Latest news with #fundingcrisis
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Popular adventure playground at risk of closure over lack of funds
A city adventure playground is at risk of closure just two years before its 50th anniversary. Blackbird Leys Adventure Playground CIO provides after school and holiday provisions for eight to 13-year-olds. In a letter shared with this newspaper, the CIO stated it will have to temporarily close from September 1 due to a lack of funds. A meeting will be held on Friday, August 8 at 4pm to discuss ideas on how to keep it open. In the meantime, a fundraising page has been set up with a target of £3,000. In the letter, it said: "We are writing to inform you about a very difficult decision regarding Blackbird Leys Adventure Playground (BLAP). Starting September 1, BLAP will be temporarily closing. READ MORE: 10 criminals jailed at Oxford Crown Court during July A youngster enjoying the adventure playground (Image: Jon Lewis) "We are aware of the impact this will have on many families. We hope, but cannot guarantee, to be reopen by Christmas. "We are inviting you to a meeting at BLAP on Friday, August 8 at 4pm. A bouncy castle will be available (already paid for as part of the play-scheme) so your children can play while we meet. "We will listen to ideas you may have to help BLAP reopen as soon as possible." It added: "This decision has not been taken lightly. Unfortunately, our current financial situation leaves us with no other choice. "Rising operational costs, funding cuts, and the challenging economic climate have created a shortfall that we cannot immediately overcome. "During this temporary closure, two important things will happen. We are seeking funds for essential renovation work to take place. "We are working together within this time to apply for major grants and funding, so that BLAP can return stronger and more sustainable." On its upcoming anniversary, the letter said: "BLAP will celebrate its 50th anniversary in 2027, and we are determined to keep our gates open so that all children - past, present, and future - can enjoy this special place. "We now turn to you, our wonderful parents and supporters, for help. "If you can, please consider making a voluntary donation to help us through this crisis. Every contribution, no matter how small, makes a real difference. "Please share with family and friends and workplace who might be able to donate or share through their social media platforms. "The cost of running BLAP has increased including a 25 per cent in staff costs in the last three years." It added: "Every pound donated goes directly towards keeping BLAP alive for the children in our community. "Thank you for your continued support over the years. "Together, we can ensure that BLAP reopens, thrives, and celebrates its 50th birthday with all of you by our side." For more on the fundraiser, visit:
CTV News
19-07-2025
- Politics
- CTV News
Summer camp for youth in crisis
A northern Ontario summer camp for youth that identify as 2SLGBT+ says it's in crisis. It's getting record numbers of sponsorship requests from campers at the same time it's lost funding. Angela Gemmill reports.
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The Independent
17-07-2025
- Business
- The Independent
Chris Blackhurst answers your questions on wealth tax – from millionaire exodus to Labour's silence
Calls to tax the super-rich are no longer confined to fringe rallies or left-wing think tanks – they're now firmly in the political mainstream. According to YouGov, two-thirds of the British public, including a majority of Conservative voters, support a wealth tax on individuals with more than £10 million in assets. It's not hard to see why: the country faces a funding crisis, services are under strain, and the public is being asked to swallow yet more fiscal pain. The question many are asking is simple: why shouldn't the very wealthiest shoulder more of the burden? But as I explained in The Independent 's latest Ask Me Anything, this isn't a straightforward issue. There are real risks: capital flight, investor nerves, and a government already struggling to convince the world that Britain is open for business. There are also deep flaws in our existing tax system, and a shocking lack of data on who actually holds wealth in this country. During the Q&A, I answered your questions on everything from Labour's silence and HMRC's blind spots to non-doms, offshore trusts and the fear that we'll end up punishing wealth creators rather than closing genuine loopholes. The answers may not please everyone, but this is a debate we need to have. Q: Isn't socialism the problem here? Margaret Thatcher once said that the problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money to spend. We are now well past that point. Since Blair was first elected, the political establishment has increased the overall tax burden to its highest ever level in history, and created an