Charity funding cuts: 'Much that is good gets thrown on the tip'

It's a new year, and the cuts move from just being a topic of discussion to a reality. The media, politicians and economists have dissected and discussed but now it's actually happening. Public servants are getting redundancy notices. Charities are losing swathes of funding. And the people they support are scared. We – I work for a national charity – are losing all our funding, as we have been almost wholly dependent on a grant that central government has chosen to end in March. We can wish that we had done more to diversify our income and certainly questions do need to be asked of those at the top who had the responsibility of managing this fundamental risk. But the reality is that of the charities dependent on the beneficence of ministers, we really thought we would survive: our volunteer army of experienced professionals provide expert support to help deprived communities get involved with decisions affecting where they live – the epitome of "big society" and "localism". Power to the people is what we have been about for decades. Helping the small folk battle the overweening power of local and central government. We have been in great demand because so many communities do not have the financial resources or professional expertise to do it themselves. Wherever we work, we always try and leave people more self-sufficient, but it can be very difficult for them to navigate their way through the complexities of government policy and bureaucracy. Fundamental to our ability to support them has been our army of volunteers – twenty for every member of paid staff. Ten times the value of the cost of the service. Professionals, experts, giving their own free time to help. But all is to change. Central government have confirmed the sudden and full cessation of our grant. All staff have been given notice that they are "at risk" of redundancy. That risk seems just a way of them saying they will be making us redundant before the end of the financial year. Since the news broke of our impending doom, our volunteers have expressed bewilderment. Why now? Everyone thought that of all the organisations under threat, we would be sure to survive. But that was to underestimate the ideology that drives the government. Of course there were always going to be cuts and as someone with many years experience of working in different public sector organisations, I have no doubt there was waste and duplication and unnecessary bureaucracy (we spent much of our time battling it on our service users' behalf). But when a government as radical as this one rushes to change everything with such speed and ferocity, much that is good gets thrown on the rubbish tip. The redundancy of frontline employees is not just tragic for them, it reduces the infrastructure that supports the volunteers, in turn destroying the support for people that need it the most. The politicians won't suffer, their senior advisers may not suffer but some people – human beings, not statistics – will suffer. The ones that didn't work for banks, but clean the offices. The ones that don't live in pretty rural idylls but in crime-ridden estates, in unsuitable housing. The ones that are desperate for a massive shift in the insane property market to find somewhere to live that is of a decent standard. The ones that need our professional support to give their views a fighting chance against the vested interests. Our government minister worships the free market. Its pursuit of profit can conflict with social good. Nothing shocking in that statement. I went to the same illustrious educational establishment as the politician in whose hands our fate rested. Only I remember them teaching me how the free market can also be inefficient and ineffective at allocating resources. I learnt about social policy, about why the state exists, about the reason we need a health service, an education system and why it is important that the state intervenes to support those who need it. When you remove the funding for an organisation like ours at a stroke, causing it to implode, you reduce the ability of volunteers to get in the mix and help those who do not have the resources to help themselves; you let the moneyed interests determine the outcomes, for themselves and for those who oppose them. That leads to frustration, social unrest and eventually to the desire to change government and policy. By axing our funding, the government may have shot itself in the foot. And maybe that will show there is justice in the world after all. This content is brought to you by Guardian Professional. To find out about forthcoming Q&As, sign up to the voluntary sector network .