Joint Public, Voluntary and Community Sector Compact 2005-08

The Joint Public, Voluntary and Community Sector Compact 2005-08 was launched at the Social Enterprise and Entrepreneurship in the City event—’Changing the Dynamic’ on Friday 31st March 2006 at Aberdeen Exhibition & Conference Centre.

The Voluntary Sector Liaison Group, on behalf of the Aberdeen City Alliance, led the development of the city’s first joint public, voluntary and community sector compact in line with the guidance issued by the Scottish Executive, COSLA and Scottish Council of Voluntary Organisations. The joint compact sets out an agreed set of common principles, values, commitments and working relationships between the voluntary and community sector and main public sector organisation who commission, contract, or have a role to resource or support the development of the sector.

Resources decisions made by the public sector are critical to the sustainability of many voluntary and community organisations and in turn impacts on the social well being and economy of the city. Therefore, the compact sets out the public sector agencies commitment to work more effectively with the voluntary and community sector on finance issues. It sets out the detailed processes that each of the public sector organisations will adopt in making funding decisions and the voluntary and community sectors responsibilities when they receive funding. The compact sets out how the joint agreement will be monitored. Failures to resolve the issues internally by the public sector agencies will be referred to an independent complaints group established by the Voluntary Sector Liaison Group and reported to The Aberdeen City Alliance.