ever larger class of people living off welfare who do not want to do many of the jobs that need doing. The economy is now in chronic stagflation, the National Debt is escalating, and just like Stalin and the Kulaks, our political establishment is scapegoating the very people who are the wealth creators and major taxpayers. Mark A: It's hard not to agree with you. We built a welfare state and the NHS when our population was smaller. Now, they remain elephants in a crowded room that no politician dares touch. Their models are no longer suitable for their intended purpose. I'm not a fan of Thatcher, but she was right here, though I'd say Tory governments are also guilty of the same populism. Q: Wouldn't the wealthy just shield their money from a wealth tax? A wealth tax in the UK would likely trigger a wave of asset restructuring among the wealthy. Those who hadn't already done so would move quickly to shield their wealth. This could include shifting ownership of property, art, shares, and other taxable assets into foreign foundations, trusts, or offshore holding companies beyond HMRC's reach. EmiliaPortante A: I agree with your sentiment, but we should do far more to clamp down on tax avoidance and evasion. The UK turns a blind eye to offshore havens it's responsible for – the Isle of Man, Channel Islands, Cayman Islands, etc. There's a whole industry dedicated to avoiding, and sometimes evading, taxes. It makes a mockery of the government's claims to be collecting fairly. Q: Why complain about a 1 per cent tax rise if you're worth £500m? What the super-wealthy are doing is essentially making sure they have enough money to guarantee their children's and grandchildren's aggressively campaign against a 1 per cent tax rise when you have £500m in wealth or even £100m? You will live comfortably forever - the reason is they want their children to do the same. ChrisMatthews A: It's true the rich sit atop a mountain of wealth, but they can't be forced to distribute it — if we try, they'll leave. If we make them believe in the UK, they'll choose to spend, donate, and invest here. That may sound naive, but the alternative is worse. Q: Would you personally pay a wealth tax or leave the UK? CharlesMartel A: It's unlikely I'd qualify, but if I did, I'd stay – I love this country. But the concern isn't people like me. It's the globally mobile few that nations compete for. Other countries are falling over themselves to attract them. So should we. Q: What about the millionaires who want to be taxed more? Illearthstoner A: I'm all for millionaires paying more tax – if they want to. The trouble is, far more don't. Some are already abroad, deciding where to go next. And Britain slips down the list when they do. Q: How do you ensure redistribution if you're against a wealth tax? Illearthstoner A: We should aim to turn the trickle into something stronger – not a flood, but a solid flow. A previous Labour government said: 'We love the filthy rich, provided they pay the taxes they owe.' They recognised their worth and wanted more of them. Q: Which European countries still have a wealth tax? Do they work? CharlesMartel A: We should examine why so few countries have wealth taxes when, on paper, they're an easy win. Most democracies are similarly strapped for cash, but don't go there. Some, like Italy, are even offering incentives to attract the rich. Why? Q: Why doesn't HMRC know how many billionaires are in the UK? forum A: Yes, it's shocking HMRC knows so little. How can they apply serious analysis with such gaps? In the US, the IRS studies the Forbes rich list and works with its compilers. We have the Sunday Times Rich List, but HMRC pays it scant regard. That's an obvious place to start. Q: Who's going to value all the houses, the repositories of most people's wealth? GrymSdijk A: Property experts are predicting a crash, certainly in London, should there be a wealth tax. Values at the top end will fall, and that will cascade downwards. As to who will assess the worth of a property, should there be a mansion tax, say, those estimates are already made by councils for council tax Q: Is Labour's silence on wealth tax a sign they are considering it? BBenB A: Almost certainly, yes. If they weren't, they'd say so and end the speculation, which is already sending the wealthy abroad and discouraging investment. Their silence suggests they're weighing it carefully. Q: Why no action, despite the public's support? Jimmy A: Because they know it would damage business and wealth creation. The richest tend to be those who own businesses and invest. A wealth tax sends a negative message to potential investors about how Britain views them. Jase A: They can justify it because, while popular, it comes at a cost. It's a case of the head ruling the heart. Yes, taxing the rich sounds better than cutting services, but it's not that simple – the tax system could be made more efficient, something successive governments have failed to do.
