Dear Colleagues,
This is a difficult time for the VCSEF sector across the UK, as we face unprecedented challenges. We know that many charities continue to face tough operational and financial decisions, including reducing services and / or closure.
The Charity Commission warns that people are using artificial intelligence (AI) to submit fraudulent applications for charity registration and grants.
An increasing trend in cases where charitable status is suspected of being abused for private financial gain, has made regulators apply much stricter scrutiny to new applications.
The Charity Commission’s second annual Charity Sector Risk Assessment highlights a sustained increase in concerns raised about charitable status being abused for private benefit, with a 29% increase in 2025-26 (374 cases) following a 38% increase in 2024-25 (291 cases, up from 211 in 2023-24).
Additionally, a recent report by NCVO highlights that rising extremism and social divisions can cause hostility, which has forced some charities to scale back public visibility or cancel community events due to security concerns.
We know that people start community groups and charities principally through a mixture of wanting to help others, seeing a gap in services or through lived experience and turning challenging or negative personal experiences into something with a good or positive outcome.
Increasingly, groups and organisations are facing a higher demand for their services alongside tighter budgets and tougher competition for grants and donations. This demand will continue to increase as health and local authority leads move towards configuring services around neighbourhood / community and organising multidisciplinary staff into integrated neighbourhood teams.
Shifting care from hospitals to the community, referred to as ‘left shift’, is a core part of the Labour government’s 10 Year Health Plan. To achieve this, the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) and NHS England (NHSE) have released a Neighbourhood Health Framework. The framework outlines plans to redesign care in the community, help people stay well at home, deliver more joined-up care and reduce pressure on acute services. There will be more information as neighbourhood working is rolled out over the coming months.
With so much fluctuation and change, we should also take time to celebrate our achievements and impact across the VCSEF sector.
With that in mind, we would love you to join WVCA in celebrating a milestone for our projects: our Service User Involvement Team (SUIT) drug and alcohol recovery project was established in 2006 and our Social Prescribing service was established in 2016.
These are public facing projects serving some of the most vulnerable people in our community. We know directly from the people who have used our services, that not only have these projects changed lives, but they have also saved lives.
Please hold the date in your diaries:
WVCA Celebration: 20 Years of SUIT and 10 years of Social Prescribing
10:30am – 3pm on Friday 20th November 2026 at the Arena Theatre
Before that, we are also really looking forward to seeing you at the following:
- Social Investment Webinar by Tom Bostock from Big Issue Invest at 11am – 12pm online on 24th September 2026.
- VCSEF Alliance Meeting at 10:30am – 12pm on 13th October 2026 at The Workspace, ASAN
If there are any issues that you would like to raise or anything that you would like to hear more about, please contact me.
If you would like more information, please remember to check out our website and newsletter regularly – there is always new information, and opportunities are always presenting themselves.
Thank you
Sharon Nanan-Sen
Chief Executive Officer