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2011 has started with a bang for Sir Stephen Bubb and 100 other voluntary sector luminaries who received gongs in the New Year Honours List. But staff at Connexions Staffordshire are facing the new year with trepidation as the charity prepares to wind up and be absorbed into two local authorities.

£12m service delivery charity to be subsumed by local authorities

Connexions Staffordshire, a £12m-turnover charity that until recently employed 330 staff, is to be wound up and its services absorbed into Staffordshire County and Stoke-on-Trent City Councils.

Almost half of sector thinks Big Society is just a 'rebrand', poll finds

A poll of over 1,000 members of civil society has found that 42 per cent believed that Big Society was "politically rebranding existing community action".

Stephen Bubb knighted in New Year Honours List

Stephen Bubb, chief executive of the Association of Chief Executives of Voluntary Organisations is to receive a knighthood following the announcement of the New Year Honours List which named over 100 people for recognition of their service to the voluntary and charity sectors.

Small voluntary organisations to play "crucial" role in Work Programme

Prime contractors for the government's Work Programme will have to prove that they are developing partnerships with small, specialist voluntary sector providers in order to win contracts.

Tiger Moth charity censured for health and safety failure

A charity which provided flights in a World War II aeroplane to sick and terminally ill children invalidated its insurance by failing to ensure the plane had the appropriate certificate of airworthiness, a Charity Commission inquiry has found.

Charity Bank appoints six new trustees

Charity Bank has announced the appointment of six new trustees to help develop its range of social investment services.

American boardrooms can offer UK charities valuable insight

BoardSource has recently published its NonProfit Governance Index 2010. Tesse Akpeki says the findings hold valuable insights from the US for governance development in the UK.

A project born of concern: Project Prevention in the UK

In May last year Civil Society announced that Project Prevention, an American charity that controversially pays drug and alcohol addicts to undergo sterilisation and long-term contraception procedures, would be coming to the UK. Here its founder Barbara Harris asks UK critics to think again before passing judgement.