Community and Voluntary News March 2008

• The National Audit Office has published a report claiming that community sentences, available to courts since 2005, can offer benefits to both communities and offenders. The sentences currently available could involve unpaid work or drug rehabilitation. According to the report these enable the offenders to stay with their families, avoiding additional pressure on the prison system and some evidence points to a lower reconviction rate than custodial sentences. For more information see The National Probation Service: The Supervision of Community Orders in England and Wales on our publications section
  
• According to government report the improvements in progress made by the New Deal for Communities are starting to slow down. The report states that of the 36 indicators used to measure performance, more progress was made between 2001-2002 than between 2004-2006. To view the whole of NDCs: A Synthesis of New Programme-wide Evidence, see our publications section
  
• The Commission on The Future of Volunteering has published a study on the barriers to volunteering. The report claims that bureaucratic hurdles and misinformation about how volunteering affects people’s benefits are putting potential volunteers off. It recommends that the government should set up a working group to look at the problems. For more information see Manifesto For Change on our publications section
  
• A study by London Metropolitan University on the Adventure Capital Fund has claimed that while the target for funding was community based organisations engaged in community activity programmes, little of the money has been spent on this area. The report recommends that the fund reaffirms its focus. The report also says, however, that groups who were funded have boosted their turnover. For more information see Delivering Against Expectations on our publications section