Former Inland Revenue chair to lead NCVO tax review group

Sir Nicholas Montagu will lead the umbrella group’s Charity Tax Commission, which will include five other commissioners and is set to review the tax system as it affects the sector

A former chairman of the Inland Revenue will lead a group set up by the National Council for Voluntary Organisations to make recommendations to government on how it might reform the charity tax system.

Sir Nicholas Montagu, who chaired the Inland Revenue between 1997 and 2004, shortly before it merged with HM Customs & Excise to become HM Revenue & Customs, will lead the NCVO’s Charity Tax Commission, the umbrella body has announced.

The commission, which was announced earlier this year, will carry out a full review of the charity tax system and the estimated £3.7bn worth of charity tax reliefs, then submit recommendations for reform to the government.

Montagu will be supported by five commissioners who have experience of the charity sector or fiscal policy.

They are: Sarah Atkinson, director of policy, planning and communications at the Charity Commission; Dan Corry, chief executive of the think tank New Philanthropy Capital; Pesh Framjee, head of not-for-profits at Crowe Clark Whitehill and a special adviser to the Charity Finance Group; Clare Pelham, chief executive of the Epilepsy Society; and Lynne Oats, professor of taxation and accounting at the University of Exeter Business School and co-director of the university’s Tax Administration Research Centre.

The Treasury and HM Revenue & Customs will also attend the commissioner as observers, and another commissioner might be announced shortly, the NCVO said.

The commission will meet for the first time later this week and should complete its work in the next 18 months, with the aim of informing the Inquiry Into the Future of Civil Society, which is chaired by Julia Unwin and is expected to report in 2019.

The tax commission is the first comprehensive review of charity tax since 1997, according to Montagu.

“My aspiration is for the commission’s proposals to inform future changes to the tax system such that it can continue to support charities’ work as effectively as possible,” he said.

“I look forward to drawing up pragmatic proposals that will appropriately balance the need for a fair and efficient tax system with the important role that we want charities to continue to play in society.”

In response to the NCVO’s announcement, Caron Bradshaw, chief executive of the CFG, said: “This commission comes at a critical time for our sector and carries a heavy weight of responsibility. We believe the commission should ensure that the proposals it puts forward deliver significant positive change for charities.

“We urge it to be brave and bold; now is not the time for tinkering. We have long argued that the tax bill for our sector is too high, and we look forward to hearing how the commission proposes this burden can be reduced.”

John Hemming, chair of the Charity Tax Group, said the commission “offers a further opportunity to challenge the anomalous tax position charities often find themselves in, particularly in respect of VAT”.

He said: “It is essential that charity tax reliefs keep up with societal and technological developments, or they may become obsolete. We look forward to working with the commission and recommend that future-proofing tax reliefs for charities be one of its major areas of focus.”

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Baroness Pitkeathley is preferred candidate for presidency of NCVO

The appointment of the Labour peer is expected to be approved at the umbrella body’s general meeting on 20 November

The Labour peer Baroness Pitkeathley is set to be the next president of the National Council for Voluntary Organisations.

Pitkeathley, who has worked in the voluntary sector for more than 40 years and recently chaired the House Of Lords Select Committee on Charities, has been announced as the NCVO’s preferred candidate to replace Lady Grey-Thompson, who has served five years in the position.

Pitkeathley’s appointment is expected to be approved by NCVO members at its annual general meeting on 20 November.

The umbrella body also announced that Sally Young, chief executive of Newcastle Council for Voluntary Service, has been appointed as vice-chair, replacing Matt Hyde, chief executive of the Scout Association.

Pitkeathley, who is also chair of the Big Society Trust, which oversees the social investors Big Society Capital and Access – the Foundation for Social Investment, said she had been closely involved with the NCVO for many years and had always been a great admirer of its work.

“If my appointment is approved by the membership, it will be a particular pleasure to hold this important office during the centenary anniversary celebrations in 2019,” she said.

Peter Kellner, chair of the NCVO, said: “Jill’s decades of professional experience, initially as a social worker and then in the public and voluntary sectors, make her the ideal candidate for the role. She has always been clear about her dedication to civil society.

“As chairman of the House of Lords Select Committee on Charities, she has worked with peers from all political parties to challenge both the voluntary sector and the government to ensure that the sector plays a greater and more effective role in British society.

“She will prove a crucial champion during an era of uncertainty and the continuing squeeze on public services, when demand for those services is certain to grow.”

