Disasters Emergency Committee launches Myanmar appeal

More than 500,000 Rohingya, consisting mostly of women and children, have fled the country to neighbouring Bangladesh

The Disasters Emergency Committee has launched a new emergency appeal to help thousands of Rohingya Muslims fleeing Myanmar.

More than 500,000 Rohingya, the majority of which are women and children, have left Rakhine state in Myanmar following alleged state persecution to seek sanctuary in neighbouring Bangladesh.

The DEC campaign is raising money to provide shelter, medical care, water and food for those leaving Myanmar, and for the Rohingya already living in makeshift shelters in Bangladesh.

The DEC, which is a collaboration of 13 major humanitarian aid charities including ActionAid, the British Red Cross, Oxfam and Tearfund, is launching the appeal today and will broadcast television advertisements on all of the UK’s major broadcasters.

The UK government will match the first £3m donated to the DEC appeal by the public, and a dedicated phone line has been set up.

Saleh Saeed, chief executive of the DEC, said: “People are arriving exhausted and traumatised into already overcrowded camps in Bangladesh. This is one of the fastest movements of people we have seen in recent decades. 

“Families are living in makeshift shelters or by the side of the road with no clean drinking water, toilets or washing facilities. This humanitarian catastrophe is unfolding in a country that is already reeling from the worst floods in decades.

“Without urgent support, the risk of disease and further misery is alarmingly high.”

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Charities urged to give evidence to new Lords committee on citizenship

The Citizenship and Civic Engagement Committee is an ad-hoc committee that will run for one session of parliament only

Voluntary sector organisations have been invited to submit evidence to a new House of Lords select committee that will examine citizenship and civic engagement.

The Citizenship and Civic Engagement Committee was announced last month as an ad-hoc committee for the next parliament, and will consider how best to promote best practice and support civic engagement across the country.

Ad-hoc committees are set up to look at a specific subject outside the remit of the permanent House of Lords committees, and they generally run for one session of parliament.

The Conservative peer Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts, who carried out the government-commissioned review of the Charities Act 2006, will chair the new committee.

Other members include the Labour former Home Secretary David Blunkett, Baroness Pitkeathley, the Labour peer who chaired the recent House of Lords Select Committee on Charities, and Baroness Barker, the Liberal Democrat House of Lords spokesperson on the voluntary sector.

The committee will release a report on its findings before the end of March 2018 and has issued a call for evidence, for which the deadline is 8 September.

Last year’s House of Lords Select Committee on Charities released a wide-ranging report in March featuring more than 100 points and recommendations to address issues with the charity sector.

The government is expected to respond to that report in the autumn.

The National Council for Voluntary Organisations has called on charities, especially smaller community organisations, to engage with the new civic engagement committee and provide evidence before the deadline passes.

Chris Walker, senior public affairs analyst at the NCVO, said: “This is a very important opportunity for charities to demonstrate how our sector is leading the way in civic engagement. Charities are often the vehicles with which people engage with society. We are keen for as many organisations as possible, no matter how small, to submit examples of the sort of work they do to foster this.

“Given the subject, the committee wants to encourage those who wouldn’t normally speak out. If you have a good case study that you can contribute, but haven’t provided written evidence to a committee before, it might be worth contacting the committee staff and talking to them about how you can provide what they need.”

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