Greetings! 

The Office for Civil Society has begun telling unsuccessful strategic partners that they have fallen at the first hurdle and not made it through the initial "sift" - but it won't say out loud who all these organisations are. TimeBank and Community Development Foundation have gone public with the bad news - more are sure to follow.
 

OCS strategic partner funding decisions trickle out
  

TimeBank and Community Development Exchange have been told they have failed in their bids to secure further funding from the Office for Civil Society's strategic partner programme.

£20m BIG children programme gets charities working together
  

The Big Lottery Fund has launched a £20m fund for vulnerable children which will require charities to work together to develop multi-issue support for their families.

Civil society 'more susceptible to fraud than public and private sectors'
  

An investigation into how well the public, private and voluntary sectors are set up to prevent, respond to and clamp down on fraud has shown civil society to be lagging well behind the other two sectors.

More Race for Life participants raise money online
  

Cancer Research UK has seen a 30 per cent increase in Race for Life participants fundraising online after it integrated JustGiving functionality into the event's website.

New bill to simplify charity law put before parliament
  

The Charities Bill, which will consolidate existing charity legislation, is going through Parliament.

FRSB develops new Child Sponsorship Charter
  

Five charities have signed up to a new Child Sponsorship Charter designed to clarify confusion over child sponsorship programmes and safeguard the fundraising product from any future public complaint.

Payroll giving quality awards increase
  

More companies are reaching higher levels of payroll giving, the Institute of Fundraising has indicated as it prepares to award more than 3,600 certificates of excellence to businesses with payroll giving schemes.

Complete the Charity Banking Survey 2011
  

The annual Charity Finance Banking Survey 2011 is now open and we would be very grateful for your cooperation. Your contribution will help the survey maintain the reliability and robustness that it has become famous for. In return we will give you free access to the survey, which would otherwise cost £35.

The Funding Commission's big ideas
  

The Funding Commission wants to increase giving and put fundraising front-and-centre in a new world order. Co-chair Richard Gutch explains precisely what the Commission wants to happen.

Fundraisers must aim for more than legal compliance
  

Fundraising has an obligation to aim for best practice and transparency, not just comply with the precise letter of the law, says Alistair McLean.

Charity uses software to ensure staff don't work too hard
  

In an announcement which will shine like a beacon of hope to the country's overworked masses, human rights charity Christian Solidarity Worldwide has revealed that it has taken action to prevent staff from working too many hours.

"I can hear Eric Pickles' statement in six months time now... "Unfortunately, the voluntary sector has not reacted, in a timely fashion, to our munificent offer to allow them to buy community assets. We are now open to selling them to the private sector...at knock-down prices, of course (It wouldn't be Thatcherism, otherwise)!""

"Political affiliations aside this is actually, rather practical and direct: partnership funding directed at local delivery of defined key themes. So much more do-able than the 'community organisers' programme which seeks to recruit thousands of foraging foot soldiers and hope they can live off the land."

"The most succinct definition I've yet seen of the Big Society was in Jeremy Clarkson's column in the Sunday Times last week: "Ask not what society can do you for you, ask what you can do for yourselves". "

They said it...