The Hammersmith Law Centre realised that it was about to lose 60% of its funding a week or so ago. Staff there found out on a day when long-time centre lawyer Tony Pullen just happened to be leafing through the centre's mail.

The centre is on the mailing list for Hammersmith and Fulham Council agendas, and the agenda for the April 16 2007 Cabinet meeting had turned up in the mail as the agendas usually do. Pullen decided to thumb through the agenda and noticed that there was a report in the agenda called 'Voluntary Sector Funding, 2007 to 2009.'

The report, which is still due to go before the Monday 16 April Cabinet meeting, recommended a £159,000 cut to the Centre's annual £260,000 grant – the biggest hit of all local groups on the list. Pullen says he could hardly believe it. 'We hadn't had any warning, and we hadn't heard anything from the council. This report was saying that we were going to lose 60% of our funding, and the Cabinet meeting (where a vote would be taken on that recommendation) was only a few days away when I saw that report'

The report to Cabinet recommended that the local voluntary groups that were due to lose some, or all, of their funding under the proposed new funding regime (and there are plenty of them) be given just six months to organise 'strategies' and 'contingencies' where the performance of those groups was deemed 'satisfactory.' By October 1 2007, that will pretty much be that.

The news came almost too late to make a formal protest: the deadline to organise a formal deputation to speak at the Cabinet meeting was Monday 9 April, which meant that the Law Centre had to try and find the ten local registered voters required to sign up for a formal deputation over the Easter break. Pullen says it seems likely that the smaller voluntary groups that didn't know about the funding cuts, or about the deadline for organising a deputation to speak against the cuts at the coming Cabinet meeting, have missed their opportunity to bring a deputation on Monday.

At is it, some groups have had their requests to bring a deputation refused, on the grounds that their (necessarily rushed) written requests didn't meet the council's formal criteria for deputations. 'It has been a very bad time for people in these (voluntary) groups,' Pullen says. 'It's hard to accept that this is the way that the Council is handling these voluntary groups. These groups have been working in their communities for a long time.

It certainly is hard to accept says Helena Ismail. Ismail is the co-ordinator of longstanding Somali and immigrant support group Horn of Africa. One of the things she finds particularly hard to accept is that after serving her community for 15 years, she'll be out of a job in six months' time and won't even have a chance to speak at the Cabinet meeting about it. Her group is due to lose all funding if the Cabinet accepts the report's recommendations on Monday.

Her group is also one of the groups that had its application to bring a deputation turned down (she says the council ruled her application out on the grounds that two of the signatories to the deputation weren't borough residents. She says that the process was confusing, and that she wants the council to waive the requirement so that she and her service users can talk to the cabinet on Monday about the work that her group does). The group got about £55,000 to run their organisation last year. For the 2007 to 2008 year, it will get nothing. That means that Horn of Africa, which has been providing immigrants with welfare, benefits and housing support and advice for about 20 years, will have to shut in six months' time.

Ismail says she can't believe it.

'The work we do is helping immigrants integrate into society. They are people who have little English. They come from other countries, from war-torn countries, and they're suffering and they find it very hard to work around the benefits and housing systems. Those systems are incredibly complicated, especially if you have got no idea of who to call, or how to get started. We can tell them what to do and who to talk to and we give them that support while they're going through the systems.'

Horn of Africa's work is not just about getting people onto welfare, either, Ismail says. It's about getting them off welfare when they've settled into the UK, and teaching them how to make their own way. Which they do. 'A lot of the people we've helped in the borough now have jobs. They're taxpayers and they're homeowners.'

Ismail says that the reality is that once Horn of Africa is gone, the people who use her group will simply not find the same sort of support elsewhere.

'I suppose they will be told to go to the Shepherd's Bush Advice Centre, or to Citizens' Advice.' (Citizens' Advice is due for a substantial funding boost if the Voluntary Sector Funding report's recommendations are accepted by Cabinet on Monday. Not all voluntary groups are facing funding cuts: it's local groups that provide comprehensive support to deprived communities that are being hit particularly hard).

The problem, Ismail says, is that the Shepherd's Bush Advice Centre doesn't have the capacity. SBAC, which provides welfare and benefits advice, can hardly be hanging out for the extra work. It doesn't have extensive opening hours and has faced staff and funding cuts itself in recent times.

The CAB, Pullen says, is excellent, but acts largely in an advisor capacity. It explains the law and people's entitlements, but doesn't offer the same sort of support, or ongoing representation service, that organisations like the Law Centre do. Law Centre lawyers advise, and they also take on cases and represent people at court, tribunal and appeal.

Ismail is pretty convinced that the problem is her clients aren't politically useful to a Conservative administration. 'They're immigrants. They're Somalis,' she says. 'They don't count. They're not the sort of people who are going to vote for the Conservatives. But they live in terrible situations. I had one woman in who was living in temporary accommodation, in a bed and breakfast. She was sick and her child was sick, because of the conditions they were living in.'

The Law Centre, which was set up in 1979, spends most of its time acting for people who can't get - or afford – legal help or a hearing elsewhere. There are 12 lawyers and barristers at the Centre. They advise and represent people who have housing problems, or problems at work, or problems with the Home Office. They give legal advice to other agencies, including the Council. They take referrals from the Council. They've won damages for tenants who've fought for adequate disabled access to their own houses, and dealt with housing rent arrears and possession cases.

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Join the start of the campaign with the protest at the Hammersmith and Fulham Council Cabinet meeting

7pm
Monday 16 April 2007
Assembly Hall
Hammersmith Town Hall
Kings Street
Hammersmith