Technical Issues in Charity Law

This Consultation Paper analyses various issues in charity law and makes provisional proposals that the law should be reformed. Charities occupy a special place in society and in law. They exist for the benefit of the public: it is a fundamental principle that, for an institution to be a charity, its purposes must be exclusively charitable. Charities come in all shapes and sizes, and their aims range from focusing on local issues to a nationwide or global sphere of interest. There are approximately 180,000 charities in England and Wales registered with the Charity Commission for England and Wales, with a combined annual income of nearly £65 billion. The importance of charities is reflected by the significant donations made to them each year; charitable giving by individuals in the United Kingdom in the financial year 2012/13 was estimated to have been £10.4 billion. Charities have an important role and law should both protect and properly regulate them. The project is intended to further these objectives by removing unnecessary regulation while safeguarding the public interest in ensuring that charities are properly run.