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MONTREAL, July 16, 2012 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Development & Peace has ranked last in its category again in 2012, with only 70% of donations actually ending up in the Third World, according MoneySense magazine.

In its annual Charity 100 report, the magazine awards the Canadian bishops’ beleaguered aid organization a ‘C’ for “overall charity efficiency,” putting it at the bottom of the pack for international aid groups.

By way of comparison, Chalice, the Catholic child sponsorship charity, earned an A+, with 92% of donations going to international programs.

The MoneySense report rates 14 Canadian charities in the category of international aid and development, including World Vision, Amnesty International, Doctors without Borders, and others.  Based on annual tax filings and individual questionnaires, they were graded on spending efficiency, fundraising efficiency, governance and transparency, and the size of their reserve fund.

Overall, D&P earned an ‘A-,‘ in large part because of an A+ for both fundraising efficiency and governance and transparency.  With the aid of volunteer parish leaders across the country, and the support of the country’s bishops, the group only spends $3.35 for every $100 fundraised. They earned a B for their 9-month reserve. The magazine also reported that the group’s top salary is $160,000.

D&P also ranked last for charity efficiency in Moneysense’s 2011 report, allocating 72.3% of donations to international programs that year.

D&P education director Claire Doran says MoneySense graded them low on charity efficiency because the magazine grouped their domestic education programs with administrative costs.

This domestic program, she explains in a blog post, “educates the Canadian public on issues of global justice and engages the Canadian population in actions of support to the poor of the Global South.”

D&P’s figures for 2010-2011 indicate they spent $3.05 million, or roughly 9% of their budget, on education programs. These have included campaigns related to bottled water and, currently, a five-year campaign on “ecological justice.”

“Our education program is strongly supported by Development and Peace partners in the Global South who often express how crucial action in Canada is for their development,” says Doran.

But John Pacheco of the SoCon or Bust blog, whose research has helped expose the fact that many of D&P’s third world partners are pro-abortion, says much of the educational budget is not in fact about poverty or disaster relief.

“It’s about disseminating propaganda for the latest chique social justice cause like global warming to ‘help cool the earth’, promoting anti-mining hysteria, or scaling back the advances in farming to some kind of agrarian, luddite fantasy.  These are harder causes to sell to Canadian Catholics,” he explained.

Pacheco also balked at the high grade given to D&P for transparency given that they have failed to reveal their full list of Third World partners for over two years, even going to court to stop LifeSiteNews.com’s access to information request. According to MoneySense, the transparency grade is based strictly on D&P’s disclosure of financial statements, which are available on their website.

LifeSiteNews did not hear back from D&P by press time.

Find the full Moneysense 2012 Charity 100 report.

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