Letter of CCIC CEO-President Gerry Barr

Dear CSO Colleague,

The Canadian Council for International Cooperation (CCIC) is entering a period of severe institutional crisis and is urgently seeking your support and solidarity. 

After months of silence from CIDA, CCIC’s proposal for renewed funding, which has been available since 1968 from governments of all political orientations, has seemingly fallen into an institutional void. After July 15th, the Council may be compelled to operate without any federal government funds, which represent two-thirds of its core budget.

Already the impending threat and lack of commitment has prompted major organizational change. More than two-thirds of the staff have been given layoff notice and have opted for severance; the CCIC offices have been put up for sale to maximize available resources. Important national and international program activities being undertaken by CCIC ahead of July 15th are well in hand.  But CCIC has commenced a process with its membership and Board to review and prioritize CICC program priorities for the future.

The Annual General Meeting of CCIC 90 members met May 27-28 and resolved to vigorously seek emergency resources to protect a minimal infrastructure and staffing for the Council. Members are united in their commitment to defend the Council’s mandate to coordinate the voice for Canadian civil society organizations working internationally. CCIC launched this week, with the full support of its members, a public debate on its impending situation in the Canadian parliament and in the media (see the attached press release).

As an important component of this campaign, we are seeking international expression of solidarity for the continued ability of the Council to sustain its work. Over the past decades, CCIC has been a strong voice and an advocate for the rights of poor and marginalized people in international cooperation policy. We remain committed to make every effort to continue to participate in and foster equitable global collaborative civil society policy advocacy in the coming months.

It is important that Canadians hear your views. Please send short statements or expressions of solidarity to the attention of Gerry Barr, President and CEO of CCIC, via Brian Tomlinson, Senior Policy Analyst (Aid Policy) at btomlinsonccic.ca. We will compile them and put them on the website to contribute to the coming public debate.

Unfortunately CCIC is not an isolated case. What is increasingly at stake in Canada is the freedom and ability of Canadians to vigorously advocate for the protection of human rights – of all rights and of all people – both here within Canada and abroad, and to do so without political interference, intimidation or manipulation.

A sea-change is underway in the way that the Canadian government is relating to citizen voice and its representation in Canadian civil society organizations – challenging a long Canadian tradition that government recognized its responsibility to financially strengthen citizens’ collective contributions to public policy-making. While sometimes smarting at civil society criticism, no government has swayed from a non-partisan consensus that federal funding for alternative views has improved the quality of public policy, particularly those views that gave voice to marginalized groups. This consensus can no longer be assumed.

Long-standing federal government funding is no longer available to women’s organizations advocating for the protection of Canadian women’s rights, with 14 such organizations cut off in the past month alone. Several domestic convening organizations, similar to CCIC, such as the Canadian Social Development Council, have been cut entirely. Heads of important official over-sight bodies, responsible for monitoring and adjudicating government conduct, have been removed when they have challenged government on crucial issues. A deep crisis has enveloped and paralyzed the world-respected human rights organization, Rights & Democracy, along with politically motivated funding cuts to Kairos, Alternatives and the Canadian Arab Federation, among others, all based on their support for respected civil society programs protecting the rights of Palestinian people.
The civil society sector in Canada is under siege by its own government, organizations are being intimidated, and dissent is being silenced.

We are well aware that these conditions, and even much worse, have been the daily experience facing many civil society colleagues in countries across the global South. We have been proud that Canada has many times spoken out against governments that suppress the voices of their citizens; we are shocked and dismayed that now voices in Canada are being sidelined and punished. Not because they have wasted money or done their job poorly. But simply because they speak out about things the government does not want to hear.

In solidarity,
Gerry Barr
CEO-President
Canadian Council for International Cooperation

Canadian Council for International Cooperation (CCIC)
De-funding Backgrounder

Background

• CCIC has over 40 years’ experience of monitoring and analyzing federal policies on foreign affairs, aid, trade, peacebuilding, environmental justice and human rights.
• CCIC regroups approximately 90 Canadian civil society organizations working both in Canada and overseas.
• CCIC provides leadership for accountability and enhancing good practices.
• CIDA funding to the Canadian Council for International Co-operation (CCIC), Canada’s pre-eminent coalition to end global poverty is at risk.
  • CCIC’s program proposal was submitted to CIDA in October 2009.
  • CCIC’s three-year contract with CIDA expired on March 31, 2010.
  • CCIC in now two months into a three-month temporary extension.
  • 2/3 of CCIC staff has received layoff notices.
  • CCIC’s office space has been put up for sale to help meet the costs of reduced funding.
• About 30% of CCIC’s money comes from outside the government, including from CCIC members, who are both generous and supportive of CCIC.
• A critical and well-respected voice for the world’s poor risks being silenced if funding to CCIC is cut off.
• Defunding CCIC sends a powerful message to the CSO community to “watch what you say, or risk losing funding”.
• If partisan politics determines aid funding, then effectiveness and accountability, to Canadians and the world’s poor, are abandoned.

Key Messages

1. CCIC De-funding Imminent:
   • CIDA funding for CCIC, Canada’s pre-eminent coalition to end global poverty, is threatened.
   • Cutting off funding for CCIC means that a critical and well-respected voice for the world’s poor risks being silenced
2. Political Chill Felt:
   • De-funding CCIC sends powerful “chill” message to the Canadian CSO community. 
   • The “chill” message is one of 
   • “punishment politics” – speak out and lose funding; and
   • “message management” – government will closely monitor what is being said and by whom. 
3. Advocacy Matters:
   • If you shut down diversity, there will be weak policy debate resulting in bad public policy.
   • If partisan politics determines aid funding, then effectiveness and accountability, to Canadians and the world’s poor, are abandoned.

What We Want

• Bev Oda, the Minister for International Cooperation, should immediately announce funding for the Council. 
• Clear, transparent and reliable standards must guide CIDA aid funding decisions.
• The Minister for International Cooperation must work with the Canadian CSO community to restore confidence and trust in a non-partisan aid programming decisions.