You can suggest it as much as a typical uniting care supporter wants, but in my area the workers filling out the application for hamper assistance this Christmas were lobbying the clients in the interview to avoid the salvos and specifically pushed the venues they were in partnership for. An apparent perceived over zealous salvo volunteer might think that the organizations employees actively did similar with family and friends.
I had no intention of trivialising the issue. As you state, it is in 'your area' and one would hope it was confined to that. Still, it needs to be reported in detail to an authority, no matter how isolated the incident.
Well I have and I see that a lot of volunteers are actually taken advantage of, and alot of positions including paid ones are staffed by people without the skills that the roles require. It does make economic sense conning people to volunteer to save on wages. it does a make some sort of social sense getting old ladies off the pokie machine chair and standing around short changing you when you purchase from the op shop they give there time too.
Many of those 'conned' volunteers are fully aware of what the scheme of things are, but the tasks still have to be done. The government is happy to have cheap labour, but there is also the direct involvement of locals helping others that is a benefit less tangible.
Don't underestimate the warm and fuzzy feeling of helping your neighbours.
In the rural organizations you get alot of nepotism. Alot of the grants that are applied for through the department of human services, are actually quite fraudulent. Its just the nature of the client there is little accountability. Your dealing with the poor, noone really takes them seriously, the ruling class tend to think they don't understand and fog off there issues, much like you doing here. Mind you I'm experienced in a regional area, more than likely its different in the city.
Nepotism is a human quality, not a rural one.
There
is accountability (ever been through the paper warfare when running a charity event?), responsibility and a fair whack of heavy-handed bureaucracy. Each, again, is the nature of people. The government doesn't like giving money away without seeing something for it, but there are slick traders who make a career of marketing, reading bureaucracies and side-stepping legislation and they sell themselves to charity groups on a commission basis.
The disadvantaged still need support. I feel for your concerns, but take it further than BF so they can get it right.
Thats getting away from my point and more to my agenda, these organizations are getting in a marketing war between two large international department stores who only want to fleece customers for all they can , who (department stores) also run any PR campaign that facilitates that end result. Then they (UC/anglacare and such) complain about how stressful Christmas can be for the needy as result of how commercialism is dominating Christmas.
Yes! And this is the real issue!
Having dealt with similar situations myself, I can see the marketing and economic power of the companies running rings around the charities. Although not all are so mercenary, there are different imperatives for commerce, but the companies can see big profits and PR brownie points if they position themselves right. You can see that the charities are actually the victims of this trend, rather than perpetrators.
All the more reason to expose this whole turgid mess - in another arena.
Start something.