Charity

The Charity Commission in Northern Ireland has contacted a charity over allegations of pro-terrorist chanting at one of its events. The regulator was responding to reports that crowds chanted their support for the IRA during an event hosted by Féile An Phobail, a Belfast-based arts charity. The brother of an IRA bombing victim complained to

The Charity Commission has ordered trustees to address governance failings at a charity that could not account for nearly £5m in spending in Iraq. The commission opened a compliance case into Assyrian Church of the East Relief Organization (ACERO) in November 2018, after the Metropolitan Police began investigating a payment of £147,689 referenced in the

A former cabinet minister and Conservative leadership hopeful has been named as the new chief executive of a global development charity. Rory Stewart, who was international development secretary in 2019, took over at the US-based GiveDirectly this weekend, where he will be both president and chief executive. GiveDirectly has a partner charity called GiveDirectly UK,

Charities are being forced to sell properties and cut services as the inflation crisis bites, according to the chief executive of the National Council for Voluntary Organisations. In a blog post published today, Sarah Vibert also warned that charities faced a challenge “in many ways far greater” than that posed by the Covid-19 pandemic. Inflation

Limited capacity among local commissioners has resulted in poor levels of understanding of voluntary sector organisations’ ability to deliver public service contracts, a new report has found. The report by the consultancy Perspective Economics, commissioned by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport, examines the levels of participation by voluntary sector organisations in public

A £200m foundation has appointed a former Baptist minister as its first chief executive. Liam Eaglestone took up the top role at the Steve Morgan Foundation last week. The foundation worked with the government in 2020 and 2021 to match-fund and distribute charity grants during the Covid-19 crisis. It was previously led by Jane Harris,

The government has appointed the solicitor Ann Phillips to the board of the Charity Commission. Phillips, who is a consultant with the law firm Stone King LLP, joins the regulator’s board on 1 September for a three-year term as one of its legal experts. She succeeds Kenneth Dibble, who joined the board in 2018 after

The Charity Commission has opened a statutory inquiry into a mosque charity that has been subject to three compliance cases in the past four years. The compliance cases “examined issues arising from an ongoing dispute” between two groups vying to represent West Midlands-based Dudley Central Mosque and Muslim Community Centre, the regulator said in a

The Scottish charity regulator’s budget has been cut by 4 per cent. The Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator’s accounts for the year ending March 2022, published yesterday, show that it received £3.6m from the Scottish government in 2021/22, but the figure for 2022/23 has fallen to £3.4m. The accounts also show that the majority

The National Trust has hit back at a “paid-for” campaign group that the charity says is seeking to influence its governance. The charity accused Restore Trust, a private company that this weekend accused the National Trust of “forays into controversial social activism”, of spreading misleading information about its work. In an opinion piece published by

A volunteer at the Christian poverty charity St Vincent de Paul has been sentenced to four months in jail for stealing more than £8,000 from the organisation. Barbara Allen, 64, of North Shields, Tyneside, had been volunteering with the organisation for more than a decade when the wrongdoing was uncovered in 2017, Newcastle Crown Court

The membership body Care England has called for immediate government action after figures showed the sector was facing a £2bn uplift in energy prices over the past year. The charity, which represents independent providers of adult social care, said the government must act to prevent a “widespread catastrophe” within the sector. It said figures released

The National Trust has hit back at a campaign group that the charity says is “seeking to subvert” its governance. The charity accused Restore Trust, a private company that this weekend accused the National Trust of “forays into controversial social activism”, of spreading misleading information about its work. In an opinion piece published by The

The disability charity Sense has formed a partnership with a grant-maker for the first time in its 60-year history, in an effort to help beneficiaries cope with rising inflation. Sense has created a £500,000 Cost of Living Support Fund and partnered with Turn2Us to distribute grants. Richard Kramer, chief executive of Sense, told Third Sector

Charity campaigners will release new anti-racism guidance next month amid concerns that conversations about race and discrimination have become “stifled” in recent months. Lena Bheeroo, engagement and equity manager at the global development umbrella charity Bond, told Third Sector she hoped the framework would bring “motivation and momentum” to anti-racism work at aid charities at

