Clause 7
Charities Bill [Lords]
9:45 am
Edward Miliband (Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Cabinet Office; Doncaster North, Labour)
The hon. Gentleman makes an important point.
I was about to say that, as with everything that the hon. Member for Worthing, West has said so far in this Committee, I have sympathy for what he said. I think that I will accept his challenge to sit down, at least, with the commission and talk to them about the SORP and about whether there is a way in which it can be produced in a more comprehensible and shorter form. I suspect that that has probably occurred to the commission before, but I think it is a fair and important challenge. When I do so, I shall also take into account the comment made by the hon. Member for Isle of Wight in a recent intervention that the actual phrasing of the SORP is important. I understand that if the charity’s turnover is less than £100,000, the SORP does not produce significant requirements, even in law. However, I shall take up these issues.
In a sense, we are talking about the administrative practice of the commission. I think that the commission will have heard this debate and I hope that it will take account of it. My hopes that it will take account of it are buttressed by both the legislation that we have before us and what the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill will do. That will have an important effect.