Lag in payments

Published on 25/10/2012 00:00

On Monday, David Cameron announced yet another of his big ideas – that voluntary organisations will be “employed” to work with prisoners so they do not re-offend when released. These organisations will be paid by results, ie after it can be shown, several years down the line, that their work has been effective.

During his sheltered existence, the Prime Minister has clearly never worked closely with any voluntary organisation, otherwise he would 
know that, unlike large companies, which can use creative 
accounting to hide large 
reserves and use “losses” to avoid paying taxes, voluntary organisations tend to live from hand to mouth, waiting for the next grant from some trust or other.

They have no money to subsidise government schemes in the hope that they will make a big killing if (and only if) they can prove that their work has reduced re-offending many years later.

Although we are supposed to be all in this together, I fear that, yet again, all that this back-of-an-envelope idea has shown is that our leaders do not live in the real world where most of us live.

Henry L Philip

Grange Loan

Edinburgh