How are reduced aid budgets impacting our abilities to keep people safe?

The sector continues to experience shrinking funding and NGOs are having to reprioritise their budgets to stay afloat.

How have budgets been impacted?

There has been an alarming increase in the number of organisations feeling forced to pull focus from safeguarding work. Just under half (45%) of responding Bond members reported that their safeguarding budget (used to fund staff time, training etc.) has been affected by aid cuts in the last year. This is much higher than in 2024, when 20% of respondents reported a reduced safeguarding budget.

Areas of safeguarding affected by cuts include training, fewer safeguarding team members, safeguarding roles being merged with other roles (such as HR roles), and focal points in countries taking on other roles as well as, or instead of, safeguarding.

While it’s true that cuts may need to be made across an organisation, reducing efforts to keep people safe, especially efforts to prevent harm, is short sighted and could ultimately lead to communities being put at risk. This alone is enough of a worry, but the potential rise in concerns coupled with a reduction in prevention could be costly for an organisation later down the line, both financially and reputationally.

What is happening to safeguarding professionals?

Many organisations (40%) reporting having fewer than one full-time safeguarding post. A small minority (10%) were at the other end of the scale, with more than five full-time safeguarding posts in their organisations.

 It appears that safeguarding staffing is sliding back to pre-2018 levels. Increasingly, safeguarding is being framed as an added responsibility; something extra picked up by staff who don’t necessarily have the deep expertise. We must remember that safeguarding knowledge lives in people; with increased staff turnover across the sector, this knowledge risks being lost.

When other roles are ‘picking up’ safeguarding, it is more important than ever for organisations to be in networks like Bond which provides spaces for those working in this area to ask safeguarding questions of their peers, and where safeguarding resources and sector-wide updates can be retained and made accessible. Most respondents (94%) that engaged with Bond’s safeguarding offer said their knowledge, skills and understanding of safeguarding has improved as a result.

Are organisations still making progress with safeguarding?

Despite the cuts, the professionals in safeguarding roles remain committed to improving practices. Most (85%) reported seeing progress towards better safeguarding practice in their organisations over the last 12 months. Improvements included:

• Creating, developing and implementing policies, policy guidance and standard operating procedures. Respondents said that having these policies, procedures and guidance has boosted staff’s confidence throughout their organisation and improved the organisation’s safeguarding culture as a result. Others reported working on their culture by using Bond’s Leadership Culture Tool.
• Many organisations reported working with the communities they support to ensure their safeguarding practices are appropriate for them.
• Some organisations shared that taking time to reflect on previous safeguarding cases and learning lessons from them has led to changes when managing future cases.
• Members reported having better internal coordination on safeguarding. Some reported that safeguarding is being taken more seriously by management teams, internal decision-makers and trustees. Management teams have been more willing to be kept up to date with good safeguarding practices.

How does progress on safeguarding impact communities?

Respondents described seeing the communities they support having more confidence in reporting mechanisms (with some organisations reporting that they have put more mechanisms in place in the last 12 months). Organisations feel they have a better understanding of contextual safeguarding, and they are getting improved responses from the partners they work with.

58% of respondents said improved safeguarding practices in the last 12 months are having a positive impact on survivors of SEAH.

Bond and its steering group is continuing to work on an influencing tool to allow organisations to consider their current offer for survivors and influence their management teams to improve it.

Does this mean we are seeing a rise in reported cases?

We all know that safeguarding concerns are going to happen in our work. Since 2018, Bond has been supporting its members to embed a culture of safeguarding with the aim of creating quality reporting mechanisms for the communities they work with. We want to see cases rise to know that our reporting mechanisms are working.

We asked members how the number of safeguarding incidents reported to their organisation compare to a year ago. Only 35% said that reported incidents had increased, with the vast majority reporting that they had stayed the same or decreased. We believe that most organisations are experiencing underreporting – this has been consistent since the beginning of Bond’s safeguarding work.

Capacity, time and budget is what safeguarding professionals need to ensure they are keeping the communities their organisation works with safe. NGO professionals are fatigued, often doing the work of many or wearing many different hats. The sector needs to remember that safeguarding is the golden thread of the work that we do – failing to keep people safe can leave communities worse off than providing support in the first place.