The Charity Commission will rely more heavily on umbrella bodies to help charities avoid problems, said the Commission's chief executive Sam Younger upon endorsing Visible Standards 2011, a quality standard developed by Community Matters through its Visible Communities programme.

The Commission worked with Community Matters to develop the Visible Standards, which are aimed at medium to large community organisations with paid staff. Now deemed in-line with the Commission's Hallmarks of an Effective Charity guidance, the standards provide the basis of a solid community organisation, calling on organisations to fulfil seven core principles which include being a "voice to represent issues of local concern", and a "builder of partnerships with other local organisation and groups".

The Visible Standards are the seventh set of quality standards to be endorsed by the Commission. Others include the Community Foundation Network's Quality Accreditation (QA2), ACRE's Good Practice Quality Standard and the YMCA's Insync 2010.

Younger said endorsements like these were more important than ever for the Commission:

"I am delighted that we are able to endorse Community Matters' Visible Standards 2011. The new standards are a clear and continuing demonstration of Community Matters' commitment to encourage best practice in the sector. We are going to rely ever more heavily as a regulator on the work of umbrella bodies like Community Matters to help charities avoid problems from occurring," he said.

The Charity Commission is in the process of a thorough review of its services following spending cuts which will see the regulator lose a third of its budget in real terms between now and 2015. Last month it announced its new management structure and in February it announced its top-line priorities for the future.

Community Matters is a lottery-funded membership body championing voluntary and community action at neighbourhood level. It supports 1200 member organisations throughout the UK.