Household-name charities should play a larger part in sector lobbying, a think tank has argued. Leah Davis, head of policy and external affairs at NPC, said advocacy work was “too dispersed” across the sector to influence government most effectively. In an essay exploring the relationship between charities and the government, published today, Davis welcomes the

The RSPCA has paid tribute to a senior inspector who died after working at the charity for nearly 50 years. Mike Butcher, a chief inspector at the RSPCA, died last week due to complications after a long battle with cancer, the charity said. A colleague said Butcher had “worked tirelessly” to protect and rescue abused

UK charities and community interest companies helping people with digital and financial skills are being invited to apply for grants of up to £150,000 from the Santander Foundation. The grant-maker said the Financial and Digital Empowerment Fund, which is in its second year, will support 12 organisations through grants awarded over three years. Charities can

UK charity staff are paid an average of 7 per cent less per hour than equivalent staff in other sectors, new research has found. Analysis by the think tank Pro Bono Economics, published today, shows that voluntary sector workers faced a collective “wage penalty” of nearly £1.5bn in 2019 compared with workers elsewhere in the

A former Foreign Office diplomat has been appointed as the chief executive of a £1m-a-year prison rehabilitation charity. Sian Williams will join Switchback in October. She succeeds Alice Dawnay, who founded the charity 15 years ago and announced her departure in May. Williams joins Switchback from Toynbee Hall, where she is director of policy and

The Charity Commission for Northern Ireland has resolved a 10-year inquiry into a charity that made outstanding loans worth millions of pounds to businesses linked to a trustee. The CCNI called its investigation into Victoria Housing Estates Ltd “one of the most complex and prolonged” cases it had ever conducted. The inquiry was closed after

The grant-making charity founded by the controversial steel magnate Sanjeev Gupta is expected to continue its work despite growing questions about his business empire. The GFG Foundation, which was established in 2017 as a grant-maker supporting training for engineers, is funded exclusively through donations from Gupta and his wife. Companies House documents show the couple

Employees have donated more than £1.6bn to charities through the Charities Aid Foundation’s payroll giving service over the past 35 years. CAF said its service had supported about 40,000 charities since 1987 and worked with donors at 2,000 companies in the UK. Payroll giving schemes enable employees to make donations from their salaries before income

A poverty charity has been removed from the register after the regulator found three brothers “abused their position” as trustees. The Charity Commission accused David, Sidney and Michael Chontow, the only trustees of their charity Achiezer, of exploiting the organisation for personal gain. A seven-year statutory inquiry concluded that Achiezer, which had objects of making

The animal welfare charity Mayhew has appointed Sherine Wheeler as its next chief executive.  Wheeler, who has been a consultant and strategic adviser since last year, is the long-term successor to Caroline Yates, who last year moved to become the charity’s head of international projects and relations after 14 years in the top role.  Wheeler

A Scottish charity has been forced to cancel its 50th anniversary event after supporters said the cost-of-living crisis meant they could not afford tickets. Perth & Kinross Association of Voluntary Service said it started planning a Golden Anniversary Ball in 2020 but dropped the event this week. Supporters told the charity they were “reluctant to

A housing charity that featured in a BBC Panorama documentary this week has said it is reviewing all aspects of its governance and compliance work. The programme alleged that the founder of My Space Housing Solutions used the charity to inflate the value of properties before he sold them on for private profit. The charity

The charity sector must prepare for “an all-hands-on-deck crisis” as inflation bites, experts said today. Economists at the charity think tank Pro Bono Economics issued the warning after official figures showed inflation rose to its highest rate for 40 years. Jane Ide, chief executive of Acevo, told Third Sector that rising costs had charities “over

One of the country’s biggest social care charities has spent about £1m from its reserves so far this year to cover Covid-19 absences. Community Integrated Care said it had been forced to fund growing levels of sick pay from its reserves since the government closed a scheme that covered those costs. CIC warned that other

The Charity Commission has opened a statutory inquiry into concerns that a banned trustee is still working for his charity. Alan Blacker, a founding trustee of the Joint Armed Forces Legal Advocacy Service, was disqualified from sitting on any charity board in 2020 after being convicted of dishonestly claiming benefits. Blacker applied for a waiver