Clause 20
Charities Bill [Lords]
12:30 pm
Edward Miliband (Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Cabinet Office; Doncaster North, Labour)
Let me briefly explain the intention of the clause. At the moment, the Charity Commission has a draconian power to suspend or remove trustees from membership of the charity, but it has no intermediate set of powers. A number of cases have arisen in which annual general meetings have not been held and annual accounts have not been submitted because of, for example, a dispute with a charity. In such circumstances, the commission faces Hobson’s choice: it can either do nothing or take extreme action to suspend trustees.
The intention behind the clause is to give the commission the power to give specific directions if it considers that necessary and in the interests of the charity. That would, of course, be reviewable by the charity tribunal. The problem with the amendment is that it would restrict the powers to those necessary for the protection of the property. The hon. Gentleman says that that is in the 1993 Act; that may well be the case, and that is precisely the problem. The commission would be pushed back to either facing the possibility of using the very extreme power to suspend trusteeship, or sitting on its hands.
The hon. Gentleman raised the question of use of the commission’s powers not having to wait for the outcome of the inquiry. It may not be much reassurance, but that is true of all the commission’s powers, which can be exercised any time after the start of the inquiry. That has always been the case. I hope that, on that basis and in that context, the hon. Gentleman will accept my reassurance.