Monday, 4 October 2010

actionaid in the news again

actionaid (or act!onaid if you prefer their stupid spelling) is on my shitlist again.

After reading the annual report of their Australian operation last year, I discovered that their top two executives were raking in an amazing $354,000 between them. Those from a "charity" that managed to raise only $2 million from the public (the federal government kindly tipped $6 million of our cash into their pockets).

  • Public donations - $2,007,315
  • Costs to raise those donations - $1,002,507
  • Admin costs - $873,390.
If it wasn't for the generosity of the Australian taxpayer, this charity would have a measly $134,000 to spend on "charitable works" after paying the CEO, CFO, rent, phone bills and so on. In other words, 93.5% of the money that they raise from the public is spent on salaries, a plush office, travel expenses, nice furniture etc etc.

Why are they in the news again?

You know that silly video that 10:10 has put out?

It turns out that the UK arm of act!onaid has been giving 10:10 money and support. Well spotted, Richard Sharpe.

Don't you love the way these "charities" operate? They pay their executives an incredible amount of money (3-5 times the average wage in Australia), suck up to the government in order to get a wodge of our money (that we wouldn't give to them ourselves) and then they spend it on this sort of alarmist propaganda.

I wouldn't mind if the CEO was earning $80,000 and they were spending 90% of what they raised on buying food and clothing for orphanages in the third world. But they're not. They're fleecing us, paying themselves a fortune and then using our money to ram their ideologies down our throats.

The sooner these "charities" are de-funded and de-registered, the better.

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