Charity

The International Rescue Committee UK has become the 15th member of the Disasters Emergency Committee. The DEC is a coalition of major humanitarian aid charities that work together to respond to major disasters around the world, collectively raising money to help ensure that emergency relief reaches the people who need it most.  The charity works

The conservation charity WWF-UK has said it was “disappointed” to find its headquarters targeted by Extinction Rebellion protesters. The XR youth group was joined yesterday by activists from WTF WWF, a group that claims the charity has “participated in the evictions of hundreds of thousands of indigenous peoples from their ancestral homeland, for purposes of

The Charity Commission has cleared the race equality think tank the Runnymede Trust after the charity said a group of backbench Conservative MPs had launched a “politically motivated” attack on its work. The commission began looking into the trust in April after the charity was part of a large group of charities and individuals that

A more than 40 per cent surge in donations resulted in the Charities Aid Foundation distributing a record £958m to charities in 2020/21, new figures show. The amount passed to good causes through CAF accounts rose by £300m in the year to the end of April 2021 compared with the previous year, according to the

A scheme aimed at increasing innovation in social prescribing has been launched to meet an expected increase in demand.  The Accelerating Innovation programme, which is being run in partnership between the National Academy for Social Prescribing, the Royal Voluntary Service, NHS England and NHS Improvement, also hopes to improve the availability of social prescribing services. 

Charities are being warned to watch out for bogus tax rebate or refund requests after officials said they had identified about 1.5 million scams during the pandemic. In a letter to the Charity Tax Group at the end of August, HM Revenue & Customs warned charities to be careful if they were contacted “out of

Charities could be missing out on up to £50m in donations as research suggests that individuals have held on to cash for three times longer than they did before the pandemic. A new survey by the trade association UK Finance shows that cash as a method of payment has declined because of the Covid-19 pandemic,

An animal charity has been wound up and two trustees have been disqualified after an inquiry found it received just £1.8m from a £10m arrangement with a fundraising agency. The Alternative Animal Sanctuary was set up to offer permanent care to abandoned and neglected animals across England and Wales. But the Charity Commission opened an

A charity that regulates the cyber security education and skills sector has appointed its first permanent chief executive. The UK Cyber Security Council has brought in Simon Hepburn to succeed Don MacIntyre, who was appointed as interim chief executive by the board of trustees in January during the council’s formation. Hepburn is the founder of

The National Trust made nearly 1,800 people redundant as it looked to plug £173m in lost income as a result of the pandemic.  The conservation charity’s latest accounts for the year ending 28 February show total annual income fell from nearly £681m in 2019/20 to £508m in 2020/21.  The charity said this was largely down to

Simon Hepburn is a 20-year veteran of the charity, education and careers sector London – September 1st 2021 – The UK Cyber Security Council – the charitable, self-regulatory body for the cyber security education and skills sector – today announced the appointment of Simon Hepburn, a charity and education executive with over twenty years’ experience

An employee of the British Red Cross has won an employment tribunal claim after the charity did not respond in time. Midlands East Employment Tribunal documents show that the claim brought by an employee named J Creasey succeeded because the charity “failed to provide a valid response on time”. Employment judge Kimbra Welch decided that

The National Lottery Community Fund has helped to invest £650m in more than 10,000 community spaces and infrastructure over the past five years, new figures show. A report published today, called Connections Make Communities, explores the impact of government and third-party funding awarded by the grant-maker between 2016 and 2021 in England. This investment has

The LGBTQ+ rights charity Stonewall has defended the impartiality of its diversity scheme after the UK’s media regulator announced it would no longer participate in it due to a “risk of perceived bias”. Ofcom said it had decided to step back from its membership of the Diversity Champions programme after a review of its relationship

A gambling harms prevention charity has made a number of senior hires as part of a restructure that aims to expand its capacity to deliver a public health approach to its work. GambleAware said the appointments were needed to help meet the objectives laid out in its new five-year strategy, which includes increased investments based

