Cost and Priorities Programme

The Board, at its meeting in May, decided that AIUK's Senior Management Team should institute a programme of substantial cost reductions. This followed a review of AIUK's medium-term financial outlook. The Cost and Priorities Programme aims to achieve sustainable savings of £2.5m with half of this amount to be secured by the start of 2013.

On 30th May, AIUK's Senior Management Team (SMT) informed staff and their union of the decision and that given the scale of the required savings that they were contemplating redundancies.

The key driver for these savings is to enable AIUK to increase its financial contribution to the international movement over the coming years. This follows a decision reached by Amnesty International's highest decision-making body (the International Council Meeting) and it applies to all national sections.

Thanks to our supporters, AIUK's income has grown since the onset of the financial crisis. However, the assessment of the Board and the Senior Management Team is that it would be unsafe to budget on the assumption that we can meet our increasing financial obligation purely through income growth. The steps that will be required in order to reduce our expenditure will be difficult and painful and we are deeply conscious that this is a very anxious time for our staff.

Members should be reassured that AIUK is not experiencing a financial crisis. Donations continue to show signs of growth and our reserves are healthy. The action that we are taking is to ensure that AIUK can continue to operate on a sound financial basis for the future.

We will continue to provide further updates to supporters on this page, and in the meantime if you have any concerns or questions about this programme please contact our Supporter Care Team at sct@amnesty.org.uk.

Updated documents February 2013

Further information