Charity

The Christian development charity Tearfund has reported a record rise in income thanks to an increase in individual donations, including a multimillion-pound gift.  The charity’s accounts for the year to 31 March 2020, filed with Companies House last week, show income rose 11 per cent on the previous year to £85.1m. Its income for 2018/19 was £76.3m.

Membership bodies are warning that charity shops are still being denied access to millions of pounds in government lockdown grants because confusion about European Union state aid rules meant they were being wrongly applied. The Charity Tax Group and the Charity Retail Association said in a statement that the government was continuing to apply rules

The government has opened an investigation into allegations of bullying and the use of inappropriate language made against the former chief executive of the National Lottery Community Fund. The Times newspaper today alleges that a number of senior staff members at the NLCF had spoken out internally regarding the behaviour and language used by ex-chief executive

Charities could be set for a bumper windfall from the London Marathon after organisers confirmed that 100,000 people will take part in this year’s delayed event.  London Marathon Events revealed in January that it planned to include a record number of runners in this year’s race, with 50,000 people running the famous course between Blackheath

Entries for the Third Sector Awards, which celebrate the work of charities and the difference they make to society, have opened for 2021.  After an unprecedented year for the voluntary and not-for-profit sector, the awards will recognise the work of the sector throughout the Covid-19 pandemic to support service users, raise awareness of crucial issues

A membership body has criticised a Scottish council’s decision to bring a leisure charity back under full control. Community Leisure UK said it was surprised and disappointed with the decision made by Falkirk Council last month to take the Falkirk Community Trust back in-house. Falkirk Community Trust has been providing cultural, recreational, sports and library

This week, features and analysis writer Rebecca Cooney and editor Emily Burt discuss the #RightNow campaign and what the Chancellor could do to support charities in next week’s Spring Budget. They look at options including the proposed Gift Aid emergency relief package, extending the furlough scheme and offering extra support to local authorities. And they share their coronavirus care

Ian Karet has been named as the interim chair of the Charity Commission.  A partner at the law firm Linklaters, he has been a member of the regulator’s board since January 2019.  The Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport said Karet would take up the interim role from tomorrow until 26 August, while the

The homelessness charity St Mungo’s wrongfully dismissed an employee who had been attacked by a resident with two knives, an employment tribunal has ruled. New tribunal documents show that the charity wrongfully dismissed the claimant, named in the papers only as Mr M Finnerty, after deciding he responded to a violent incident in a way

Camila Batmanghelidjh has called on the Cabinet Office minister Michael Gove to apologise to the charity’s former staff and service users for what she said were unfulfilled promises to support the collapsed charity Kids Company.  The founder and former chief executive of the charity was being interviewed on BBC Radio 4 during Woman’s Hour about

An independent investigation at Barnardo’s found evidence of racism and racially motivated behaviour in the charity’s fundraising department, the charity has revealed.  The inquiry last year concluded that the department’s leadership had failed to address such behaviour and a number of the charity’s staff are under formal independent disciplinary investigation, Barnardo’s said in a statement.  The

The Charity Commission has put Oxfam GB back on a standard regulatory footing after concluding that the charity had made “significant improvements on safeguarding”.  The regulator opened a statutory inquiry into the charity in February 2018 after it emerged that Oxfam had failed to adequately report the extent of sexual misconduct allegations by project workers

A working group is being set up by the government to create national guidelines for how culture and heritage bodies talk about British history. The plans were announced after a summit between 25 of the UK’s biggest heritage bodies and charities and Oliver Dowden, the culture secretary, yesterday. In a tweet after the event, Dowden

Retail employees at the veterinary charity PDSA have been asked to sign new contracts that allow them to be sacked or have their hours cut at short notice as part of a multimillion-pound restructure.  Correspondence between the charity and staff, seen by Third Sector, shows PDSA was predicting a £30m fall in income in March last

Charities need to consider the appetite among their supporters before restarting fundraising events, the Chartered Institute of Fundraising has cautioned.  Daniel Fluskey, head of policy and external affairs at the CIOF said although the government set out its roadmap yesterday for reopening the economy in England, it was too early for charities to start putting

