Charities Bill [Lords]
4:00 pm
Martin Horwood (Shadow Minister (Environment), Environment, Food & Rural Affairs; Cheltenham, Liberal Democrat)
It is nice to see you in the Chair presiding over us, Mrs. Humble. I have some sympathy for what the right hon. Member for Cardiff, South and Penarth (Alun Michael) said and was rather looking forward to his pronouncing the words in the proposed new section 69C(4)(a) of the Charities Act 1993, as I suspect that he is the only member of the Committee who could do so.
The right hon. Member might be rather exaggerating the threat contained in schedule 7, because although it provides for added flexibility in exactly which incorporated status a charity might adopt—I hope that every member of the Committee would welcome that—as I read it, it does not oblige them to use the letters CIO. In fact, the precedent is for limited company status, which many charities—certainly all the major ones—have adopted without having to use acronyms such as plc, Ltd or anything else in their notepaper or elsewhere. That has not proved much of a limitation, so although I share the right hon. Gentleman’s dislike for acronyms where clear English will do, the injunction to charities that adopt CIO status to call themselves charitable incorporated organisations rather than CIOs should remain.