Services

My clients

I provide cost effective charity law and governance advice to:

• Those wishing to establish and register a charity
• Trustees and staff of charities
• Professional advisers with charity clients, e.g., tax consultants, law firms in the United Kingdom and abroad, accountants, investment managers and IFAs
• Public bodies, e.g., central and local government, non-departmental public bodies  and lottery distributors
• Commercial businesses and social enterprises
• Donors to charities and founders

Examples of the help and advice I provide

• Training trustees and senior staff of charities on the powers and duties of the trustees and good governance practices and provide updates on charity law
• Advising and assisting those wishing to establish a new charity by drafting the governing documents and the application to the Charity Commission to register the charity
• The correct interpretation of their  governing documents and the obligations of the trustees to develop appropriate strategies  in line with their charitable objects and the requirement to provide public benefit
• Updating and amending a charity's governing document and, where necessary, to apply for the consent of the Charity Commission to change the objects clause or to remunerate trustees
• Assisting charities to overcome organisational difficulties and to restructure or improve their  governance processes, including the method by which trustees are appointed, the period of time for which they serve and the role of members of a charity
• The most effective way to ring-fence charitable funds and, conversely, on how permanent endowment property and endowment funds can lawfully be spent
• The proper management of conflicts of interest
• Dealing effectively with regulatory matters, e.g., statutory inquiries by the Charity Commission and other compliance related issues
• With internal disputes, assisting charities to maintain or restore harmony on the board of trustees
• Charity mergers, the necessity or otherwise to incorporate a charity and how to do these things with the minimum of fuss and expense
• Consulting to other professional law, accountancy and investment firms to enable them to provide a full service to their clients and also to enable senior members of those firms to pursue their own charitable trusteeships with confidence and to enable their staff to engage properly in pro-bono programs
• The proper administration of charitable funds by local authorities
• Compliance with commercial participator and professional fund-raising regulations
• Ring-fencing a donor’s gifts through the establishment of restricted funds and trusts
• Attendance at board meetings to assist with particular charity law and governance matters and to aid decision-making by trustees

Projects and in-house support for charities and professional practices

Charities sometimes need temporary or ad hoc in-house legal support to supplement their existing in-house lawyers, to implement a particular project such as a merger or a full governance review or to assess the performance of, and manage external advisers.  By prior arrangement I can provide this type of service for clients.

I am also available to consult to other professional firms to help them to provide charity law expertise for their clients, to enable senior members of those firms to pursue their own charitable trusteeships with confidence and to provide back-up and expertise for their pro bono and CSR programmes.