Following is part of an article which leads to a lot of questions.

http://www.theage.com.au/national/charities-cant-cope-with-increasing-demands-says-report-20141012-114w2d.html

Charities are pessimistic they will be able to meet an expected growth in demand over the next 12 months, a new report reveals.

PricewaterhouseCoopers found 84 per cent of more than 300 chief executives it surveyed in the not-for-profit sector doubted they would have the necessary resources.

PwC partner Mark Reading said despite a 60 per cent increase in government funding over the past six years to $41 billion a year, 40 per cent of the sector believes social outcomes have deteriorated.

"These results make clear that the way government is currently funding charities isn't working," Mr Reading said. "Funding is currently awarded on an ad-hoc basis with no clear rationale."
"The PwC report said the not-for-profit sector is the fastest growing part of the Australian economy, having grown at almost twice the rate of the mining sector in the last six years.

In 2012-13, its turnover was more than $100 billion."

1st Question (more than 300 CE's) this implies there are more than 300 NFP charities, how many are there? I only know of about 10 or so.

2nd Quote "to $41 billion a year" to me this says charities in Australia get this much money each year, Who is getting it and what are they doing with it?

3rd Quote "In 2012-13, its turnover was more than $100 billion." Love to see the account books where this is going.

4th What are the salaries of these 300+ CE's? Bet no one can find out.

Philip S,

Charities in Australia are under the control of The Australian Charities and Not-for-Profits Commission (ACNC) an arm of ASIC. There is indeed hundred of registered charities in Australia. For example every Sub-branch of the RSL is a registered charity. Chartres apply to the government for grants and have to put their case. You want to know how every cent is spent? Why. Do you ask the Army how they spend every cent. Account books, salaries, why do you want to know? Is it a casual interest, or an ideological beef you have, obviously the questions are loaded to some degree.

When anyone associates a charity with the likes of an RSL, with their ALL ABOUT PROFIT pokies, meals, grog, etc, I just find it hard to believe we offer any subsidy to them at all.

As far as I'm concerned, if we stopped the scam that is churches raising money, tax free, only to spend it on assets, or legal defense of it's rock spiders, then perhaps the tax payer funding could be better distributed to GENUINE needy charities.

As for CEO's, yes well, they don't work for nothing, do they.

If you ask me, the whole charity industry needs to be closely looked at.

Butch, not all charities receive government grants, far from it, most rely on fund raising and donations. That is true about the RSL, don't confuse the RSL Sub branches, which normally have only a few members i.e returned servicemen with RSL Clubs which hold the liqueur and gaming licences and can have thousands of members, the majority termed associate members. If you want to check up on charities then all non for profit organisations would also deserve a closer look. You raise the question of churches, the Catholic Church, asset wise, is the richest organisation in the world. One in the news lately in Australia, has been The Hillsong Church, one could suspect it is run more to financially benefit a few, and uses religion as a means to that end. Jesus trudged the roads with dirty feet and sandals, some of his modern day disciples prefer the 'Ferrari' to the sandals.

So the penny has dropped !
What you are seeing are the early symptoms of the "new economy".
If you want to find out why charities are having a hard time I suggest this reading;
The End of Growth by Richard Heinberg.
Your World is About to Get a Whole Lot Smaller by Jeff Rubin.
Many others which can be found with a little research, but those will fill in the blanks.
For how to run the future go to the Transition Town web site;

http://www.transitionnetwork.org/

As I have said it adnausium everything will become local. Including charity.
The large charities will disappear and even suburbs will become village like.
Energy is becoming expensive and society will have to change to cope with that.
The current low oil prices are temporary because it is at or below the well head price of the latest wells.

Australia in particular is in a very difficult position.
We import 95% of our fuel, soon to be 100%.
There is no guarantee of supply.
The government should force the oil companies to keep two or three refineries operating.
We would at least then have about 25% of our own fuel.

It is an economy operating in an environment as I describe above, that will have
difficulty keeping unemployment below 15% to 25%.
In that case you can see why charities will struggle.
It should be expected that government pensions and other entitlements will start to wither on the vine.

I gave up giving to Charities after Tracy. There were millions raised. I gave a quarter of a weeks wage as a donation. Then half the money "just disappeared" the other half went to Auditors & Lawyers looking for the first half.

