scot47

I've just watched a really upsetting tv advert by Save the Children. Small black children dying of malnutrition. Asking for people to give £3 per month...

I won't give anything, and here's why:
SAVE THE CHILDREN UK MANAGEMENT
CEO Justin Forsyth £139,950
COO Anabel Hoult £139,950
COO / CFO & Strategic Initiatives Rachel Parr £131,970
Global Programmes Director Fergus Drake £113,300
Fundraising Director Tanya Steele £112,200
Marketing & Comms Director Sue Allchurch £111,920
Policy & Advocacy Director Brendan Cox £106,029
CFO Peter Banks £102,000
HR Director Paul Cutler £100,980

Save the Children’s highly paid and very numerous HQ staff work in a swanky office for which they pay a staggering 6.5 million pounds a year lease. Do they really need their HQ in ultra expensive Central London? I suppose all those high earners have to get home to Islington. Their HQ costs more than all their other premises put together, including all their shops.

not2old

scot @ post#1

for the same reason

Here in Canada all charities financials are available to the public, they file yearly & surprising public donations for some charities are a small part of the revenue. In fact most charites get their money either from other charities, foundations or the government coffers (the taxpayer)

It takes money to run a charity, no different than running a business (a charity is a business), they need management, operations, facilities, computers, phones, advertising etc & a few volunteers to make it look all warm & fuzzy as though every penny collected is going to a good cause.

Save the Children (Canada)

REGISTERED Charity's Return - Quick View

Canadian Red Cross... huge dollars on this one

http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/ebci/haip/s...amp%3Bb%3Dtrue

compensation is over $152.4 million

Total compensation for all positions $152,405,544
Full-time employees 1,704
Part-time employees 6,195
Professional and consulting fees $5,286,636

.

spouse of scouse

I agree that you have to be careful about where you allocated your charity donations, especially since we're bombarded every day now with causes, all of them worthwhile.

What I do is research any company I'm thinking of donating to - not only their outgoings (admin/salaries etc), but also the funds they generate. Sometimes you actually get more 'bang' for your charity buck (or pound) by donating to big organisations, as more of your money is allocated to the actual charity work.

Work on percentages. From the pound you pop in a tin-rattler's tin, how much of that pound is being spent on admin costs? 10p? 50p? Do the same with large charities, how much of your pound goes to admin costs? - some of them do have huge admin costs, but might be comparatively more worthwhile to contribute to as a higher percentage of your donation actually gets to the people/cause that need it.

Editha

There are sites such as givewell which rate charities according to value for money. But that is easy to do for the smaller charities that concentrate on one or two issues, but harder for the big beasts with a complex multinational presence and many projects.

I share the concerns about Save the Children. I accept that the top managers in a charity of that size need to be highly skilled with salaries to match, but I'm damned if I can see why the CEO of the UK branch must be paid a salary commensurate with that of the British Prime Minister. My main concern about this charity, however, is the political shenanigans it has been up to in the UK since Forsyth, an ex Blair aide, took over, including distributing charity to British children, which the donors probably thought would be spent on children in the developing world, and giving a prize to Tony Blair.

We'd contributed to Save the Children by direct debit for decades, but we've cancelled that and haven't yet decided which alternative charity to make regular donations to. In the meantime we are making lump sum donations as and when it seems appropriate.