Community Platform Structure
A small amount of funding is provided by the Department of Community, Rural & Gaeltacht Affairs under the Scheme for Social Partnership related funding for the Community & Voluntary sector.
The Community Platform will seek to access funding from other sources to cover the costs associated with implementing elements of the strategic plan.
Staff
The Community Platform currently does not employ any staff.
Steering Group
There is currently an ad-hoc ‘action plan steering group’ made up of 7 members including the resource worker.
The role of this group is to:
-
Advise the worker in relation to operational issues and key strategies/policies to be progressed.
-
Act as an ‘executive arm’ of the Platform, mandated to make (certain?) decisions for the Platform where insufficient time exists for normal Platform decision-making processes.
Secretariat
When the Platform was established there was a decision taken not to set up the Platform as an independent legal structure. Instead the European Anti-Poverty Network Ireland,which is a member of the Community Platform, acts as secretariat to the Community Platform and manages all legal and financial aspects of the structure. Previously this role was carried out by the Community Workers' Co-operative,
Latest News
The Community Platform*, a network of 30 national community organisations today called on those involved in negotiating the new programme for government to pursue an alternative vision for Ireland - an Ireland where policies and actions are based on the values of social solidarity, justice, equality and sustainability.
Updates From Members
Debt and Development Coalition recently launched a new book 'Driving the Getaway Car? Ireland, Tax and Development', written on behalf of its member organisations by Dr Sheila Killian of the University of Limerick.
'Driving the Getaway Car?' explains how impoverished countries lose billions of euro through weak domestic tax collection capacities and through unjust international tax structures. Transfer pricing abuse is highlighted as a particular area of concern. This is when subsidiaries of the same multi-national company artificially set the prices of goods and services in order to minimise their tax bills, often through the use of secrecy jurisdictions, popularly known as tax havens. This illegal practice is very difficult to monitor and costs impoverished countries billions in lost tax revenue.