NCVO, Acevo and the Charity Finance Group have all heavily criticised Charity Commission proposals to require charities to declare campaigning spending and government income in their annual returns, which they say go beyond its remit.

NCVO and the CFG said the proposed rules were burdensome, unnecessary and badly-defined, and would not enable the Commission to more effectively regulate charities.

Sir Stephen Bubb, chief executive of Acevo, criticised the proposals as “corrosive, disproportionate and illogical” and said they risked alienating the Commission from the sector.

He said while charities had been heavily criticised in the press and Parliament for spending too much on campaigning and taking too much money from government, he was disappointed that the Commission had decided “to pander to an infantilised debate” and that it seemed “to move from news story to news story with no direction or thought”.

The Commission launched an eight-week consultation in June into proposals to collect more information on charities in their annual returns, including suggestions that all charities with incomes over £500,000 would have to declare all money they spent on campaigning, and all money received from the public purse.

Umbrella bodies said the Commission did not need to collect the information to be an effective regulator, that collecting the information would place an unnecessary burden on charities, and that it was not even clear what information the Commission wanted, because campaigning spending was not effectively defined in the consultation.

“We are strongly against the inclusion of this question,” the CFG said in response to the Commission’s proposals on campaigning. “This is likely to lead to confusion and the inclusion of this figure would cause charities an unnecessary burden.

“It is not a SORP requirement, there is no clarity regarding what would be included and there is no counterbalance arising from a clear public appetite for this information.”

In response to a question on whether charities should have to declare public sector income, the CFG also said it was strongly against the proposals.

“This would create additional burden for charities,” it said. “There is no clear evidence to suggest that its inclusion enables the Charity Commission to act as a more effective regulator or that this is in the public interest.”

Elizabeth Chamberlain, a policy manager at NCVO, said her charity agreed with the CFG. “There appears to be widespread unity in the sector on these two points. I haven’t spoken to anyone in favour of introducing the question on campaigning.

“It’s far from clear what information would have to be included, and that’s setting aside the fact that it’s not really a regulatory matter anyway. Whether charities spend their money on campaigning is not a question for the Charity Commission.

“Similarly, declaring income from government isn’t practical and again, it doesn’t seem to have much correlation with the Commission’s regulatory role.”