DSC responds to Charity Commission research with more positive outlook
Melanie May | 29 June 2016 | News
Public trust and confidence in charities may not be as low as believed, according to the Directory of Social Change (DSC).
Responding to yesterday’s (28th June) Charity Commission research, which stated that public trust and confidence in charities has fallen to the lowest recorded level since monitoring began in 2005, DSC policy officer Ciaran Price warned against over-reacting to the findings.
According to Price, statistics on how much people donate, how much time they give to charity, and how many people volunteer as trustees provide a better measure of public trust, with trust greater where people have a personal connection to a charity.
He said:
‘The real test of how much the public trusts us is in how much they give to charity, how much time they give as volunteers, and how many people volunteer as trustees. All I’ve seen recently in those measurements suggests something really positive. Individual charities should be more interested in the trust and confidence of their existing supporters and beneficiaries before deciding they have a problem relating to this report.”
He added:
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“It’s obvious that people trust charities more if they are familiar with them. The problem isn’t entirely about charities not communicating enough. The public rightly wants transparency but realistically we can’t spoon feed the public about how we use every penny they donate. We can advertise the fact charities’ accounts are freely available online but that doesn’t mean people are going to read them. One thing we can do is talk more about the big picture – how absolutely everybody benefits from the work of charities, in ways they do not even realise. As a sector we need to get that message out loud and clear.”
The DSC has developed a game, called #EverybodyBenefits (pictured), to demonstrate to the public the extent to which every person in every community benefits from the work of charities. It is inviting people to play and share the game at www.dsc.org.uk/everybodybenefits.
About Melanie May
Melanie May is a journalist and copywriter specialising in writing both for and about the charity and marketing services sectors since 2001. She can be reached via thepurplepim.com.