Turning the clock back two decades or so, in the early years of the new Scottish Parliament one of the areas of law to receive comprehensive attention was Scots charity law. The end result was the Charities and Trustee Investment (Scotland) Act 2005. The Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator (OSCR) was also established under the 2005 Act.
Many things have changed in the intervening period and there have been two recent consultations on potential changes to the 2005 Act, to expand, clarify or modernise it. We now have the Charities (Regulation and Administration) (Scotland) Bill which is making its way through its parliamentary stages in Scotland. Much of the content of the Bill is technical in nature and would empower OSCR to act in specific scenarios. This article picks out two key areas where the Bill expands and modernises Scots charity law and regulation in ways which are helpful to donors, trustees and indeed the public at large. This all serves to underpin confidence in charities, in what they do and how they operate.
For anyone trying to find out or verify financial information about a Scottish charity, the starting point is usually to check what information is shown in the OSCR Charity Register online. A quick look using the search function on OSCR’s main webpage brings up a charity’s details, including some information about the charity’s latest accounts. There is no legal requirement for accounts to be published on the Charity Register, however, which can lead to a dead end when trying to locate financial information online.
In the absence of a legal requirement, OSCR does helpfully include some weblinks to other online sources of financial information, such as Companies House where accounts are filed for charities which take the legal form of a company limited by guarantee. Weblinks may also appear to other regulators who hold accounts. This only covers around half of all charities on the register, however.
The new Bill will simplify access and improve the transparency of charity accounts by imposing a duty on OSCR to publish statements of accounts for all charities in the Scottish Charity Register. This would be a very welcome development, together with the proposed dispensation which enables confidentiality in cases concerning safety or security.
At the moment, there is no legal requirement for the names of charity trustees to be included in the Scottish Charity Register. The position is different in England and Wales, where a search of the Charity Commission’s website does name the trustees of a charity. The Bill would make a change in Scotland and requires trustees to be named in the Scottish Charity Register.
For trustees worried that their home address will be disclosed, it looks like they can rest assured here. The Bill only requires that trustee names be disclosed in the public register. Beyond this, the proposed changes require OSCR to keep a new schedule of charity trustees, where contact information for trustees will be kept. The Policy Memorandum accompanying the Bill makes clear this schedule is an internal document for OSCR, in contrast to the information which can be found online in the Scottish Charity Register.
This change would be a positive development, justified by the need to promote public trust in charities through an approach which favours transparency. It is also balanced with a dispensation process to protect individuals whose safety or security might otherwise be at risk.
Beyond these two transparency-related areas, there are several other areas of proposed change relating to the disqualification of charity trustees and those in senior management positions in charities. Some practical improvements are being proposed to assist charities which merge. A second forthcoming article will cover these and other aspects of the Bill.
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