Charities say red tape stops them providing even more help

The Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations (SCVO) said excessive bureaucracy was diverting cash and resources away from their services.

It claimed that organisations would be able to help more people if there was less unnecessary paperwork.

The Scottish Executive said it was working with charities and local councils to help cut red tape.

The SCVO said it accepted charities must be fully regulated and monitored, but it wanted better co-operation between different official bodies.

Red tape drowns charities' operations Lucy McTernan SCVO

It said some organisations had to answer multiple regulatory authorities, many wanting much the same information but in different formats and timescales.

Spokeswoman Lucy McTernan told BBC Radio's Good Morning Scotland programme something had to be done to address the situation.

She said: "All charities and voluntary organisations want to be open and publicly accountable and the involvement of people in that work is absolutely essential.

"What we don't want though is to have to give the same type of information 14 times in different ways, in a way that wastes time and everybody's effort and energy and money.

Improvement pledge

"Red tape drowns charities' operations, it means that they spend more time at the desk filling in forms than actually out in the field working with children, with young people, with older people, whoever it is that they serve."

Ella Simpson, chief executive of Edinburgh and Lothians homelessness charity The Rock Trust, said she regularly experienced red tape hampering its work.

She said: "We would probably be able to free up the resources to be working with the best part of another 100 young people a year.

"That's a big service difference."