After many months of deliberation, Barnet Council has withdrawn its funding for Barnet Racial Equality Council (BREC).

On Monday, council cabinet members stopped the North Finchley-based organisation's £58,000 annual grant and agreed to set up its own team of community development workers.

The decision comes after the Commission for Racial Equality (CRE) withdrew its annual £41,000 funding for BREC in March while Barnet Council halved its grant because staff posts had not been filled and it failed to meet quarterly deadlines for submitting accounts.

Council Leader Alan Williams said: "Clearly BREC has not been doing its job for some time and they will find it difficult to get funding from elsewhere without CRE's recognition.

"We'll use the money to appoint two new community development workers who will be based in Barnet's equalities team until 2003."

The leader revealed he is in talks with CRE over their future plans to reorganise race equality councils in London. This could involve setting up regional groups rather than current borough-based RECs.

Meanwhile, BREC's director Emkay-Magba Kamara remained upbeat: "BREC is not closing, the council said it's withdrawing the grant. That doesn't mean they're going to close us down," he said.

BREC chairman Ashitey Ollennu added: "They can't close BREC down because we're an independent charity and can find funding elsewhere."

A spokeswoman for CRE said: "BREC failed to meet core standards and didn't produce audited accounts to us. Their recent appeal or funding was rejected."

November 28, 2001 17:58

SARAH MILLS