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В прошлом году доход NCVO упал на 1,1 млн фунтов стерлингов

. Последние данные зонтичного органа говорят, что доход снизился до £ 8.2 млн, поскольку в прошлом финансовом году завершился ряд масштабных, ограниченных по времени проектов

Национальный совет добровольных организаций увидел, что его доход упал на 1,1 млн фунтов в прошлом году, согласно его последним счетам.

. Отчеты зонтичного органа за год, закончившийся 31 марта 2017 года, которые были опубликованы вчера, показывают, что доход снизился до £ 8.2 млн, что, по мнению этих аккаунтов, связано с рядом масштабных, ограниченных по времени проектов, конец предыдущего финансового года.

Доход от благотворительной деятельности сократился на 1,2 млн. Фунтов стерлингов из-за сокращения грантов и контрактов с ограниченным проектом

Число сотрудников сократилось с 109 до 95 в течение года, что, по мнению этих счетов, является результатом реструктуризации в марте 2016 года.

Но было увеличение доходов от пожертвований и наследства – от 1,6 млн. Фунтов стерлингов до 1,8 млн. Фунтов стерлингов, причем пожертвования Фонда благотворительных фондов составляют большую часть этой цифры.

В отчетах говорится, что увеличение доходов от подписки на членство, конференций и сборов делегатов и 3-процентное увеличение торговых операций с доходом, достигающим 3 млн. Фунтов стерлингов в течение года, помогли компенсировать другие сокращения доходов

Расходы снизились с £ 9,5 млн до £ 8,4 млн, а расходы на персонал были на 5,1 млн. Фунтов стерлингов меньше, чем в предыдущем году.

NCVO произвела актуарный убыток в размере 600 000 фунтов стерлингов на свой определенный пенсионный план, согласно данным счетов.

Сэр Стюарт Этерингтон, исполнительный директор NCVO, заработает 138 627 фунтов стерлингов в 2017/18 году, показания на счетах и ​​три других высокопоставленных сотрудника будут зарабатывать 88 117 фунтов стерлингов.

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NCVO publishes guide on communicating with the public

Telling a Better Story About Charities, which is free, gives tips on dealing with the most often-asked questions about the sector

The National Council for Voluntary Organisations has published a guide advising charities on how they should handle questions concerning subjects such as aggressive fundraising and senior pay.

The free guide, called Telling a Better Story About Charities, includes advice on what charities should do to restore public trust, such as being transparent and using simple language rather than management-speak.

The umbrella body worked with the research agency BritainThinks to uncover key themes in the way charities work that appeal to the public and find out how to present them most positively.

The guide includes advice on how to answer questions such as “why do charities have volunteers at the same time as paying big salaries to staff?” and “why do charities hound people for money, particularly vulnerable groups like the elderly?”

It says media coverage has confirmed the public’s concerns about charities, not created them.

The guide includes suggestions for words and terms that charities should avoid when communicating with the public, such as “paid staff”.

The phrase “professional expertise” is preferable, it says, because it shows that charities employ staff without having to mention salaries and helps to show charities as experts in what they do.

The guide also says: “It’s worth underlining that actions speak louder than words, and the advice in this guide is intended to be complementary to taking clear steps to address issues the public are concerned about, not an alternative to doing so.

“Communications alone are not enough – we need to ‘show, not tell’ the public that we take their concerns seriously.”

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NCVO says better communication with trustees required after regulator warns charity

The umbrella body said it was “alarming” that the chair of the charity that received the Charity Commission’s first official warning did not understand her role

The sector must get better at reaching trustees “who may not fully understand their roles” the National Council for Voluntary Organisations has said, after the Charity Commission warned a charity which paid a trustee and spent most of its income on fundraising.

The National Hereditary Breast Cancer Helpline was issued with the first official warning by the Charity Commission last month after the charity failed to address concerns about its finances.

Wendy Watson, the charity’s founder, paid herself £31,000 for running the charity while she was chair, a payment which had not been properly authorised and which she says was an error.

The charity had also been criticised for spending large amounts on staff, charity shop and sales costs, which meant that the charity was only spending a fraction of its income on running its helpline.

While the charity shops brought in 90 per cent of the charity’s income, according to its accounts for the year ending 31 March 2016 store costs and fundraising accounted for £409,227 of its total income of £924,827.

Staff costs were also £397,168 and cost of sales accounted for £123,580, the accounts show.

The charity’s 2015 accounts show that only £27,403 was spent on charitable activities, despite a total income that year of £974,555.

Speaking to Sky News yesterday, Watson said she wanted to make the charity more sustainable so she could retire and hire staff to run the helpline, which she had been running voluntarily by herself.

