Renamed Unclaimed Assets fund to be voluntary
Howard Lake | 8 November 2007 | News
The Queen’s Speech this week included the “Dormant Bank and Building Society Accounts Bill”, which was previously called the Unclaimed Assets Bill. However, it will not be compulsory for UK banks to take part in it.
The Queen’s Speech stated that “legislation will be introduced to enable unclaimed money in dormant bank accounts to be used for youth facilities, financial inclusion and social investment.” A Treasury briefing explained that the purpose of the Bill was to “enable unclaimed assets to be invested for community purposes, whilst ensuring the rights of owners to be reunited with their assets are protected.”
The bill defines unclaimed assets as “covering all bank and building society accounts where there has been no customer-initiated activity for 15 years.”
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The Community Foundation Network (CFN) was not pleased with the bill, especially the voluntary element for banks. CFN Chief Executive, Stephen Hammersley said: “Many people had hoped this legislation would help address the funding crisis now looming for small community groups, many of which are amongst the most effective in getting money to the most disadvantaged.
“In fact it now looks as if there will be no compulsion on banks and building societies to join the scheme. Government has pulled the plug on a huge swathe of local community funding. This bill was supposed to refill the bath but with the legislation framed as it seems, the inward flow of funds could be little more than a dripping tap.”
He called on the Big Lottery Fund, which the bill states will distribute the funds,
to ensure that what money is raised gets to grassroots organisations, “rather than going to the 10% mega-charities that currently absorb nearly 90% of all charitable income.”
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.