"Where a person within subsection (6) solicits money or other property for the benefit of one or more particular charitable institutions, the solicitation shall be accompanied by a statement clearly indicating—"

Surely "or other property" covers direct debits, clothing collections etc.?

I must agree with you Catman, in saying that fundraisers have had to make disclosure statements for some time now. But it's also been clear for some time - or at least, it's been clear to the government - that disclosures have very often been "not specific enough" (PDF, p.6). Indeed, the Prime Minister's Strategy Unit recommended that the law regarding fundraising disclosures should be changed in its landmark 2002 report, Private Action, Public Benefit (PDF).

The Charities Act 2006 enacted this change, meaning that fundraisers now have to give more specific details regarding their pay. This problematic change in the law was discussed in Professional Fundraising (ahem) last month, in a rather good column by Gordon Michie of Relationship Marketing (which sadly isn't available online).

Anyhow, I agree that the best time to kick up a fuss about the new rules would have been a few years ago. Unfortunately, though, we've only been around for a year and a bit - so we're using this opportunity to raise awareness of the issue.

Adam, Intelligent Giving

PS - I am young and trendy, thank you.

Adam,

The time to be concerned about the fairness of disclosure statements was about three years ago when the Charities Act was still a Bill going through parliament. Maybe you should be asking key sector organisations like...maybe the IoF how they lobbied for changes to these statments to make them fair.

And to say that these statements affects street and telephone fundraisers (why must you say chuggers? Do you think it makes you sound young and trendy?) is showing that you are not quite up to speed.

Street and telephone fundraisers have had to make disclosure statements since the the Charities Act was last revised, in 1993. If you had a subscription to PF magazine, you would have found out that a major charity had not considered the impact on their cash collectors in the run up to their National awareness/fundraising week meaning all of their cash collection could be liable for a £5,000 fine!

catman