Just recently, in the Brisbane floods, very little of the money was distributed. Yes there were Photo Opportunities to raise more money. I believe the excuse was that most of the money went into a future fund for disasters. "AY!" how does that work. Red Cross I think.

I spent two years in the Army in Malaysia. Every Company had a small village to look after & we did a fine job. When the Poms pulled out we were assigned an new village. We were to the Village, spoke to the Head Man & did an assessment of their needs. When we came back with two truck loads of equipment for the village (Rice seed, Lumber, String to repair their fishing nets, etc.) the Head Man got very upset. You see we were supposed to give him "Money" which he kept half & then gave the other half to his family to split up. That's the way it's done, we were told. He didn't want the equipment we had brought with us.

We left with what we had brought. The Head man complained to the Australian High Commissioner that we had refused to give his Village Aid.

The Australian High Commissioner turned up in a rage. so we took him to the Village & let the Head Man explain the procedure with the Aid. The AHC left without even an apology to us.
cont

cont

Frazer flew to East Africa to hand out some Aid to an African Villages. He then flew back to Australia for his daughter's Birthday, then back again to Africa, all first Class. He stayed at the Best Hotel & hired a fleet of vehicles to move all the staff & Media. His Salary is enormous. The Aid he gave out was only a fraction of the cost of the Photo Op.
They have floods in India/Pakistan. The Adds tell us. "Imagine "your" house being washed away in a flood, give generously." For a start these houses are, one room grass & sapling huts, The same people have been getting washed away every year for the last 5000 years. This is all just part of life to them.
What makes you think that whatever Aid is given, gets to these people. If 10 Million Dollars was raised, each household would only get about 50 cents. OK, so 50 cents would be the equivalent to $50 to us.
It is said that out of every Dollar raised only 5 cents get to where it is intended. The rest goes on CEO's salaries, Administration, bribes, etc. Been there done that seen it all working.

As for the Churches, their excuse is that they are looking after the "Spiritual need" of the people with the money they collect. Then we have the Islamic Charities whose Charities collect for Terrorist Organizations through third parties.

Give to Charity. No. No way.

Jayb, I have said for years that charity, or at least FORIGN aid, should consist of all products that our nations producers can't sell or use. Farmers failed crops is one such example.

Instead of the farmers having to plow them in, why can't we harvest them, process them and send them off. Who knows, we might even create jobs for the unemployed.

The fact is that wherever cash is involved, corruption is never far behind.

Here's one charity that is well known,

From their site:
"If I donate money does it actually go to those who need it?
When you donate to a specific Special Work we ensure that it goes directly to where you want it. The Society prides itself on ensuring all funds donated are used specifically for what they are intended. We have the lowest administration fees of any other Australian charity because of our huge volunteer base.

Is the Society government funded?
The core work of the Society is carried out by members and volunteers and does not receive government funding ie home visitation and Vinnies shops. These services are funded through donations, fundraising activities and enterprises run by the Society.

However some of the St Vincent de Paul Society’s Special Works do receive government funding ie aged care facilities, housing and homeless services, supported employment for people with disabilities.

The Society does not receive any direct funding from the Catholic Church."

More at:http://www.vinnies.org.au/page/About/FAQs/

I do believe the Salvo's, Vinnie's & other such Charities do great work for the needy. My Mother worked for Vinnie's in Ayr & Mackay for about 40 years in all. Even though she helped out she had some horror stories of what goes on behind the scenes. Staff helping themselves, first pick freebies for their friends etc.

I have a list from 2012, "Cost of raising Funds" What it doesn't tell you is that the CEO's Salaries & Wages are not included in this figure.
Worst;
Surf Lifesaving 62%
Care Flight Australia 51%
Make a Wish 51%
National Heart Foundation 48%
Aust. Red Cross 27%
Save the Children 25%

Best 9% & under
Guide Dogs 9%
Aust Cancer Research 7%
Arthritis Foundation 7%
Alzheimer's Aust 5%
Royal Flying Doctor of Aust 3%
Diabetes Aust. 2%

The worst is any other Charity other than the Best, under 9%. The list I have is very long.

