BIG CHARITIES IN BED WITH GOVERNMENT

This report from the excellent EU Referendum Blog shows the incestuous relationship between charities and other non-governmental bodies and government. These organisations have become so large that they could not survive without tax handouts such as those generously provided by the EU and others. Next time you hear them support the views of the EU, or for that matter a national government, remember it is not done to bite the hand that feeds you!

Here's a summarised extract: "As for Bond, the umbrella group for anti-poverty groups it's a network organisations with over 300 members. Much of its activity is in fact advising its members on how to obtain EU funds, for which purpose it has even set up a specific unit called the EC Funding Group.

Through Bond, however, these 300 members link with Concord, the European NGO confederation for Relief and Development. It consists of 42 member organisations: 20 international networks and 22 national platforms. Its aims are to co-ordinate the political actions of NGOs for Relief and Development at European level and to stimulate exchanges of information among NGOs but also with the European institutions.

Concord, in turn, is linked with the act4europe programme, which is directly funded by the EU commission. This organises and administers the EU Civil Society Contact Group and produces the NGO guide.

It also hosts the Green 10, an informal platform of environmental NGOs, which is headed by the European Environmental Bureau. It is funded by the EU, and by the governments of Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Luxembourg, The Netherlands, Norway, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom as well as the secretive Sigrid Rausing Trust". Oh what a tangled web they weave!

I bet similar arrangements exist in many other nations.