A charity that provides horseriding opportunities to disabled and disadvantaged people has raised more than £1.2m in just two months to secure its future.  The sums raised by the Park Lane Stables in Teddington, south-west London, amount to almost 10 times its annual income.  The charity, which is part of the Riding for the Disabled

The MS Society has appointed Clare Horwood as executive director of engagement and income generation.  Horwood, who joined the charity today, has spent the past five years working in interim positions, including senior fundraising roles at the mental health charity Mind and Diabetes UK.  She succeeds Emma Whitcombe, who left the MS Society in December

There will be no regulatory action taken against former leaders of the defunct charity Kids Company, Third Sector has been told. An email sent to former Kids Company trustees by a Charity Commission investigator, seen by Third Sector, says that after the conclusion of High Court proceedings the regulator can finish its investigation and remove

The Charity Commission has disqualified a trustee of a now-defunct Birmingham-based charity that claimed it lost all of its financial records in the Grenfell Tower disaster in London.  A report published by the regulator setting out its findings in relation to its inquiry into The Voice Of Truth, which had objects of promoting the benefit

In this month’s bumper special episode, features and analysis writer Rebecca Cooney and editor Emily Burt find out about the Hidden Leaders: Disability Leadership in Civil Society report, commissioned by the charity leaders body Acevo. The report, published earlier this month, explored how Acevo and other senior leaders in the voluntary sector can create a more

Time is running out to submit entries for Third Sector’s Business Charity Awards 2021, which celebrate the significant contribution made by companies to UK charities and social enterprises.  The deadline for entries in this year’s awards is 11:59pm on 23 February.  The independent charitable foundation the Berkeley Foundation won multiple awards at Third Sector’s 2020

More than 50 heritage and culture organisations have received a share of £18m of government funding for regeneration and maintenance projects.   The final grants have been allocated by the National Lottery Heritage Fund and the British Film Institute on behalf of the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport. The funding is part of the

The animal welfare charities Blue Cross and the Scottish SPCA have formed a partnership designed to enable them to share best practice and reach more people.  The organisations said they had launched a joint research study with the University of Edinburgh to identify ways to contact people living with pets in hard-to-reach, minority or vulnerable

More than two dozen charity sector leaders from minoritised communities have signed an open letter calling for charities to hold themselves accountable for tackling discrimination by publishing three-year equality, diversity and inclusion targets.  The letter, which has been shared with the National Council for Voluntary Organisations and the charity leaders body Acevo, has also been signed

The disability charity Whizz-Kidz has appointed Sarah Pugh as its next chief executive.  Pugh, who has spent almost six years as chief executive of Heart of Kent Hospice, will succeed Ruth Owen, who has taken up the top job at the disability charity Leonard Cheshire after 17 years at Whizz-Kidz.  Whizz-Kidz, which provides equipment and

Charity retailers were not as badly hit as the rest of the high street in the final quarter of last year, new figures indicate.  Statistics from the accountancy firm BDO, produced with the Charity Retail Association, found that like-for-like sales in charity shops were down by 19.2 per cent in October compared with the same

Data-led insight delivers greater understanding of donors to support charity’s growth London, 17 February 2021 – Data and insight company REaD Group has announced that it is working with the Trussell Trust, supporting the good work the charity does through donor and volunteer engagement and fundraising. Trussell Trust logo The Trussell Trust is a charity

The children’s charity Action for Children acquired an after-school club in Scotland last year as part of a £1m deal, new figures show. The charity’s latest accounts, for the year to the end of March 2020, show it bought a business called Out of School Scotland in June 2019. The company provides after-school clubs, breakfast

– This article has been updated; please see final paragraph. The chief executive of St Andrew’s Healthcare received a payment of about £28,000 last year as the charity closed a performance-related bonus scheme, latest figures show. The charity’s accounts for the year to 31 March 2020 show chief executive Katie Fisher was paid between £303,000

Four in 10 charities reported a fall in the amount of time they received from volunteers last year as the coronavirus pandemic hit, new figures show. Latest data from the Covid-19 Voluntary Sector Impact Barometer, which is produced by Nottingham Trent University, the National Council for Voluntary Organisations and Sheffield Hallam University, found that of