Naomi House boss offers reassurnaces as hospices access money reserves

This comes as the charity announces that it will have to dig into its financial reserves to meet a planned £1.4m deficit, amid the reality that they need to raise millions per year to keep going.

Based in Sutton Scotney, the charity provides hospice care to over 500 life limited and life threatened children, young adults and families from across central southern England.

Mark Smith, Naomi House and Jacksplace chief executive, said: “It’s a status quo in that every year we have to raise a majority of our funds to keep us going from voluntary sources. Each year, with costs increasing that becomes more and more difficult to do, because we need to raise more and more money each year. What we’ve done this year is to really highlight that we are relying on our reserves currently, because we are setting deficit budgets because of our services.

“We have set deficit budgets before, and we have utilised our reserves before, because these are funds that have been given to us to spend on services, but also we want to make sure we are sustainable for the future as well. We can’t rely on our reserves indefinitely, and while we are using them at the moment, we just want people to know that we rely on their support continuously.”

Mark Smith, CEO of Naomi House and Jacksplace (Image: Naomi House and Jacksplace)

Mr Smith said that the charity needs to raise approximately £9m a year to continue to run its services, and that the hospices have reserves of approximately £15m, saying “We can afford to set a deficit budget of £1.4m, but we can’t afford to do it for much longer. We need to keep some reserves in place so we can make sure we are sustainable and here for the future.”

The chief executive added that it is unlikely that the hospices would be faced with lay-offs or closures in the immediate future.  He said: “We are a good number of years from that scenario, because our trustees manage our funds and regularly review all of our strategies on a monthly basis, as we do in the management team. We are quite a few years away from that, but what we want to do is make sure that people know we can’t rely on reserves forever, and we want to ensure that we’re both spending to invest in our services but also to spend further money.

“We are pleased that the government have confirmed that the funding known as the Children’s Hospice Grant is confirmed for three years, which is money that we are already receiving, but helps us plan a little bit further ahead, as that money is usually only confirmed year by year. So, we’re pleased that announcement has been made.”

Mr Smith added: “One of the most important things we never take for granted is the generosity of and the special place that Naomi House and Jacksplace hold in the heart of the community. We want to take every opportunity to make sure that we recognise and value and thank all the people that support us through whatever means”.