There are so many worthy charities out there it's really confusing as to who are the best, and who's the most worthy of them all ? I've not got a lot of faith for the Salvation Army, as they're very choosy as to what material help they'll accept. As an example, we had a totally new, traditional rocking chair costing in excess of $350. I purchased it for my wife, and she never actually used it. I offered it to the Salvo's, and they declined it out of hand ?

Generally speaking I'll support charities dealing with Cancer. I made regular contributions to one, and they (apparently) shared around my address and other details with yet more charities, consequently I was flooded with correspondence from many others all seeking donations of one sort or another ?

Makes it really tough to try and legitimise many of these so called worthy causes. Therefore, I'd like to see a much closer scrutiny by authorities, in order to regulate and oversee many of them ? So the generous public would feel more secure when parting with their hard earned funds ?

o sung wu, sadly, charities are reluctant to accept anything that could potentially cause harm to the receiver, even if they do get it for free.

Perhaps they have seen rocking chairs that have fallen apart in the past. I don't know!

It's compliance gone mad, the very same compliance that has many companies, large and small, reconsidering their futures here.

Anything electrical must now be tested and tagged before it can be sold. Considering one can by a fan for $12 or so from the likes of Kmart, most sad looking ones end up in land fill.

I work in the CSG industry, service role, and the electrical tools that get thrown out is a disgrace. Grinders, drills, leads, saws, you name it, simply because all electrical tools used in the field now have to be tested and tagged every three months. Lifting slings and ratchet straps are the same. The hassle and costs are often deemed not worth it.

While I understand it's creating jobs, it's also creating waste and costs, as the miners and their contractors pay millions per month to dump waste. Some being simply due to what's been deemed as safe working dates.

As I say, it's compliance gone mad.

Butch,
Is the 135 workers killed on the job so far this year in Australia, also a sign of "compliance gone mad". In the mining sector alone 14 workers have been killed, without compliance how much greater would those figures be. Your concern seems to be about "waste and costs" no consideration of workers lives what so ever, they don't rate a mention.
There is always the old employer way of thinking, profits are paramount, safety by all means as long as it doesn't affect the bottom line and get the job done regardless. Industrial history clearly shows that employers treated workers lives as expendable until governments were forced to legislate on issues of safety, maily due to the agitation of unions.

http://www.safeworkaustralia.gov.au/sites/swa/statistics/work-related-fatalities/pages/worker-fatalities

Paul1405: Your concern seems to be about "waste and costs" no consideration of workers lives what so ever,

Paul, I know what the WH& S is supposed to do, but sometimes the conditions placed on the Workers & the Workplace can be so ludicrous that nothing can move. A lot of these "Rules" put in place are there because some young fellar, straight out of Uni is looking to impress his Boss & justify his high paid job.

I remember we had one such young fellar impose some work place conditions on us, so we invited him out to the site. He had never been out of his office. We had previously explained the situation to the Manager. They both came out & we asked the young fellar to perform the work using his conditions. He failed. It was only a simple task but he had so complicated it he would have been killed if we had let him go on.

& That's what happens in a lot of these cases, not all. Total lack of, on the job experience, common sense & lack of knowledge of the "coal face" conditions. They come up with some of the stupidest "Paper work" solutions, justifying their job.

Hi there Butch...

You're right about the wanton waste, with nearly everything. My Dad always repaired our shoes, and Mum turned our collars and the cuffs also. Thus extending the life of our shirts significantly. You mentioned powered tools and the need to have them tested and tagged before being allowed to be used again.

Mate I really don't know, you say many smaller mfg's would rather discard them and purchase new tools, thus avoiding all this red tape ?
Do you think perhaps it's somewhat of a false economy to service, repair and then re-test the item, rather than purchase a new one, and simply discard it later ? Apparently some tools are so cheap to buy, so why not ? Butch, you're far more appraised of this subject than me, because you're in the actual CSG industry, that's why I'm asking.

Years ago, I was speaking with an American Army Officer, about their logistics philosophy, and how it differed greatly to ours ? When in the field, if it's at all possible, we Aussies replenish our 'kit' by a 'repairing by replacement' philosophy. Whereas the yanks, simply replace their 'kit' and that's it. No greater example was Vietnam. When their UH-1's became AOG'd they'd simply replace it with another !The must have mfg'd 'squillions' of the things ! Go figure ?

o-sung wu: When their UH-1's became AOG'd they'd simply replace it with another.

