The Fundraising Standards Board has referred ex-member charity Painted Children to police and the Charity Commission after its fundraisers repeatedly violated public collection codes and law.
The FRSB expelled Painted Children from its membership late last year after upholding a complaint against the charity for violating the Institute of Fundraising’s code of practice relating to public collections. The regulator, however, agreed to monitor the charity for a year to see whether it fell into line with the codes and Fundraising Promise and could be reinstated as a member, but during the first nine months three complaints were lodged about the charity’s collections.
The most recent incident saw Painted Children run an unlicensed collection in Brixton, which was witnessed by an FRSB staff member. The matter has now been referred to Metropolitan Police, Trading Standards and the Charity Commission.
A statement from Painted Children said: "We are extremely disappointed in this decision. Painted Children have worked very closely with FRSB during the time of the monitoring programme with the aim of becoming an example of good fundraising to other charities. The charity has abided by all of the requests made by FRSB, and have put in place stringent training, guidelines and procedure with regard to all fundraising.
"As a small charity working both in East London and in Bangladesh, fundraising is vital. We will continue to work within the guidelines and policies we have now in place and commit to transparency and high ethics in all of our work."
'Continued threat to public confidence'
Colin Lloyd, chair of the FRSB, said: “We simply feel that Painted Children’s actions pose a continued threat to public confidence – the charity isn’t ready to make the commitment to best practice that FRSB membership requires.”
When announcing the initial action against Painted Children in November last year, the FRSB also called for the Institute to clarify its code around public collections. In a statement about this latest development the FRSB says it will be feeding into the review of the Charities Act 2006, due to begin in November.
FRSB chief executive Alistair McLean said: “Public collections are so often seen as the face of charity fundraising and it is essential that regulation in this area is clearly understood by all practitioners; professionals and volunteers alike. When a collection isn’t done properly, supporters’ trust in charity and charitable giving can be severely shaken.”
McLean told civilsociety.co.uk that the Insitute provides ample guidance on its website regarding cash collections, and that while the FRSB had earlier floated the idea of a cash collections code with the Institute it was satisfied that the regulatory environment for cash collections would make this very difficult.
