Earlier this month CIPD - a large membership organisation with a royal charter - published a shoddy report about spending on education and training quangos.
The report was shoddy because:
- several of the organisations identified - including LSN and NIACE - were not quangos at all;
- the figures cited were inaccurate;
- the author of the report seemed neither to have understood the work of the organisations in question, nor to have checked his facts.
CIPD subsequently withdrew the report, but not before The Daily Telegraph had blithely repeated the report's assertions.
Here are links to justifiably angry rebuttals from LSIS [100 kB PDF], NIACE, and LSN. Excerpts:
NIACE - "NIACE's reputation, built up over eighty nine years, rests on its independence. Unlike trade or professional associations, NIACE does not defend a single sectional interest and unlike a quango, it can and does campaign against government policy on occasion (for example by drawing attention to the loss of 30 per cent of publicly-funded places for adult learning between 2004 - 2008). This advocacy work is not funded from the public purse but through other charitable funds - which are also used to fund independent research, such as the Inquiry into the Future for Lifelong Learning that reported last year."
LSIS - "It is unfortunate that an organisation such as the CIPD that purports to support professional development can be both so inaccurate and dismissive of this activity. It’s a pity too that they can be so unprofessional as to not check their facts or find out how an organisation really works or what it does before rushing into print. I’m sure many of their existing members will be very disappointed in what is clearly a lack of professional competence."
LSN - "LSN is not a quango. It is a private, independent charity which seeks to improve learning and skills in this country. Contrary to the CIPD’s report, LSN is not in receipt of grant funding, nor have any of its recent acquisitions been funded by the taxpayer."
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