Commission to consult on admin cost index

Finance | Tania Mason | 1 Jul 2011

The Charity Commission has said it will consult the sector before devising its “good-enough” index of admin costs.

The regulator has flatly denied a media report suggesting that sector opposition to its idea of devising a standard way to allocate charities’ admin costs within their public documents had prompted it to “quietly drop” the proposal.

The Commission issued a statement saying: “The charity sector is diverse and complex, and this is not something that it would be sensible to develop in a rush or try to push through, without the right amount of due thought and consideration about its impact.

“In addition, as has clearly been said, there is clearly a role of the sector itself in helping to explain to the public about how charities work and how they use their resources.

“The ‘good-enough index’ mentioned is a small part of a wider information strategy that is being developed within the Commission, the high-level aspects of which the Commission’s board will discuss for the first time at the next board meeting next week, and elements of which almost certainly will have to be consulted on, formally and informally.”

The prospect of a consistent method for charities to report their expenditure has led some in the sector to warn of league tables being created that can’t, by their nature, encapsulate the diversity and differences of various types of voluntary organisations.

But Commission chair Dame Suzi Leather (pictured) said at a public meeting in May that the regulator ought to pursue the idea because public feedback shows that the single biggest issue affecting public trust in charities is the amount of money that is spent directly on ‘the cause’.

Directory: Charity Commission
Who's Who: Suzi Leather

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