Telegraph
17-07-2025
- Business
- Telegraph
Universities scramble to give out offers so they don't go bust
Universities have made a record number of offers this year as vice-chancellors scramble to fill places amid a spiralling funding crisis. More than two million offers were handed out to people applying for UK undergraduate courses starting this September, up 74,000 compared to last year and marking a nine per cent jump since 2023. It means more than nine in 10 people who applied for British university degrees before the January deadline this year have secured at least one offer. International students saw the highest rise in their overall offer rate, with almost two-thirds – or 64 per cent – of individual university applications proving successful. It is up from 59 per cent last year and 55 per cent in 2023. British teenagers will go into this summer's A-level results day more confident than last year's cohort, as the UK 18-year-old offer rate also rose, although marginally. Students can apply for up to five university courses through Ucas, with 80 per cent of entries from British Year 13 pupils resulting in an offer this year – up 1.2 per cent compared to 2024. It comes despite the application rate amongst UK 18-year-olds declining this year, suggesting universities have been more generous in handing out offers as they clamber to fill seats. Many institutions are grappling with worsening financial problems following a drop in overseas students and years of frozen tuition fees, with The Telegraph revealing earlier this year that a record 43 per cent are now in deficit. Nick Hillman, director of the Higher Education Policy Institute (Hepi) think tank, told PA: 'Universities nearly always prefer to fill their places than to have to close courses or make staff redundant, so I am not surprised that they are in such a scramble for students. 'Universities currently lose money on average on each home student but if you can enrol a few more students on lots of your courses then fewer of your courses will make a financial loss.' The Government announced last year that tuition fees for UK students will rise from September for the first time in eight years. Bridget Phillipson, the Education Secretary, confirmed the annual price of a degree will increase from the current £9,250 to £9,535 to help reverse the eroding value of domestic tuition fees, which have remained frozen since 2017. But vice-chancellors have warned the move will only go a small way in helping universities through the current crisis, after a dramatic drop in lucrative international students dealt a hammer blow to their finances. Universities have been rushing in recent months to boost their attraction to prospective foreign students, who typically pay much higher tuition fees than those from the UK. Ucas data published on Thursday showed the efforts may have begun to pay off, with huge rises in applications from some countries. It includes a 14 per cent increase in applications from the US, which may be in part driven by President Donald Trump's attack on America's top universities. Mr Trump has slashed funding for many elite US colleges, which he claimed have become hotbeds for ideological indoctrination. It has meant many American universities are now under pressure to bow to Mr Trump's demands for fear of losing research grants and other funding. The US leader said he wants to grant the federal government the power to vet admissions and influence hiring, and has also ramped up security checks on foreign student visas. Meanwhile, undergraduate applications from China jumped 10 per cent this year to hit a record 33,870, despite the growing popularity and reputation of Beijing's domestic universities. Nigerian applications to UK undergraduate degrees also rose by 23 per cent, in what will prove a lifeline for UK universities highly dependent on students from the country. There were fears that a Nigerian currency crisis, which pushed the naira to an all-time low against the dollar last year, could deter applications and place some British universities under significant financial pressure. The Telegraph revealed last year that Nigerian students make up more than a quarter of the postgraduate student population at some UK institutions, including Robert Gordon University and the University of Bradford. Ucas data primarily covers undergraduate degrees, but most international students come to the UK to study postgraduate courses. The latest figures suggest overseas students may be increasingly opting for undergraduate degrees in Britain following a crackdown on postgraduates being allowed to bring family members with them. The previous Conservative government imposed a ban on foreign student dependent visas for most postgraduate students, with a small number of exceptions including for PhD students. International students enrolling on UK undergraduate courses are unable to bring family members with them in most cases, but the ban on student dependents may have reduced the attraction of postgraduate courses.
News24
08-07-2025
- Health
- News24
Russel Rensburg: This is how SA could respond to US aid cuts
South Africa still lacks an action plan after the withdrawal of US aid for HIV and related health services. But when funds do arrive, how will they be managed? Russell Rensburg suggests the answer may lie in the District Health Programme Grant. The government's extended silence on how it plans to solve the funding crisis created by the withdrawal of US aid has thrown much of the health sector in South Africa into severe despair. It has been five months since the withdrawal of the aid, amounting to about R7 billion per year. It covered salaries for 15 000 health workers, of which 8 000 are community health workers, 2 000 are nurses, and 300 are doctors working in 27 of South Africa's high HIV priority districts. As a result, volumes of high-risk populations have lost access to care, while overstretched healthcare workers are facing increased pressure amid ongoing staff shortages. Recently, the Global HIV Treatment Coalition and a bevy of civil society organisations wrote a strongly worded letter to the government, demanding action on a fully costed emergency plan. They accused the state of not taking concerted action. They are not wrong: The government has still not made a clear plan available to the public, although there is consensus on the urgent need to strengthen the emergency response. Plans have been developed internally in the national Department of Health, and a national technical support unit has been established in the office of the health department's director-general to support the integration of services. It is understood that several provinces are being supported to