FEARS have been raised for the future of services by a charity for young people with learning disabilities after a council grant of almost £29,000 was axed due to budget cuts.

Harrow Council is cutting charity Ashiana's annual funding of £28,877, which it has received for the last two years.

The charity, started in September 2000, has 86 services users and provides weekly activities, including yoga, Bollywood dancing, IT sessions, arts and crafts, swimming, badminton and snooker, as well as group befriending services.

Bob Blackman MP (Harrow East, Conservative) highlighted the plight of the charity by raising a question in the House of Commons last Thursday asking Communities and Local Government secretary, Eric Pickles, what steps are being taken to ensure councils protect voluntary organisations.

Mr Blackman said last Thursday: “This week I learned that Ashiana, a charitable voluntary organisation in my constituency, is having its grant completely withdrawn.

“My right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government has gone on record suggesting that he will take reserve powers to force councils to release money to voluntary organisations.

"May we have an urgent statement on what powers he is taking to protect such voluntary organisations from Labour-run councils?”

Mr Blackman said this week: “Losing this money will mean losing services and this is a wonderful organisation that can’t afford to do that.

“The council is making dramatic reductions to organisations that actually need the money to run. It is a real shame that an organisation such as this is having its whole grant taken away.”

The charity will stop receiving funding on March 31 but charity managers believe it will be able to run services until the end of the year.

Arvind Joshi helps run the charity and said the funding has been key in expanding its services and added the charity was very ‘grateful’ to receive the funding over the past two years.

He said: “We are very disappointed that the Harrow Council funding contract will not be renewed. We would have welcomed an opportunity to have a dialogue prior to the decision being made.

“It would have allowed us to demonstrate the benefits the council receives from the services provided by Ashiana."

Mr Joshi added he would like to develop “a way forward” with the council to find a solution to keep the facilities provided at the charity.

He added: “We hope the council will provide the service users and carers of Ashiana with some reassurance that they will continue to receive the same high quality services which Ashiana is currently providing.

“Ashiana will be able to sustain its vital services until end of December. After this period we will leave it in the hands of the council to continue providing the services to meet the needs of this special group of people.

“If Ashiana or the council fails to provide these vital services’ both service users, their families and carers will suffer and it will have a negative overall impact on their well being, both physically and mentally.

“We also believe this will have a major impact on the respite breaks received by the carers.”

Ashiana has been funded by Harrow Council’s Children’s Services department since 2009.

Harrow Council confirmed the funding had been cut and the charity has been encouraged to apply for other funding from the council as well as considering other external funding.

Harrow Council’s portfolio holder for children’s services, Councillor Mitzi Green (Kenton East, Labour), said: “This is yet another cut imposed on us from central government.

"We are having to look extremely carefully at every penny we spend, and in children’s services this means prioritising our most vulnerable children and fulfilling our statutory safeguarding duties.

“While it’s extremely regrettable that we are being forced to stop funding this excellent organisation, I hope we can find other ways of working with them in the future.”