The National Trust has announced it will introduce “Mediterranean” shifts for employees working on some sites during the summer months in response to the UK’s warmer weather. Staff and volunteers in south-east England will start earlier, finish later, and have longer lunch breaks in the event of “extreme” temperatures under the new measures. The charity

The Chartered Institute of Fundraising has announced plans to end its relationship with the HR consultancy Tell Jane, with the consultancy saying it is “disappointed” in the CIoF. In a report summarising Tell Jane’s findings from its investigation into allegations of sexual harassment at CIoF events and the CIoF’s handling of sexual harassment complaints, published

One of the survivors in the Chartered Institute of Fundraising sexual harassment case yesterday described the investigation report as “gaslighting”, saying she has lost her “final shreds of faith” in the CIoF. In a statement, the fundraising consultant Beth Upton said that significant elements of her evidence had been overlooked in the investigation, despite her formal

Charities have been offered the chance to apply for free SIM cards with 20GB of data, texts and calls for six months, through an initiative launched by the mobile phone network Vodafone in an attempt to tackle digital exclusion. Any charity that would benefit from free connectivity can apply for six months of free connectivity

Two married former trustees at an animal rescue charity used a £200,000 donation to pay off part of a loan they obtained to buy a detached house and up to 40 acres of land, a Charity Commission inquiry has found. The regulator opened an investigation into The Retreat Animal Rescue after placing it into a

Charities with HSBC accounts face a host of new charges from November after the bank announced it will charge a £60 a year fee just to keep the accounts open. The bank has also introduced charges for branch transactions including a 0.4 per cent fee to pay in and withdraw cash, a charge of £4

Up to 26 people will be made redundant at the charity fundraising website Virgin Money Giving when it closes its doors following its final sponsorship of the London Marathon later this year. Virgin Money announced the closure today after carrying out a strategic review of the fundraising platform in light of the end of its

The investigation into sexual misconduct at the Chartered Institute of Fundraising has upheld four allegations of sexual harassment against a CIoF Fellow. The investigation, conducted by the consultancy Tell Jane, was launched in March this year to look into the complaints against the Fellow and allegations that the CIoF had been made aware of his

Unicef UK has appointed Jon Sparkes as its executive director. He will join the children’s charity from his current role as chief executive of the national charity for homeless people, Crisis UK. Steve Waugh, Unicef UK’s chief financial officer, will continue as interim executive director until Sparkes takes up his new role early next. Crisis UK

Adult safeguarding concerns more than doubled at Save the Children International while child safeguarding concerns dropped by nearly a third, according to the charity’s latest accounts.  The adult cases covered a wide range of incidents, from disrespectful comments in the workplace to bullying behaviour by line managers and misuse of power and abuse involving community

The platform, developed in conjunction with software developer Amdaris, has helped 93% of therapy users find a therapist who match their needs, putting power in people’s hands Paranimo’s partnership with Amdaris secures Innovate UK funding and COVID-19 Business Response grant to help scale the platform to UK charities Bristol, UK; 24th August 2021: Mental health

The government is facing a High Court battle over the allocation of its £4.8bn Levelling Up Fund, amid claims it is funnelling money to constituencies for its own political benefit.  Judges have agreed to hear a case brought by campaign group the Good Law Project, which means the government will have to defend the criteria

The Charity Commission has opened a regulatory compliance case into a children’s charity after two trustees were found to be using it to further their own business.  A number of allegations were reported against Miss Dorothy.com and the Dot Com Children’s Foundation in several publications over the weekend, including The Times newspaper.  The children’s charity

Grants of up to £50,000 are available for charities in London aiming to tackle unemployment among blind and partially sighted people. The Vision Foundation’s 2021 fund is inviting applications that will help to tackle barriers that prevent visually impaired people from getting into work. These may include negative perceptions among employers or the public, delivering

The Charity Commission has confirmed it did not identify any issues of concern regarding the actions of an ME charity, after investigating a complaint that the organisation endorsed a clinical trial described as a “scandal”. Action for ME supports people living with myalgic encephalomyelitis, also known as chronic fatigue syndrome. The debilitating condition, which can