develop provincial transition plans that can be translated into concrete action. But ongoing discussions with National Treasury have made little meaningful progress to close the funding gap. Treasury has indicated that any new funding will either be part of the adjustment budget or an emergency allocation. At this stage, it is still unclear how much money, if any, will be allocated. There is another challenge that is yet to be considered. When the funding does arrive, there will need to be consensus on how the money is co-ordinated, incubated and managed. Here the answer may already be in our back pockets in the form of the District Health Programme Grant. The grant is a mechanism for funding the country's public health efforts, particularly relating to HIV, TB, and other communicable diseases. As an existing instrument, this grant programme could help address issues linked to the funding gap and lay the foundation for the sustainable integration of activities previously funded by the US President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (Pepfar). Why the District Health Programme Grant could work The District Health Programme Grant presents an ideal mechanism that can be used to strengthen governance and ensure that the funding, plans and activities down to a district level align with national campaigns and priorities. But the grant would need to be amended to ensure that there is improved management of the conditionalities so that the funds invested meet its purpose. Conditional grants are funds allocated to provinces with a primary purpose of ensuring that national priorities are implemented consistently across the country. They facilitate targeted service delivery, equity, accountability and performance monitoring. The District Health Programme Grant, which currently has a budget of about R25 billion, already has a large HIV component, so additional funding for both the HIV and TB services that are needed could easily be allocated to this grant. And if the health department amended the grant mechanism to allow for the contracting in of service providers, such as the Pepfar implementing agents, which are mostly local NGOs previously funded by the US government, the country would be able to use the capacity built up over time in these organisations to strengthen the delivery of HIV and TB services. The concern, however, is accountability. In the current set up of the grant, provinces have the ability to act more autonomously and the grant conditionalities are poorly managed. However, for the system to be more effective, there needs to be a greater emphasis on co-operative engagement where two-way reporting between national and provinces can take place. Amending the grant to include stronger accountability mechanisms would help the health department to co-ordinate and manage it better. The clock is ticking The funding gap comes at a time when the health department has launched two ambitious campaigns to tackle HIV and TB. The Close the Gap campaign aims to enrol a record number – an additional 1.1 million – of people living with HIV on lifesaving antiretroviral medicine this year. Along with teenage girls and young women, the initiative prioritises an estimated 600 000 men who know their status but are not on treatment. This campaign aligns with the country's strategy to END TB by 2030. This year, the health department also hopes to accelerate TB case finding by scaling up testing to 5 million TB tests to reduce the high rate of infections and deaths. The linkages between the campaigns make sense. TB is the leading co-morbidity for people living with HIV. HIV is also the leading contributor to TB mortality, accounting for an estimated 55% of TB deaths, according to the World Health Organisation's data on TB in South Africa. The campaigns are evidence-informed and well considered. ALSO READ | Phillip de Wet: South Africa massively benefitted from foreign aid – and the age of aid is over But the ambition is not matched by budgets that can support and ultimately enable its success. In addition to the R7 billion Pepfar funding gap, there is a funding gap of at least R600 million in TB to sufficiently fund the required five million tests needed for the campaign. Funding pressures at the provincial level are also constraining the scaling up of the capacity required to administer the tests. A recent analysis from the South African National Aids Council (Sanac) situation room which evaluates the HIV response every month as part of the Close the Gap campaign suggests that while there are increases in the number of people being initiated on HIV treatment, the pace is not fast enough to mitigate the losses the country experiences in retaining patients in care. This has resulted in negative growth in many high-prevalence districts. Similarly, in the first TB provincial managers programme meeting co-ordinated by the National TB programme, reports on the poor performance against the testing targets belied the underlying frustrations many are experiencing. South Africa has made incredible progress in expanding access to healthcare in the last 30 years. These include significant declines in maternal mortality, decreases in the under-5 mortality rates, and significant declines in the incidence of TB. Much of this success, particularly in the last decade, is the result of the mass rollout of lifesaving antiretroviral treatment to about 6 million of the estimated 8 million people living with HIV in the country. But the abrupt withdrawal of US aid has put at least some of this progress under threat. As we look to the mid-year adjustments budget, we don't just need new money to plug the gap, we also need a sensible framework for spending that money. Channelling the funds through a tweaked District Health Programme Grant is a financial solution that will both provide some quick relief and that will mitigate the impact that the funding gap will have on universal health coverage more broadly in the long run. - Russel Rensburg is director of the Rural Health Advocacy Project and project director for the TB Accountability Consortium. *This piece was published by Spotlight – health journalism in the public interest. Sign up to the Spotlight newsletter. *Want to respond to the columnist? Send your letter or article to opinions@ with your name and town or province. You are welcome to also send a profile picture. We encourage a diversity of voices and views in our readers' submissions and reserve the right not to publish any and all submissions received. Disclaimer: News24 encourages freedom of speech and the expression of diverse views. The views of columnists published on News24 are therefore their own and do not necessarily represent the views of News24.
