The Charity Commission yesterday blamed Parliament for the ongoing delays in implementing the Charitable Incorporated Organisation.

Kenneth Dibble, head of legal services at the Charity Commission, told the Charity Law Association annual conference that the Commission “has been ready for many months” to begin registering CIOs.

“But secondary legislation has to be agreed by Parliament and that is not a matter that is within the Commission’s hands,” he said.

He said the Commission’s latest understanding is that CIOs would be ready to be implemented from spring of next year: “I know that last time we said autumn, and it keeps slipping, but now I’m told it’s next spring.”

He added there was a groundswell of interest in CIOs, and that Jane Ryder at OSCR had told him that the SCIO is starting to prove a valuable model in Scotland.  “I have no doubt that that will happen here too,” Dibble said.

“I also know that lots of trustees are holding fire on certain proposals while they wait for CIOs to come in, and for the Commission’s part I apologise, but the Commission has been ready for some time for the CIO regime.”