Charity

The music director of the English National Opera has announced his resignation over proposed cuts across the charity. Martyn Brabbins said proposed changes to the charity were driving “a coach and horses through the artistic integrity of the whole of ENO as a performing company”. The Musicians’ Union said the ENO plans to cut 19

BBC Children in Need is inviting bids from charities running children’s mental health and early intervention projects for £1m of funding.  The Million & Me Award, which has been launched to mark this week’s World Mental Health Awareness Day, is a single stand-alone grant offered by BBC Children in Need in partnership with the Health

The Charity Commission will be “robust” in handling charities that fail to comply with its guidance on campaigning, the chair of the regulator has warned.  In a speech yesterday at the first conference held by the infrastructure body the Muslim Charities Forum, Orlando Fraser spoke about the commission’s commitment to holding people to account if

Charities on Merseyside are set to receive £100,000 worth of funds reclaimed from criminals. The Community Cashback Fund allows Merseyside Police to reinvest money reclaimed from criminals “into local communities to help provide vital resources and fund community projects”, according to its website. These funds are available to reinvest because of the Proceeds of Crime

Income at the local infrastructure body Navca increased by almost 12 per cent as it distributed funding to support member charities through the cost-of-living crisis and the war in Ukraine.  The charity’s annual accounts, for the year to the end of March, show its total income rose from just under £1.4m in 2021/22 to slightly

Total charity income fell for the first time in 10 years, new figures show, highlighting the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic on the UK voluntary sector.  The UK Civil Society Almanac, published today by the National Council for Voluntary Organisations, shows that total UK voluntary sector income was £56.9bn in 2020/21, down £1.8bn from the

The refugee employment charity Breaking Barriers has appointed Ciara Devlin as its next chief executive.  Devlin, who has spent almost 18 years in a variety of roles at the homelessness charity Crisis, will succeed Matt Powell, who founded Breaking Barriers in 2015.  Breaking Barriers said that by 2030 it hoped to more than triple its

The Charity Commission has opened a regulatory compliance case into the Nursing & Midwifery Council amid “serious concerns” about its governance.  The charity, which regulates nursing and midwifery practice in the UK, has been accused of leaving unchecked serious cases of abuse by nursing staff, according to The Independent newspaper.  The concerns arose from an

Two-thirds of charities registered in Scotland are run entirely by volunteers, figures from the Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator show. The OSCR’s sector overview report, which provides a snapshot of the charity sector in Scotland over the past three months, is based on the information provided by all charities on the Scottish charities register. 

Cancer Research UK has ended its exclusive partnership with a company that organises boxing events after the deaths of three fighters who participated in fundraising matches for the charity. Ultra White Collar Boxing, which is part of the Ultra Events conglomerate, offers eight weeks’ free training and match opportunities for amateur fighters who want to

A malaria charity’s income increased by 20 per cent last year to a record high, latest documents show.  The Malaria Consortium’s accounts for the year ending 31 March 2023 show its income rose by £16.3m year on year to £100.7m. The majority of these funds were restricted to use for seasonal malaria chemoprevention, which is

More than half of charities are at full capacity for their services and one in eight say they have been forced to turn people away, according to new research. A survey of more than 600 charities, carried out by the Charities Aid Foundation, shows two-fifths said they could not help any more people.  The findings

A growing number of charities have found that their investment portfolio income is not sufficient to meet their commitments, according to a new report.  The 2023 Newton Charity Investment Survey, published by Newton Investment Management, found an 18 percentage point decline over the past year in the proportion of charities experiencing “sufficient” returns on their

The Charity Commission has launched its new annual return for 2023, with changes made to ease “unnecessary burden for charities”. All charities with an annual income of £10,000 or more must complete the online document within 10 months of the end of their financial reporting period. The update includes a revised question set, which will

Marie Curie plans to increase its fundraising income by 30 per cent to help it more than double the number of people it supports over the next five years. The end-of-life charity said its new five-year strategy, which aims to increase the number of people it cares for from 44,000 to 100,000 a year, was

