Fund-raising
Charity fund-raising practices have been largely self-regulated by charities themselves, although there are rules and regulations relating to certain activities - for example Part 2 of the Charities Act 1992 which includes a reserve power for the Minister for the Cabinet Office to make regulations to control fund-raising for charitable institutions, data protection legislation, licensing requirements for charity collections, legislation governing lotteries. The Charity Commission's regulatory role is limited to circumstances where charitable funds are at risk or where the fund-raising indicates a serious governance failure in the charity.
	In 2015 there were a series of media exposés of unacceptable fund-raising practices in which elderly and vulnerable people were targeted by charities and put under pressure to donate. Several trustees and charity chief executives gave evidence before the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee in which they expressed their shock that such poor practices were undertaken by sub-contractors in their charities' name. The Government asked Sir Stuart Etherington to review the existing self-regulatory arrangements, supported by a cross-party panel of Peers and make recommendations for improvements. The Government put forward amendments during the passage of the Act to reinforce trustee responsibility and accountability for fund-raising.
	The Act (see section 13 below) reinforces to charity trustees their responsibility to ensure that fund-raising for their charity is undertaken responsibly and in a manner that does not damage public trust and confidence in their charity or the wider charity sector. It does so by:
Requiring third party, commercial fundraisers to include terms in any contracts with charities setting out their fund-raising standards, how the fundraiser will protect vulnerable people, and how the charity will monitor whether standards are being met.
Requiring trustees of auditable charities (usually those with incomes over £1m) to include a section in their trustees' annual report setting out their approach to fund-raising, whether they use third party commercial fundraisers, and how they protect vulnerable people from undue pressure in their fund-raising.
	The Etherington review ("Regulating Fundraising for the Future: Trust in charities, confidence in fundraising regulation" www. www.ncvo.org.uk/fundraisingreview) reported in September 2015. It made a number of recommendations, chief among which was the creation of a new, tougher Fundraising Regulator to self-regulate charity fund-raising. The Government accepted all of the recommendations in the Etherington Review. The new Fundraising Regulator is expected to be up-and-running in 2016.
	The Act extends the scope of the existing reserve power for the Minister to regulate fund-raising. It enables the Minister to:
Require charities to register with a specified Fund-raising Regulator, comply with its requirements, have regard to its guidance and pay fees to it; or,
Make the Charity Commission responsible for regulating charity fund-raising (the Commission may charge fees for this purpose pursuant to separate regulations).