Charity Commission Direct
PO Box 1227
Liverpool
L69 3UG

Thursday, 25 October 2007

Dear Sir/Madam,

Complaint against the Wooden Spoon Society

We would like to make a formal complaint against the Wooden Spoon Society (registered charity number 326691). We believe that the charity incurs fundraising and administration costs that are excessive. We suspect that the charity’s income is therefore not being used for its proper charitable purposes. And we think this implies that the charity’s trustees may be acting in significant breach of the provisions of charity law.

Excessive fundraising costs
The Wooden Spoon Society spends only 37.4 per cent of its total expenditure on charitable activities. The bulk of the charity’s expenditure goes towards running fundraising events. In 2005/6 it spent £1.8m on charitable activities and incurred costs of £2.6m on generating funds.

The charity has maintained a similar level of charitable expenditure since at least 2001/2. (Please see the enclosed document, ‘Financial Details of the Wooden Spoon Society’, for details.)

We have met with the Wooden Spoon Society’s interim chief executive, Chris Gill, to discuss this. We put the above points to him, and he was also given the opportunity to read an article on the subject we published on our blog (http://www.intelligentgiving.com/the_buzz/the_blog/a_real_champagne_charity). Mr Gill showed little sign that he would consider ways for the charity to improve its performance, and apparently did not realize that highly inefficient fundraising – such as the charity engages in – does a disservice to the charity’s intended beneficiaries.

Charitable purposes
We have serious doubts over whether this charity is operating for the public benefit. We do not believe that the private benefit accruing to the charity’s members is legitimately incidental to the charity’s work.

In our opinion, the private benefit generated by the charity accrues to its members when they attend the fundraising events paid for from charitable funds. Seeing as the charity spends significantly more on organizing these events than it does helping its intended beneficiaries, we do not believe that this amount of private benefit is reasonable, given its purpose.

I am writing this complaint on behalf of Intelligent Giving. We are an independent charity-analysis organization and have no interest in Wooden Spoon. The Charity Commission may put our complaint directly to the charity and it may tell the charity that we are the complainant. We are also willing to discuss this issue further if required.

Yours faithfully,

Adam Rothwell
Features Editor

Financial Details of the Wooden Spoon Society

Note: percentage (%) on Charity represents the percentage of resources expended, not percentage of incoming resources. All figures drawn from the charity’s annual report and accounts for the relevant year, as lodged with the Charity Commission

2005/6
Total incoming resources:                       £4,171,720
Total resources expended:                      £4,486,338
Direct charitable expenditure:                  £1,679,049
Cost of generating funds:                        £2,573,634
= Promotion:                                         £376,830
= Costs of events, etc:                          £2,196,804
Percentage (%) on Charity:                  37.4%

2004/5
Total incoming resources:                       £3,834,179
Total resources expended:                      £3,214,922
Direct charitable expenditure:                  £907,842
Cost of generating funds:                        £2,083,598
= Promotion:                                         £363,548
= Costs of events, etc:                          £1,720,050
Percentage (%) on Charity:                  28.2%

2003/4
Total incoming resources:                       £3,295,535
Total resources expended:                      £3,120,632
Direct charitable expenditure:                  £878,870
Cost of generating funds:                        £2,052,548
= Promotion:                                         £306,080
= Costs of events, etc:                          £1,746,468
Percentage (%) on Charity:                  28.2%

2002/3
Total incoming resources:                       £2,637,309
Total resources expended:                      £2,621,520
Direct charitable expenditure:                  £707,345
Cost of generating funds:                        £1,667,961
= Promotion:                                         £282,531
= Costs of events, etc:                          £1,385,430
Percentage (%) on Charity:                  27.0%

2001/2
Total incoming resources:                       £2,115,944
Total resources expended:                      £2,068,086
Direct charitable expenditure:                  £644,540
Cost of generating funds:                        1,154,019
= Promotion:                                         £141,498
= Costs of events, etc:                          £1,012,521
Percentage (%) on Charity:                  31.2%