News / COPE prepares for tough year ahead
AN AWARD-winning social enterprise providing employment opportunities for people with disabilities in Shetland is readying to shed five staff to cope with council budget cuts.
COPE Ltd employs 49 people and provides placements for 50 participants in the seven separate social businesses that it operates in Lerwick and Weisdale.
However the pioneering organisation that was set up in 1998 to provide work experience for disabled people is facing a 10 per cent cut in its budget of £122,600.
Shetland Islands Council, which has been providing funding through three separate departments, has agreed to provide a grant of £80,000 to tie the organisation over for the next six months while COPE Ltd finds new sources of income.
One approach will be to persuade the council’s community care department that they offer a higher value approach to helping people with disabilities.
Currently COPE operates a soap company, an outside catering business, a pet supplies shop, the Karibuni café and takeaway, a tree and shrub nursery, the Shetland Scrapstore recycling centre, and the Weisdale Centre that recycles garden tools.
Manager Ingrid Webb said that they are currently looking at closing two business units with the possible loss of five jobs.
That in turn will reduce the number of participants the organisation can help, potentially cutting the number of placements by almost a quarter.
Webb refused to say where the cuts would fall until staff and clients had been informed.
She did however suggest there would be changes at the Shetland Scrapstore after the council’s infrastructure department decided to stop paying it to redirect goods from landfill, while there are plans to grow the nursery business over the coming year.
Negotiations are being planned with the community care department, which has reduced its funding by 10 per cent to £102,600 for the next financial year as part of the council’s overall belt tightening.
Webb said COPE provided the council with “excellent value” providing more placements for people with disabilities than it was paid for.
She pointed out that cutting back on placements would have a knock on effect on other council services, as well as the families of disabled people, which would be the subject of discussions with the community care department.
She also said the organisation was being run as efficiently as it could be, but they were looking at ways to generate more income by improving the viability of the businesses, bringing in more volunteers to help and accessing money from other sources, such as the council in Orkney where they also run a soap company.
They will also be trying to fund raise within the community, she said. “Folk think COPE is part of the council and so we don’t need money.
COPE has an annual turnover of £1.2 million, half of which is generated by its business activities.
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