**Chloe Campbell, Policy & Parliamentary Officer, The Poverty Alliance**

One in five people in Scotland are held back by poverty. That is over a million people whose ability to meet basic needs is being actively restricted, creating powerful barriers to opportunities and sustaining inequality. This is a longstanding, structural injustice, but it is not inevitable.

**Read more**

For more than 30 years, the Poverty Alliance has built a strong network of organisations and people campaigning for the changes needed to end poverty in Scotland. At the heart of this network are hundreds of community and voluntary organisations providing vital support to people experiencing insecurity.

Their work - and the work of a sustainable, financially healthy third sector - is critical to making meaningful progress on poverty and inequality. That is why advocating for a Fair Funding approach for the voluntary sector, as set out by SCVO, is central to our campaigning.

Community and voluntary organisations mobilise local knowledge to deliver trusted support. They reach people too often missed by statutory services, can respond to need quickly, and tailor solutions to local and cultural contexts. Through this experience, they also advocate for systems change, highlighting the root causes of poverty and holding decision-makers to account.

Despite this invaluable work, the current precarious funding landscape has left too many organisations themselves without the security they need to survive and thrive. They face significant challenges in staff retention, recruitment and morale; continuity of service provision; and planning for the future. Some face a constant threat of closure.

While these organisations continue to work at the frontline of efforts to challenge poverty, their commitment to positive change cannot be sustained by rhetoric and praise alone. Rather, it demands fair and secure funding.

This demand is a cornerstone of [Scotland Demands Better](https://www.scotland-demands-better.com/), a campaign led by the Poverty Alliance and supported by over 280 civil society organisations. In a key campaign moment in October 2025, thousands gathered in Edinburgh for the largest anti-poverty demonstration Scotland has seen in decades. They were united by calls for fair work, strong public services and dignified social security, and the demand for a Fair Funding approach that properly supports the critical work of the voluntary sector.

It is clear that if we are to achieve a Scotland free from poverty, community and voluntary organisations must be recognised as valued partners in building a fairer society, with a Fair Funding approach the essential starting point.

Fair Funding would mean stability and security
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The Scottish Government has made it clear that eradicating child poverty is its top priority, having recognised that around one in four children in Scotland living in poverty is, of course, unacceptable. It is a harrowing statistic and the ambition to eradicate it is an admirable one that we all must support. But we as a country, quite simply, cannot seriously expect to achieve that ambition without the invaluable services, crucial expertise, and unwavering dedication of a stable and secure voluntary sector, whose organisations continue to be on the frontline of efforts to challenge poverty. And we will not see that stable and secure voluntary sector without Fair Funding.

As the Poverty Alliance’s 2026 Scottish Parliament election manifesto, [_Building a Secure Foundation For All of Us_](https://www.povertyalliance.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/The-Poverty-Alliance-2026-Scottish-Parliament-Election-Manifesto.pdf), sets out, _“a sustainable, financially healthy third sector is central to making meaningful progress on inequality \[to allow\] community and voluntary organisations \[to\] mobilise community resources through their local knowledge, delivering trusted support that has legitimacy in the communities they serve.”_ Simply put, the Scottish Government cannot expect to achieve its priority of eradicating child poverty without also taking the required steps to ensure that Scotland’s voluntary sector is sustainable.

_“The stress of finding funding is getting far too great,”_ explains a development trust with a focus on the alleviation of food poverty. _“It impacts our staff, volunteers, and clients. Even three-year funding is over before you know it – the whole process has a negative impact on mental health and is disruptive to the services we offer, it is very concerning for us all.”_

_“We spend a great deal of time and energy applying for and reporting on multiple small pots of funding, which takes staff and volunteer time away from delivering frontline support,”_ adds a community-based charity in Glasgow undertaking work to tackle poverty, isolation, and inequality. _“Ultimately, it leaves vulnerable community members facing disruption to essential support.”_

And yet, in testament to the commitment from staff and volunteers across the sector, that fight to eradicate poverty continues despite ongoing poor funding practices.

