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Our financial position
As you will most likely have heard, the current situation is financially difficult for the charity sector. As an organisation our income is significantly impacted, and we expect it will be similar for volunteer groups. So it’s prudent that we all manage expenditure.
We entered this difficult phase as a financially secure, well managed organisation and remain so. However, we are anticipating a 30% reduction in our income which is typical for charities of our size. And we cannot sustain a drop in income of that level without taking significant steps to reduce expenditure.
How are we dealing with this?
We’ve identified two areas of focus in response to this:
- Minimising risk to our income and finding new ways to generate income.
- Looking at how we can reduce expenditure.
We’re looking across the entire organisation to reduce spending. Every team is looking at their planned activities and considering whether costs are essential and where we can make savings.
None of us now how long this situation will last but if we make changes and plans now, we protect the future security of our organisation. And this is vital to ensure we can continue to support our MS community.
Looking after our colleagues
Some of our colleagues are unable to work during the crisis, or the work of their team has significantly reduced. So, we’re using the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme introduced by the Government.
This scheme pays 80% of staff wages while they can't work. While the crisis continues, these colleagues will be on a temporary leave of absence (or furlough).
The decision to furlough some of our roles was not taken lightly. Using this scheme from the Government allows us to make sizeable savings. It also means that we can protect colleague’s roles which would otherwise have been at risk.
Support will still be available for volunteers, and we’re working hard to minimise any impact from the furloughing scheme. We won’t be publishing a list of colleagues on furlough. However we will try to make sure that alternative contacts are highlighted through out-of-office email messages or other means.
What else has changed?
We’ve had to postpone some activity in order to focus on current priorities, including events like MS Walks and the next burst of our Stop MS Appeal.
There are also delays with a lot of clinical trials work across the UK whilst the health service focusses on responding to the pandemic.
Whilst this does sadly mean that some of our research ambitions have been delayed, our long term research goals still stand. We will continue working behind the scenes so that we're ready to go when normal service is resumed.
To raise the voice of people affected by MS, we’ve been lobbying the government on behalf of our community. We’re doing this with other charities, about things like social care, welfare and the charity funding package.
Our priorities
Our priority is supporting the safety and wellbeing of our volunteers, staff and community. This support includes:
- Providing the most accurate and up to date information we can via our main website.
- Offering opportunities for volunteers and local communities to connect with one another.
- And providing practical support to our community through various channels.