Yep, that's how we got our spares & a bent Caribou too. ;-)

Paul, when you lower the standards of workers intelligence, common sense goes out the door, because what they have done is allowed complete half whits in to the workforce, then lowered the bar to accommodate them, the result being that good skilled workers are treated like half whits as well. That's fact!

The other problem is that the unions have forced many employers to pay on education levels, not skill levels, so many skilled workers have adopted the attitude of, 'what's the point, they get paid the same as me', another fact!

You know there's a huge problem when an employer says to their workers, 'at the end of your 12 hour shift, we don't expect you to be fatigued' yea right, that's why so little gets done.

The trouble is that once most of these mine workers try to re enter the normal work cycles, they can't handle it, that's if they even get a start because many employers can't handle their over the top safety and compliance attitudes.

It's like, how many miners does it take to dig a hole. Well, first there's the safety inspector who identifies all the so called risks. Then there are the engineers who decide whether or not the hole can be dug there. Then there's the tool box meeting to discuss what they discussed earlier in the day, and the day before that, and that.......

Finally, one person digs the hole while the other six stand around and watch.

The amusing part is they all fail to understand that you can't legislate against stupidity, but that doesn't stop them from trying.

O Sung, no, they're not repairing them, it just that the dated tag has expired so they often just buy new tools, often because those doing the tagging are contractors and, when things slow up, contractors are the first to go.

But, it's all part of why we are becoming less attractive to big business.

Hi there JAYB...

That's right I remember, you're a product of the 'Dat' weren't you ? Therefore you'd remember what I meant too. The yanks were (seemingly) awash with money, the way that everything became redundant and easily replaceable. Yet if a spring in our M16's mags., failed, the armourers wanted the old one's, in case we're operating in the illicit black mkt. ? Sure, there was a real lot of opportunity engaging in that stuff, at Nui Dat in those days ? Nevertheless, I understand their caution I suppose. JAYB you were part of the 'angry palm trees' brigade were you, nine sqn. I think they were ?

The problem about power tools is they have to tested by a licenced electrician.
This can mean a significant trip with the tools, the time costs and the
return pickup. I agree it is stupid, but the nanies have them over a barrel,
if something goes wrong it is the employers fault not the user who let trucks
run over the cable or otherwise mistreated the tools.

Nope, 4 sec, 5 pl, B Coy, 1 R.A.R., 173d Brigade, Big Red 1, out of Bien Hoa. 65/66. Airborne! All the Way! Cheers. Closest I got to Nui Dat was Courtney Air field.

Hi (again) JAYB...

Oh well fairly close, same country at least ! 3RAR B Coy 1st Tour 1968/69.

JayB, I can not comment on your particular case involving the "young fellar" and what he did or didn't do. All I'm commenting on is the work place deaths that occur every year in Australia and the need for safety. Something that some on this thread fail to acknowledge. In my lifetime in the workforce I have seen 3 people killed on the job, all were the result of negligence on some persons part and were totally avoidable if rules and regulations had been adhered to. If as you say there is some over regulation, I find that preferable to no regulation what so ever, if... and it does mean there are no if's or but's, lives are saved.
Its one thing to toil at the "coal face" its another thing altogether to have the "coal face" fall in on you.

I am in the usa now and they have Ebola scares all over the media. The cdc are making basic eras in containment. It is like they want it to spread. Some think they are working towards compulsory vaccinations. More money for our elites . Also consider what health debilitating things go into these vaccines.

Harrison: Ludwig is banned from this forum. Just go to the last page of the Rolf Harris thread.

I Cant get into the thread at all. It seems to have disappeared.

Arjay: Some think they are working towards compulsory vaccinations. More money for our elites . Also consider what health debilitating things go into these vaccines.

Conspiracy Theory Arjay or just an anti-vaccination stance by you?

My belief. If you been to a country that has had cases of Ebola then you shouldn't be allowed back into this country until you have been fully cleared or been vaccinated.

In 1975 there was a British TV Series called "Survivors." There were 3 lots 13 episodes each. It was a great TV Series. Just what could happen if people start travelling around & it's not contained. Frightening.