As a community-led anchor organisation explains: _“As an organisation operating in a deprived area, we continue to experience high levels of deprivation – however, we are constantly having to fight against the impact of poverty with limited resources.”_

It is those very organisations, so crucial to the Scottish Government’s top priority of eradicating child poverty yet struggling every day with the unsustainability and unfairness caused by the current funding landscape, who know firsthand the necessity of SCVO’s Fair Funding calls.

_“\[Fair Funding would give\] peace of mind,”_ says the development trust. _“Core funding would be amazing and would actually help to change the way we think and function, giving us less to worry and stress about, and enabling us to be the trusted and reliable service that we know we are.”_

_“Fair Funding would enable us to respond to local needs more flexibly and consistently, giving our community confidence that support will be there when they need it,”_ adds the Glasgow-based charity. _“Fair Funding would mean stability and security.”_

The importance of core (anonymised)
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For a small, local community development project tackling poverty and inequality, **Organisation A** has found a lack of funding for core costs an issue for years now, receiving funding that only covers around a third of total core costs. During the pandemic, the organisation recognised the efforts that funders went to in streamlining and improving processes, and placing more trust in organisations, but unfortunately it now feels that most of the progressive steps taken out of urgency have now been abandoned.

A combination of a lack of core funding, which the organisation believes is, at least partly, the result of short-sightedness on the part of the local authority, and a perceived power dynamic, which results in organisations being unable to feed back when funding does not meet their requirements, has led to an ongoing financial instability. **Organisation A** also has no relationships with local authority or Scottish Government funders. This is in stark contrast to fruitful relationships and strong communication with charitable trusts, resulting in an inability to communicate the sheer importance of core funding at that level. Ultimately, the organisation feels like these funders, in particular the local authority, fail to treat them with trust, honesty, and respect.

Despite undertaking work with positive impacts that are easy to evidence, **Organisation A**’s ability to meet outcomes is still hampered hugely by a lack of core funding, despite shared priorities with the local authority. Capacity that could be spent on planning for the future, delivering services, and developing partnerships is instead spent plugging funding holes consistently. In terms of sourcing enough funding to maintain core staff and services, as well the organisation’s building, **Organisation A** has to devote large amounts of time and resource to working on applications for the vast majority of the year. The process is relentless, leading to burnout for the organisation’s staff.

If all core funding was to cease, **Organisation A**’s budgets for the next 18-months would have to change radically. Given the way in which decisions have been made on funding applications previously, the organisation would potentially consider bringing in additional staff in order to give a greater chance of then obtaining core funding, resulting in a potentially disastrous financial situation if they were unsuccessful.

In an ideal world where all core costs were met, **Organisation A** would have the space to think more boldly and provide more innovative services, developing programmes, engaging with communities, and unlocking the ability to generate further income through services and other sources. This would lead to a reduced reliance on revenue funding from the local authority which would be hugely beneficial on both sides.

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## About SCVO

SCVO (Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations) is the national membership organisation for Scotland's voluntary sector.

Our role is to champion the role of voluntary organisations in Scotland and to support them to do work that has a positive impact.

SCVO supports members and the wider voluntary sector with all aspects of setting up and running a voluntary organisation. SCVO represents the needs and concerns of the voluntary sector to the Scottish government in Holyrood and UK government and Westminster. Through our learning and events programme SCVO offers training and development opportunities to the sector.

Members access an extensive membership benefits package including specialist, in-depth, 1-to-1 guidance from our Information Services team and from professional service partners.

Access to exclusive membership networks (including comms, employers, governance and policy) supports members to grow their connections, stay up to date, exchange ideas and views with peers, and learn through tailored, learning opportunities.

SCVO members enjoy free access to Funding Scotland Premium to stay on top of funding opportunities to support their organisation’s financial resilience.

Discounts and savings savings on SCVO products and services (including our HR service, managed IT support, payroll service and events and training) and partner offers provide members with support to allow them to focus on delivering their organisation’s goals. Further SCVO products and services include [extensive digital support](https://scvo.scot/support/digital), a climate action resource [Growing Climate Confidence](https://climateconfident.scot), a voluntary sector publication [Third Force News](https://tfn.scot) and a voluntary sector jobs and recruitment service [Goodmoves](https://goodmoves.org).

For more information on SCVO membership, visit [SCVO membership](https://scvo.scot/membership)