2 Charitable Purposes
Current position
46. For a body to be a charity in law, it must meet
two conditions:
a) it must have exclusively charitable purposes
and
b) it must be for the public benefit.
For a purpose to be charitable under current law,
it must fall under one of four "heads" - the relief
of poverty, the advancement of education, the advancement of religion,
or a general catch-all category "other purposes beneficial
to the community". New purposes under the fourth category
are developed by the courts in the common law by analogy to the
first three purposes.
Draft Bill changes
47. Clause 2(2) of the draft Bill defines twelve
charitable purposes:
a) the first three existing purposes:
i. the prevention or relief of poverty;
ii. the advancement of education;
iii. the advancement of religion;
b) eight new purposes to be set out in statute
but already recognised in case law:
i. the advancement of health;
ii. the advancement of citizenship or community
development;
iii. the advancement of the arts, heritage or
science;
iv. the advancement of amateur sport;
v. the advancement of human rights, conflict
resolution or reconciliation;
vi. the advancement of environmental protection
or improvement;
vii. the relief of those in need, by reason of
youth, age, ill-health, disability, financial hardship or other
disadvantage;
viii. the advancement of animal welfare;
c) any other purposes recognised as charitable
purposes under existing charity law or any purposes analogous
to the defined purposes.
Evidence
48. The bulk of the evidence received supported the
proposals for increasing the number of charitable purposes and
the basic structure set out in the draft Bill. In addition, the
Committee received suggestions that:
a) Further charitable purposes should be added
to the face of the Bill - requests were made to add the promotion
of the efficiency of the Armed Forces,[61]
the prevention of violence and crime and the advancement of personal
safety,[62] and the promotion
of good race relations.[63]
b) Items should be added to some of the descriptions
of charitable purposes - requests were made to add the advancement
of good community relations [64]
and the promotion of racial harmony and equality of opportunity[65]
to the proposed head of 'citizenship and community development'
and to add culture to the proposed head of 'arts, heritage or
science'.[66]
c) One description of charitable purposes should
be amended -
it was suggested that "the relief of those in need, by reason
of youth, age, ill-health, disability, financial hardship or other
disadvantage" should be amended to read 'social and economic
advancement'.[67]
d) The descriptions of some charitable purposes
should be clarified -
a number of requests were made to clarify the meaning of religion
and the meaning of human rights.[68]
49. The NCVO told us:
"The [existing] list [of purposes] … was
never intended to be comprehensive; rather it was developed as
a guide. In cases where an organisation appears to provide public
benefit but cannot easily draw an analogy with existing purposes,
the courts have had the power to decide whether the organisation's
objects fall 'within the letter, the spirit or intendment of the
preamble and subsequent case law'. NCVO recommends that a version
of this statement, amended to replace 'the preamble' with 'the
Charities Act 2005', should be included in subsection (4). This
would allow for the possibility of charitable status to be granted
by the court to organisations whose purposes are not analogous
but who nevertheless provide a clear public benefit."[69]
50. A number of organisations regretted the failure
to include a definition of religion in the draft Bill.[70]
Others pointed out difficulties with the present definition and
its requirement of worship of a deity,[71]
leading to the anomaly that some organisations already registered
under the head of the advancement of religion, for example Buddhism,
do not meet the current legal definition.[72]
Concerns were also raised that the present definition is not compliant
with human rights obligations.[73]
Religions Working Together pointed to a lack of clarity in Charity
Commission guidance on the charitable status of religious organisations.[74]
Evidence from the Rev and Mrs M Braybrooke said that this "may
be prejudicial to newer religious groups or to Jainism which do
not speak of a Supernatural Being".[75]
A possible form of words was suggested by the Charity Law Association:
"belief in a supernatural being, thing or principle and acceptance
and observance of certain canons of conduct giving effect to those
beliefs".[76]
51. Oxfam pointed to revised guidelines on the promotion
of human rights which in their view confirmed "that a charity
for the promotion of human rights can engage in campaigning activity
to encourage states to sign and ratify international instruments
as an ancillary activity to an exclusively charitable purpose".[77]
They said, however, that there has been some confusion about the
content of these guidelines.
52. The Committee notes that the Charity Commission
currently has a consultation paper out on the Promotion of Human
Rights and intends to produce revised Guidance once the consultation
process is complete.
Conclusion
53. The Committee agrees that public understanding
of charities would be improved if the currently accepted charitable
purposes were spelt out more clearly in statute. The list of charitable
purposes is not intended to be fully comprehensive and, as before,
there will be a residual purpose which leaves scope for future
developments.
54. We recommend that the draft Bill includes
a definition of religion in clause 2 making it clear that non-deity
and multi-deity groups can satisfy the definition of 'religion'
for charitable purposes. Any organisation would still be subject
to the requirement of showing public benefit before it could attain
charitable status.
55. The Committee recognises the concerns arising
from the failure to spell out the established charitable purposes
of the promotion of religious harmony, the promotion of racial
harmony and the promotion of equality and diversity.
56. We recommend that an additional charitable
purpose be added to 2(2) for "the provision of religious
harmony, racial, harmony, and equality and diversity".
57. We recommend that the new charitable purpose
on "the advancement of arts, heritage and science",
should include the word "culture" to bring it in line
with the wording of the draft Charities Bill and Trustee Investment
(Scotland) Bill.
58. We recommend that "the saving of lives"
be added to the new charitable purpose of the advancement of health.
59. We have sympathy with some of the other points
made about changing the proposed wording for charitable purposes
but are not convinced that the draft Bill needs to be further
amended. None of the other changes suggested would either change
or clarify the current law on charitable purposes. The flexibility
inherent in the way charitable purposes are defined leaves scope
for all these points to be dealt with by the Charity Commission
and ultimately the new Charity Appeal Tribunal.
60. We recommend that the draft Bill be amended
by adding to the general 'any other purposes' category, the words
'or within the spirit or intent of the [11 specific] purposes'
listed in clause 2 (2) above.
61 Q898 (Major Adler). See also Ev 260 Back
62
Ev 587 Back
63
Ev 586, para 42 Back
64
Ev 586, para 4.5 Back
65
Ev 608, Ev 354 Back
66
Ev 452, para 2 Back
67
Ev 458, para 3.0 Back
68
Q886 (Mr Lattimer) Back
69
Ev 2, para 2.3 Back
70
Ev 440, para 3, Ev 406, para 1.4 Back
71
Ev 75, para 9 Back
72
Ev 345, para 17 Back
73
Ev 93para 26 Back
74
Q920 (Mr Owen) Back
75
Evidence not printed. Back
76
See Ev 75, para 9 Back
77
Ev 568, para 9 Back
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