Clubs in the community
Community influence and support
There are 33 club groups operating out of 57 venues across Canberra.
About 80% of adult Canberrans belong to one or more club.
In aggregate membership of clubs in the ACT has stabilised at over 410,000 - with the larger clubs having memberships in the range of 30,000 to 70,000.
Clearly clubs do accept their broader community obligation - not as a result of Government pressure, but motivated by a sense of social responsibility and community spirit and invariably addressing needs not met by others – be that Government or other community minded organisations.
Most of the revenue earned by clubs goes back to the Canberra community in one form or another
- the fact is that it is not pocketed by individuals or private companies, and
- the only part of club revenue that does not go back to the Canberra community is what is paid to external suppliers of goods and services.
Many individual clubs can be proud of the good work and support that they provide to a range of charities, organisations and individuals.
Collectively, Canberra's clubs contributed $12.5 million in 2005/06 to a large number of charitable, sporting and community organisations, which is $4.5 million more than required by law. This brings the total contribution to eligible community recipients over the last nine years to $112 million.
A major initiative that ClubsACT introduced has been the pooling of contributions from a group of clubs, to provide significant financial support to a number of very worthy local organisations which service the Canberra community.
Current examples of this include:
- 11 of Canberra’s major clubs have combined to support Lifeline’s Clubcare gambling counselling service – at a cost of $246,000 per year;
- the Community Partnership with the Spastic Centre of the ACT involves 14 clubs – which has succeeded in having the services located in the ACT at Spence – at a cost of $122,00 per year;
- a partnership arrangement with Camp Quality to support kids living with cancer at a cost of $57,000 per year for 2 years – involving 17 clubs;
- as well there are a number of fund raising and charity events through the year – including
- the ClubsACT Charity Golf Classic which raises funds for a nominated charity – in 2006/07 it was AFFIRM which is involved in mental health research at the ANU; previous recipients have included Galilee, the Ted Knoffs Foundation, Koomarri and Cyclops ACT
- ClubsACT was also contributed $5,000 to the second phase of the ACT Government’s “Live in Canberra” campaign.
The commitment for these initiatives totalled about $440,000.
It would be very easy for the casual observer to underestimate the level and breadth of support that clubs provide to the Canberra community.
These significant headline numbers really understate the extent of the contribution that individual clubs make which, as well as cash contributions, includes in-kind support and, in many cases, involvement with the recipient.
At any function, charity or call for support, you will invariably find a community based club in the midst of things and a generous participant and contributor.
The use of meeting rooms to a diverse range of social groups, the provision of office space and the supply of equipment are commonly offered by the clubs at no cost.
In many cases groups such as charities, schools, aged care, art and craft groups and regional and ethnic community services groups would not be funded if it was not for a club.
