Rosemount Lifelong Learning, a Glasgow-based charity supporting young parents battling addiction, has warned that energy bills reaching £25,000 could force it to close. The charity says the 'unsustainable' cost of gas and electricity is diverting funds from vital projects and threatening its survival.
Energy costs 'crippling' the charity
CEO Sean Morrow described the financial strain: 'As a public building, we use a lot of energy. In 2022 we were stuck on a variable rate and ended up paying £25,000 in one quarter – as much as we were previously paying for an entire year. That crippled us.' In a standard year, the centre's gas bill is £5,000, still a significant sum for a small charity.
Morrow added: 'It's not just the £5,000 but it's the one-off costs and the shocks. It's those things you can't control.' Energy bills have risen again this year following the US-Israeli war against Iran, which has left billions of barrels of oil shut in at the Strait of Hormuz. The Russia-Ukraine conflict had previously sent gas prices soaring in 2022.
Bureaucratic hurdles for solar panels
The charity, based in Royston in the north of Glasgow, attempted to install solar panels to reduce costs but faced a 'bureaucratic nightmare'. Rosemount applied for a Scottish Government CARES grant and a green energy grant from Glasgow City Council, but the process required five years of evaluation, planning permission, and potential lease renegotiation, making it impossible.
Morrow said: 'The requirements were so much that I pulled the plug several times. The whole process just didn't compute. We had to stop. We weren't alone in this bureaucratic nightmare. Year on year it gets harder to find bits of funding.'
Broader impact on third sector
The charity is one of thousands of third sector organisations struggling with soaring bills. This follows the closure of a residential drug facility in Glasgow last week, operated by Turning Point Scotland, which claimed its council-owned landlord 'aggressively' doubled its rent, forcing the shutdown.
The Scottish Government, which runs the CARES programme, said: 'Eligibility guidance and funding processes are reviewed regularly to ensure they are appropriate and as simple as possible for applicants to follow, whilst ensuring value for money from public funds.'
