Domestic abuse charity faced funding errors

“A decision proven to not be the correct one”

Cheshire East Council has confessed mistakes were made with domestic abuse charity My CWA – formerly Cheshire Without Abuse.

The council axed funding for some services then compounded problems by reducing funding for the provision of safe accommodation for victims and survivors of domestic abuse.

Following a public backlash, the council blamed My CWA for ‘withdrawing from the tender process’.

However, My CWA had said it could not provide the services required for the money the council was offering to fund and had no alternative but to withdraw.

After the procurement process failed, the council extended its contract with My CWA for a further twelve months.

At a meeting of the Children and Families Committee, Cllr Beanland enquired why the procurement process had failed.

Martyn Baggaley, Head of Commissioning Children, Families and Complex Needs, told the committee: “Part of the reason the procurement failed last year was the one party that did submit a bid, which was My CWA, withdrew on the basis of insufficient funding because that was reduced by £25,000 a year. That funding was insufficient, they felt, to run the accommodation sustainably.

“As a result of that we’ve quite consciously built in a contingency element of an additional £100,000 over their contract value for this year.”

Some domestic abuse provision comes from central government.

Councillor Geoff Smith said: “There was a comment about the loss of £25,000 in terms of funding. Could you help me to understand where the loss came from when, you said about central government.”

Mr Baggaley responded: “That was a decision taken locally rather than central government, a decision that, I think, time has proven to not be the correct one.

“And I think it is incumbent on us to make sure we learn from that.”