum compared to other high profile charities and has helped a lot of tragedy-struck and impoverished communities. Ironically, a former member of the charities commission said today that keeping administrative costs to a minimum so that more can be spent on practical help on the ground has had the unfortunate effect of reducing money to ensure that safeguarding procedures are properly maintained.

About twenty years ago there was a local funding to build and equip a hospice for children. I always gave to any fundraising and then they set up a draw where you paid £1 a week and the prizes are all money. We have donated the same amount every year for the twenty years and never been asked to increase it.

I have always preferred to support research such as Cancer UK and the BHF. I think I can see where the money is being spent.

My sister works at a charity shop for Red Cross and I was gob smacked when they were flown out to Scotland for a meeting. The other meetings they have in the UK all are expenses paid they are put up in a hotel where they can have a sauna etc all paid for by Red Cross. That is why I will not support any big charity. I prefer to support small local ones.

And now in the news it's a about sexual assaults going on in Oxfam charity shops! Some volunteers accused of assaulting child volunteers - volunteers apparently don't need to be police checked. I volunteer for the National Trust and have not been police checked - it costs a fair bit and takes months. And I have no unsupervised contact with children.

But children should surely not be allowed to work in a charity shop?

luzdoh, thank you for your links, I've just got in from work and will look at them later. Unfortunately it is the case that even call centres collecting for charities put a lot of pressure on their staff in terms of targets for amount raised, and I'm sure that pressure results in less than desirable behaviour from workers there. Obviously in the case of my daughter and the young lady you mentioned, they are working their temporarily but if it is a long-term job the pressure of making targets must be very stressful.

I do feel that the problem with only donating to small, local charities is that the neediest people are those who have suffered a natural disaster or are very poor, as they are so much more in need really than anyone in the first world...

humptydumpty:
For proof that fundraisers lied over the phone see info re
the Tv prog Dispatches Ch4, I think it might have been on August 11th 2014

On Youtube look for "dispatches s28e22 how to stop your nuisance calls" or youtu.be/8_FYgF7gKQo
other information can be found on:
www.channel4.com/info/press/news/how-to-stop-your-nuisance-calls-channel-4-dispatches
Channel 4 2015:
youtu.be/wl7sKVM3H3A
www.civilsociety.co.uk/news/telephone-fundraisers--told-to-lie--to-boost-donations--channel-4-investigation-finds.html
After the lid was taken off by Dispatches revealing the depths fundraisers went to, the fundraisers had to clean up their act. However I am told they still get away with what they can, making sure they are not caught.

I tend to avoid most charities these days as they all seem to have become very political, which is not their remit and I object!

"pen50 This is the tragedy. All of you dedicated, unselfish and caring people are now feeling under attack and as if you have to defend yourselves. Obviously, there is a huge number of good people working for charities, giving time and effort freely or for little reward. Just as many charities are run on impeccable lines by decent people. That is yet another reason why the despicable behaviour of those under scrutiny now makes me so angry.

humptydumpty: Very sorry to tell you but it is absolutely true. There was a TV investigative prog about this and other fund raising by big charities, but I missed it. `What happened to me (and I was a donator to the charity) was a few years ago and possibly before the TV investigation, which may have led to a change in practice.

The likes of Jacob Rees-Mogg, who is opposed to any kind of aid spending, have dug this up to smokescreen/muddy the waters. post by Nashma.
I too would like to know what evidence this statement is based on; if this is supposition what has given her grounds for posting it?
I always support the Salvation Army, as I don't believe they have a large bank of highly paid executives draining resources. They also go in where no one else will, in this country at least, and do a lot of work amongst derelicts and homeless.

I remember that GabriellaG and the first Great Blue Peter Bring and Buy Sale to help survivors of Pol Pots murderous regime in Cambodia. We didn't have much money but we sent books, records, toys, clothes and I manned a stall.

I think Mesopotamia was the cradle of civilisation (sorry to argue!) and look at it now.

Also, re the story about regular donors being asked to increase their donations. At Christmas I was sent a £5 book of raffle tickets from the Cat's Protection League. As I am an animal lover, I decided to buy all of them. I have just received a book for a new raffle, a £10 book of raffle tickets this time!!! So for their greedy attitude, it went straight in the bin and they will get nothing.

