Our weekly round-up of outlandish and interesting information collected from the corners of the charity sector.
Stop that, or we’re putting down caltrops
As a charity shop, you always face problems. Attracting enough donations, finding enough volunteers, trying to stop people from having sex in the back of your shop…
Wait, what? Back up a minute.
Yep, it appears for one Exeter charity shop, random shaggers have become such a big problem that they’ve had to introduce new procedures to prevent them.
Local man Jason Daden, 47, and an unnamed woman were caught 'committing an act outraging public decency by behaving in an indecent manner, namely having sexual intercourse' in the Heavitree WESC Foundation charity shop in April this year.
Remarkably, it isn’t a first offence. Daden seems to have a predilection for getting down and dirty among £2.50 T-shirts, and has been caught having sex in a charity shop before.
“We would like to state that we have introduced new measures to help to ensure that a similar incident does not happen again,” the charity said.
Prophylactic measures, presumably.
Want a giant to crush your head? Sign here
Fans of Game of Thrones, the HBO blockbuster featuring gore, sex and dragons will know that there’s plenty of opportunity to die in the lands of Westeros. But now, for the first time, you can do it for charity.
For a measly $20,000 you can have writer George RR Martin create a character, have them bum around for a bit in the books which inspired the series, A Song of Ice and Fire, and then get killed off in a horrible way. You can choose the nature of the character, but the way they get offed appears to be up to Martin.
The money will go to two charities, Wild Spirit Wolf Sanctuary and the Food Depot of Santa Fe.
And do the horses talk, too?
Society Diary has not previously been in the business of taking requests, largely because it hasn’t previously received any. But now, for the first time, we have.
So it’s with great pleasure we include a list of new community interest companies with the most entertaining names, which Dan Gregory, the multi-faceted social enterprise consultant and head of policy at Social Enterprise UK, has compiled and Ged Devlin, a community shares expert, has suggested we ought to nick. So ta, we have. Without further ado, here they are:
1. Talking2horses CIC
2. Props4ward CIC
3. Fit2live Sports CIC
4. I-Dare-U CIC
5. Choose2Youth CIC
There was also, it appears, a special mention also to Elite Goalkeeping in the Community CIC, which is possibly Diary’s personal favourite. We can just envisage them getting Joe Hart out volunteering on an allotment as soon as he gets back from the World Cup.
No political capital made here
Earlier this week a cross-party parliamentary inquiry backed by the Charities Aid Foundation launched a final report into how to grow giving in the UK, called Creating an Age of Giving. There was much to say about the cross-party unity of the report, but, given that these are politicians, even when they’re talking about getting on, they aren’t really getting on.
“I’m not always a fan of coalitions,” said David Blunkett, the former Labour minister and the MP who led the inquiry, on introducing the report. “But this one has worked slightly better than the one down the road.”
Fair enough. But not a very cross-party attitude, is it?
