A meeting of fundraising sector representatives earlier this month that aimed to make progress on the shape of a sector-wide public-facing campaign to boost giving, ended without any clear conclusion after differences about the strategic direction could not be resolved.

Those attending the meeting included Institute of Fundraising chief executive Lindsay Boswell; consultants Alan Clayton and Joe Saxton; fundraisers Mark Astarita, Judy Beard and Imogen Ward; PFRA chief executive Mick Aldridge; Fundraising Standards Board chief executive Alistair McLean and NCVO head of policy Ann Blackmore.

The ImpACT Coalition was not represented.

The meeting was organised by the Institute but facilitated by Kate Lee, former director of strategy at the British Red Cross.

According to sources, the group fell into two camps – those that wanted to launch an immediate major ‘giving campaign’ to encourage the public to give more to charity, and those that supported a longer process that would aim to reduce regulation around fundraising, boost sector morale, and only then deploy a campaign to boost philanthropy.

The meeting was expected to discuss whether the umbrella brand for the campaign should be ‘Right to Ask’, as originally proposed by the Institute or ‘Right to Give’ as some of its  stakeholders preferred - but the debate did not get as far as this.

Judy Beard described it as an “exploratory meeting” to examine which direction to go in, but she conceded that “the idea is not really cooked yet, there needs to be more work done”.

PFRA chief executive Mick Aldridge said those that supported the staged process did not think an immediate new giving campaign would be as effective on its own as it might be with the preparatory work done beforehand.

The Institute declined to comment on what happened at the meeting but told Civil Society that another meeting would be held next week to try to progress things.