I have never donated to foreign aid charities or any of the large multi-national ones and never will. The UK government already gives £25 million a day of tax payers' and other borrowed money and nothing is really getting any better in the 'so called' third world. The only thing that will improve their lot in life is to get rid of their corrupt leaders and control their population numbers and they can only do that for themselves. Africa was supposedly the cradle of civilisation so what happened!!!!

It was Biafra.

I remember being devasted and undeniably tearful many years ago, when the front page of a tabloid showed a photograph of a small stick-thin boy carrying his smaller sister on his back, walking to where there might have been an aid drop. There was nothing to be seen for miles, just a bleak barren landscape. I looked at my well nourished and loved children and dug deep to send a cheque.
I can still see the picture in my mind's eye but the scenario han't changed for the better. Africa (and other countries) sucks up money like a sponge but still the begging bowl is held out and we oblige.
Is the money getting to the right targets? NO.

humptydumpty a friend of mine had a direct debit set up to the Red Cross for a reasonable amount each money which she could afford. She then received phone calls asking her to increase her donation to £50 per month, when she said she couldn't afford that much the last young man who phoned became quite unpleasant and pressurised her so much that she ended up in tears and cancelled her donation altogether.

If it can be 'proved' that charities are bad, then Little Englanders have the perfect excuse for cutting off funds and turning their backs on the world's poor
That's very cynical and I don't think it is true in fact.

Does that mean you are quite happy for over-paid top charity workers to abuse the vulnerable for their own ends and that should all be kept secret so that other vital work continues?

I would rather this was brought out into the open and that charity money, whether from donations, taxpayers' foreign aid money or wherever, was properly used to help the poor and vulnerable and not creamed off by corrupt local officials or used by charity workers to exploit victims of poverty and disaster for sex.

This needs to be exposed to ensure that there is more accountability in future.

The likes of Jacob Rees-Mogg, who is opposed to any kind of aid spending, have dug this up to smokescreen/muddy the waters.
I hadn't heard that JR-M exposed this scandal - is that true? If not, then that is quite a serious allegation.

Very sad I see this morning the actress Minnie Driver has stepped down.
It’s hard to know what to do, there is a Salvation Army church in our local shopping centre they do coffee mornings,Dad and parents club on a Saturday so we keep a little jar and fill with small coins, 1p 2p 5p and by the time Christmas comes it’s full, we take it down to them. I rather put money in a bucket or give to Salvation Army, battersea dogs home

I work for a local, religious charity, and I can assure you we're not all bloated plutocrats (I wish.) Our highest paid employee is on less than £70k, and our average annual pay is closer to £28k. Admin is a cost but we are so hedged about by rules and regulations that it would be impossible to run the place solely on well-meaning volunteers - though we have over 500. Having endured our own, well-publicised, safeguarding scandal a couple of decades ago, looking after children and vulnerable adults is at the top of our priorities, and we have all sorts of procedures in place to ensure this will never happen again. But of course it all costs. We get no government aid towards day-to-day running costs though we have benefited this year from a capital works grant - though that is unusual.

So please don't tarnish all charities with the same brush; some of are really are very careful with other people's money - and time, and skills, and children...

luzdoh I find your account of phone calling by fundraisers asking for increased donations totally implausible. After leaving uni my daughter also worked for a call centre working on behalf of charities asking people if they would be willing to increase their donation, and they had scripts to which they worked and there was nothing in any way like your shoes story. It was very professional, and the only negative thing she found was in the response by people she was calling (who were already donors and had provided their number) who were sometimes personally abusive to the person calling them.

I was surprised when I volunteered in a charity shop at the amount of donations which were actually thrown away. If some clothing was donated which had been bought in a supermarket, no matter what the condition, we were instructed to put it for "rags", books which were not in perfect condition and ornaments which the manager considered "naff" were thrown away. Workers would "put aside" goods they wanted for themselves and would pay a reduced amount.

From what I have heard on the radio it seems Oxfam isn't theonly charity that this happens in but they are the ones who've been exposed so it needs a root and branch reform of all charities to ensure this doesn't happen in future.

Luckygirl Oxfam works for the government. It is its eyes abroad, finding out what cannot be gleaned by proper means. The government places people in Oxfam strategically to infiltrate difficult areas and regimes across the world so as to gather intelligence. This has become more and more widely known. Initially it was brushed aside as "Conspiracy theory", but too many people have witnessed it now. I would not be surprised to see Oxfam wrapped up soon. But it will spring back under another name.