White Paper on Giving

When the cuts to public service start to bite, the Government is hoping that a reinvigorated civic society will step up to support the most vulnerable in society. However, the Government is concerned that the giving of time and money in the UK has flat-lined, and may even be declining. They also outline important issues to be addressed:

• A minority contribute much more than average;
• Donors in the poorest income brackets give more as a proportion of their income than those in middle-income households and the wealthiest;
• Support from the business community is often inconsistent and much more could be done.

Several months ago I commented on the Government Green Paper on Giving and the last week saw the publication of the Giving White Paper, with the aim to reinvigorate giving in the UK. The full document can be found here.

The role of social business

The paper contains much praise of social businesses and private sector partnerships. Several new services have launched which aim to facilitate the giving of money to charity. JustTextGiving is a new service from JustGiving and Vodafone that allows text based donations and will be free to every charity in the UK. The Pennies Foundation is a charity that operates an electronic charity box, which allows shoppers to ‘round up’ when paying their bill electronically, donating the change to charity. Initially the service is in partnership with Domino’s Pizza, Travelodge and Zizzi with a further roll-out planned.

For the giving of time, Orange has developed and launched ‘Do Some Good’ – a mobile phone application that helps people who want to volunteer but do not feel they have the time. It allows people to be charities’ eyes and ears, share ideas, take part in research or use their skills. Slivers-of-Time is a social business providing online coordination of volunteering, matching people to opportunities to volunteer. There is also Spice, an innovative time credit scheme of which On Purpose founder Tom Rippin is Chair of Trustees. Spice credits are given to those volunteering time and can be used to access a range of services provided by public and private organisations.

Government support

The Government contribution outlined in the paper has been widely perceived as limited. There are modest funding commitments, summarised here. There is a tax incentive for charitable legacies, an attempt to encourage the level of bequests and endowments found in the USA. Announced in the budget, the move sees inheritance tax reduce from 40% to 36% for estates leaving more than 10% to charity. The final area of Government action is in removing red tape primarily around Gift Aid and vetting. For Gift Aid, online filing is aimed to reduce the paper burden many charities face. There is also provision for small Gift Aid claims on cash donations and an increase in the limit on thank you gifts allowed to donors from £500 to £2,500. To reduce the bureaucracy around vetting, the Government is seeking to introduce continuously updated CRB checks. The new CRB checks will reduce the need for employees and volunteers to have new CRB checks when they move positions, a move that has been welcomed by third sector organisations such as the YMCA.

Giving Summit

While the measures outlined are generally welcomed, it’s hard to see that they will be enough to deliver a step-change in giving that the Government would like to see. Attention and expectation will now turn to the announcement of a Giving Summit in the autumn in the hope that it will generate the big ideas and collaboration the Big Society suggests. The summit will bring together businesses, charities, social enterprises, academia and philanthropists, among others, with the aim of promoting idea generation, networking and decision-making.

However, last week also saw Cameron’s chosen architect for the Big Society, Nat Wei announcing his decision to step down from his advisory role as the “Big society Tsar.” You can see the announcement on his blog here. In the absence of any significant policy initiatives this move will add to the pressure to prove the Big Society has substance and can deliver meaningful social impact.