Regeneration charities praised by Charity Commission
Howard Lake | 31 October 2006 | News
The Charity Commission has praised regeneration charities for their performance, effectiveness and best practice. The praise appears in “The Regeneration game”, the first review of regeneration charities in England and Wales.
The report looks at the 250 organisations which adopted regeneration as a charitable purpose since it was first recognised as charitable in 1999, and analyses the performance of these charities against the charitable sector as a whole.
The report has found that the total annual income for regeneration charities is £519 million, around 1.3% of the total for all registered charities. Seventeen per cent of regeneration charities already have an income of over £1 million, against an average of 3%, and they are more likely to be charitable companies (87% compared with 15% across the Commission’s Register as a whole).
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In addition, 86% of these charities regularly review the diversity of their boards and 63% carry out a skills audit before recruiting new trustees compared to only 17% of charities overall.
Also, 81% have beneficiaries on their boards of trustees. 98% of regeneration charities consult with their beneficiaries in one or more ways, and 97% of these charities use at least one method to measure their impact and effectiveness.
Regeneration charities are also very good at reporting: 90% of regeneration charities had filed their Annual Return with the Commission, against only 82% of charities as a whole.
Rosie Chapman, the Commission’s Director of Policy and Effectiveness, said: “These charities are characterised by models of best practice in a whole range of areas and it really shows. The level of accountability is exceptionally high, particularly in terms of measuring impact and involving users. They provide a great example to other charities grappling with issues of trustee scarcity and user involvement.”
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.