Comment 13 by danconquer

Every penny that is donated to NBGA in the UK is handed over directly to Oxfam anyway, so it doesn't make any practical difference. Although by giving via NBGA the money is recorded as coming from atheist-humanist sources.

I was not aware of that, I thought it went to the "Doctors without Borders" charity. Thank's for pointing that out.....I guess if I'd bothered to pat attention and read the NBGA page it would've been apparent.

Frankly, the last thing poor people need is yet another well-meaning outfit getting directly involved in the aid 'business'. Whenever there is a horrendous natural disaster, one of the most depressing things to witness is the sheer vast volume of hundreds of thousands of pounds of advertising that appears for competing charities, all scrambling against each other in a free market tussle for donations. The sheer wastefulness of bureaucratic duplication and administration costs that this represents, among organisations ostensibly committed to solving the same problem, is really rather scandalous.

Couldn't agree more.

So although being big can lead to undue influence which needs to be checked, being big also creates the opportunity to bring about the sort of economies of scale which the aid 'industry' (and more importantly, its recipients) would benefit far more from.

This is true, I was more concerned about the scandals being thrown about and as you say, the waste of money on infrastructure and junket's, etc., that a big noise like Oxfam may incur, but I will shut up and go away now, any good is better than no good at all.