THE cutting of funding for community and voluntary groups in the north is "short-sighted", Stormont has been warned as organisations met with a department head to plead their case.
Several groups attended Wednesday's meeting with Department of Health (DoH) permanent secretary Peter May to discuss the recent ending of the core grant funding scheme.
The funding helps 62 organisations including charities in the north with grants of between £5,000 and £200,000, but budget pressures have forced the DoH to axe the scheme for 2023/24 in a bid to save £360m.
Mr May previously said his department was in an "impossible position" financially.
Groups met with the permanent secretary on Wednesday to discuss the situation, with representatives warning Mr May that cutting funds for vital services could leave Stormont worse off financially in the long run.
Among those to attend was the Women's Federation in Northern Ireland, which has previously been allocated £147,000 annually through core grant funding.
Read more:
- Charities left in limbo as Stormont department suspends £3.6m grant scheme
- Women's Aid Federation NI takes to Westminster to fight 'perilous' impending funding cuts
Its CEO, Sarah Mason, told the Irish News that despite cross-party support from MLAs at the meeting, there is no indication that the funding will be restored in the foreseeable future.
"Next year looks even grimmer than this year, and I'm afraid we have absolutely no idea what's going to happen," she said.
"There was absolute support from MLAs around that table, but support without the ability for change isn't going to be enough. We understand that there are so many pressures facing the department, but cutting this funding is disastrous."
Ms Mason said the permanent secretary "answered questions but didn't give a solution".
"What we have to do now is look for other sources of funding. The £147,000 we received provided only the core of what we needed to operate, and we sourced more ourselves, but without that core funding, it reduces our leverage to get more elsewhere."
She added: "The cutting of the funding is short-sighted. In our own case, with all of the early intervention work at risk, all these issues will come back to the doors of the Department of Health and Department of Justice."
A Department of Health spokesperson said: "The Department does not expect to be in a position to reverse this decision in the absence of additional funding becoming available, but we will keep this under review."