Charities have criticised Suella Braverman, the Home Secretary, for making “damaging” comments about the third sector. Speaking at the Conservative Party conference in Manchester yesterday (3 October), Braverman criticised the voluntary sector for opposing Conservative immigration policies. She said: “Each time I have gone to parliament to improve the law on immigration, Labour has tried

The Fundraising Regulator has promoted Nikki Renken (pictured) to head of casework. The regulator said Renken, who has spent the past two years as case manager, succeeds Catherine Orr, who has stepped down after six years in the role because she is relocating to Scotland with her family. In a statement, the regulator said Renken

The City Bridge Foundation has doubled the size of charity that it will offer small grants to and reopened the programme after a five-month review.  The grant-maker, which last month changed its name, said it had also doubled the maximum grant limit as part of an effort to address funding gaps and reach more organisations.

Volunteering in England and Wales is worth £324bn a year, new research has concluded.  A paper published by Works4U, a social enterprise that helps businesses support communities through volunteering, estimates that this equates to almost 15 per cent of UK gross domestic product.  The research has found that the total monetary value of charity trustees

Income at The Children’s Society rose by £6.8m to £43.4m after legacy donations more than doubled, latest accounts reveal. The charity, formally the Church of England Children’s Society, recorded a £5.5m rise in donations from legacies to £10.8m, its accounts for the year to the end of March show. The charity said the increase was

The Labour Party has abandoned plans to take charitable status away from private schools but still intends to remove some tax breaks. The party had pledged in 2021 that if it came into government it would remove charitable status from independent schools and reinvest the money gained from the tax breaks they would lose into the

Younger people are more likely to support charities campaigning on political issues, new research indicates. A report from the digital fundraising platform Enthuse shows that 64 per cent of people aged under 45 support charities campaigning on political issues, compared with 61 per cent of those aged over 45 who do not. The report, which

A new institute dedicated to the organisation of charities has opened at the University of Oxford. The Gradel Institute of Charity, based at New College, says it is “the first research centre in the world to concentrate on charities as organisations, not solely as a form of philanthropy”. The new body’s work will include research

The Scottish charity regulator has removed 31 charities from its register because they “no longer meet the charity test”. The Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator said it could not find any evidence suggesting the charities were still operating and said they refused to communicate effectively with it. It said the cuts were made to

Charity Super.Mkt, which sells secondhand clothing for a range of charities using a department store model, is expanding with a new store in a major shopping centre. The company has today (28 September) opened a store in Bluewater shopping centre, Kent, as part of national expansion plans. Charity Super.Mkt, which in January brought together 10

Rainbows Hospice for Children and Young People has promoted Jane Burns to chief executive. Burns, who joined the charity in 2019 as director of supporter relations, succeeds Dee Sissons, who has retired after five years in the role. Before joining Rainbows, which supports families in the east midlands, Burns held senior roles at charities including

The Charity Commission has asked the charity behind Parkrun to take action after a candidate in the Mid-Bedfordshire by-election posted a promotional video from one of its events. Alistair Strathern, who is standing for Labour in the constituency where Nadine Dorries is stepping down, last week posted a video from the Millennium Country Parkrun, Forest

Income at the National Council for Voluntary Organisations rose by £1.7m last year, its latest accounts show. NCVO’s income grew from £5.4m to £7.1m in the financial year ending 31 March 2023, which included £3.8m raised from charitable activities and £2.2m from trading. The membership body said the increase could be mostly put down to

The number of charity whistleblowing disclosures rose by 16 per cent last year, new figures show.  A report from the Charity Commission shows it received 327 whistleblowing disclosures in the year to the end of March, up from 281 in 2021/22.  The primary issues raised by the disclosures were concerns relating to governance, safeguarding or

The charity behind Parkrun has written to all the major political parties to ask them not to refer to the organisation in their campaigning activities.  Third Sector revealed this morning that the Charity Commission had written to Parkrun trustees after Alistair Strathern, the Labour Party candidate in next month’s Mid-Bedfordshire by-election, posted a promotional video