She said: “Mistakes were made. I’m not a businesswoman, I’m somebody passionate that wants to keep the helpline going and find a way to raise some money to do that.

“The charity needed to make the shops more profitable, which is what we’ve been doing. That will enable me to train others to work on the helpline so that I can retire.”

A report released by the Charity Commission last month says that the charity had been “exposed to undue risk through a lack of appropriate financial controls and its financial model was unsustainable”.

The report also criticises the unauthorised payments made to Watson and the charity’s receipt of interest-free loans from a trustee “for which no formal agreement or repayment schedule was in place”.

The report says: “Specifically, although the former chair had resigned as a trustee, she continued to run the charity’s operations without any formal role and continued to receive payments.

“They were continuing to allow the former chair to make key decisions about the operation of the charity, despite having resigned as a trustee.”

The charity’s failure to properly address the issues raised by the regulator led to the commission issuing an official warning under the Charities Act 2011 – the first time it has used these new powers.

The warning calls on the charity to review the loan arrangements it has in place, properly record board-level decisions and improve its financial controls.

Aidan Warner, external relations manager at NCVO, said: “It’s obvious that Mrs Watson is very well intentioned but this case is the perfect reminder that good intentions are not enough to run a successful charity.

“There’s a major question as to how the trustees ever arrived at the strategy of rapidly opening a large chain of shops in order to try and support a small, low-cost helpline.

“It’s alarming that Mrs Watson didn’t properly understand her role as a trustee, and that matters didn’t improve even after the commission’s involvement.

“We have lots of guidance available on trusteeship which is very well used. But I think all of us in the sector should think about what more we can do to reach those trustees who may not fully understand their roles.”

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Culture change needed in volunteer management to attract more people, says NCVO manager

Kristen Stephenson, volunteer development manager at the umbrella body, says charities should allow volunteers greater flexibility in how and when they offer their time

A broad culture change in volunteer management is needed in order to attract more volunteers, Kristen Stephenson, a volunteer development manager at the National Council for Voluntary Organisations has said.

Speaking at a joint event held by the NCVO and the Office for National Statistics on trends in volunteering in central London today, Stephenson said charities needed to allow volunteers greater flexibility in how and when they volunteered in order to keep them engaged.

Many charities failed to take into account the fact that people’s engagement was an ongoing journey that depended on what else was happening in their lives, heard delegates at the event, which was held as part of National Volunteers’ Week. 

For example, they might volunteer as students, then less when they find full time work or have children, but then get re-engaged through children’s groups, she said.

“There’s a broader culture change that’s needed in terms of volunteer management, so that we create a culture of volunteering where people are able to volunteer in different stages of our lives and we can build in the flexibility and also the pathways to allow people to do that and support them on this journey,” said Stephenson.

She also said that organisations needed to embrace the fact that volunteers might have a more fluid relationship with them because people have become more focused on causes than organisations.

“It might mean we might need to change our mentality a bit from one that recruits volunteers to do a very specific role that we define, to one where we enable people to give their time and talent,” she said.

“So is might be that we are seen as volunteer enablers rather than volunteer managers in the future.”

She said charities should look to sharing volunteers and enabling them to move between organisations easily rather than thinking about protecting or keeping them loyal.

Matthew Hill, a senior researcher at the NCVO, agreed and said the sector needed to be careful about the way in which it viewed time as a barrier to volunteering.

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Many studies had shown that those who were busiest, for example, in full-time jobs and caring for children, tended to volunteer more, he said.

“We should be honest about what does it really tell us when people say they don’t have enough time to volunteer,” he said, pointing to data shared earlier in the session by Chris Payne, a  senior research officer at the Office for National Statistics, which showed that non-volunteers tended to consume more mass media.

“I think we all know mass media means boxsets, which we watch instead of volunteering,” Hill said,

“So I think we’ve got to be realistic that it’s not that people don’t have time to volunteer, it’s more the data shows that people are choosing to do other things with their time rather than volunteering.”

He said it often was not the overall amount of time that was needed to volunteer that presented a barrier by the idea of a regular, open-ended commitment that tended to deter people, so more flexible opportunities needed to be offered.

Stephenson said one solution was to design volunteering to fit around people’s lives – pointing to Projects such as Good Gym, where people go running but stop off to do activities for their communities along the way.

“In those roles the volunteering is almost secondary – it’s about how it fits into their lifestyle,” she said.

“If we want people to choose volunteering over watching a boxset we need to think about how we make it easier and how we really highlight what the other selling points are of that activity.”

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