The chief executive of homelessness charity Shelter has written to the government to ask them to stop using his charity's name in defence of an anti-advocacy policy.

In a letter to Cabinet Officer minister Matthew Hancock, Campbell Robb has called on the minister to stop using the charity’s name in defence of the new policy. He said that references are a “misrepresentation of the situation”, and that the charity had been unaware it was participating in a pilot.

The clause, which was due to be introduced on 1 May, restricts organisations that receive taxpayers' money from lobbying government.

Robb, who was the first director general of the Office of the Third Sector - now the Office for Civil Society - said: “At the time of the announcement, and on occasions since then, government representatives have used Shelter’s name in defence of this new policy.

“The grounds of mentioning Shelter are that we have already been subject to these rules as part of a pilot within the DCLG, and that this has not prevented us from using our own funds to lobby government on housing policy. This is a misrepresentation of the situation and it came as a complete surprise to us to be referenced in this way. As such I request that the government cease referring to Shelter in this context in future.”

He added: “The use of Shelter’s name implies that we have given our blessing to this initiative, when in fact we were never made aware that we were participating in a pilot and have at no time been asked whether the clause has any impact on our lobbying work.”

The charity was mentioned by Hancock in February when the new clause in the contract which is to be inserted into grant agreements was first announced. A note on the announcement stated: “Organisations which have signed the new DCLG grant agreement include Shelter (to run a homelessness advice hotline); this has not prevented the organisation from using its own funds to lobby on housing legislation in this Parliament."

Robb said the contract that Shelter received the funding for is a partnership with Citizens Advice that sits separately from Shelter’s mainstream services, which he says is “unusual in its structure and operations”. Robb said that, as a result, the charity “doesn’t feel it is representative”, and is “uncomfortable with it being used to justify placing restrictions on other, potentially very different charities and projects”.

He said: “In other contexts the clause may well impact on a charity's (including Shelter’s) ability to lobby government, and a lot will depend on how it is enforced by government departments.”

Robb concluded the letter by saying he would happily take a meeting with Hancock to discuss this further.

Robb said that he welcomed the government’s decision to pause the implementation of the policy, as announced last week.