Charities (Protection and Social Investment) Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Hope of Craighead and Lord Watson of Invergowrie

Monday 29th June 2015 Grand Committee

[Lord Hope of Craighead (CB)]

My Lords, Amendment 6 is the sole amendment dealing with Clause 8 of the Bill, which is a comparatively short clause on the “Power to direct property to be applied to another charity”. As it appears in the Bill, Clause 8 makes one amendment to Section 85 of the Charities Act 2011, which is dealing with a different matter from the one that is of concern to me. Amendment 6 seeks to insert two words into Section 85(1)(a) of the 2011 Act so that the phrase,

“persons in possession or control of any property … unwilling to apply it … for the purposes of the charity”,

would also deal with those who say that they are willing to do so but are unable to do so.

The draft Bill, as it appeared before us in the Joint Committee, included the words that I am seeking to insert into Section 85. The description of the draft Bill can be seen in paragraph 141, read with paragraph 142, of the Joint Committee’s report. As paragraph 141 records,

“Clause 7”—

as it was in the draft Bill—

“would amend the 2011 Act to allow the Commission to direct the application of charity property in the event that the person is either ‘unwilling’ or ‘unable’ to do so, rather than just ‘unwilling’ as is currently the case. The explanatory notes to the Bill refer to ‘several cases in which financial institutions holding charity property were contractually unable to transfer it to secure its proper charitable application but would have been willing to do so.’”

In paragraph 142, we go on to say that,

“The evidence received by the Committee was supportive of this provision”,

and the footnote refers to Professor Gareth Morgan, the Charity Commission for Northern Ireland and the Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust. Paragraph 142 continues:

“The Charity Law Association”—

which had made a number of very helpful comments on the wording of the draft Bill—

“did not oppose this change, but questioned whether the meaning of the term ‘unable’ was sufficiently clear and whether banks in such situations were really ‘unable’ to transfer charity money or just ‘unwilling’ to breach a contract to do so”.

Since the current Bill was published, I have had a meeting with William Shawcross of the Charity Commission, who has explained to me that he would much prefer that the words “unwilling or unable” were put in—in other words, that the words “or unable” were restored, as my amendment seeks. He explained that, from time to time, he encounters cases of this kind where a direction is proposed and the response is, “Yes, indeed, we are willing to do this, but for a variety of reasons we are simply not able to do so”. As he put it to me, it would be possible by sleight of hand to fudge the thing a little bit, as it were, and treat unwillingness on such a ground as being within the scope of the section, but he would rather that the section was really upfront about the fact that both situations that he encounters in practice were actually dealt with in the wording of Section 85, so that unwillingness, which certainly occurs and is a source of concern, was dealt with but inability—where the persons involved are perfectly willing to comply with the direction but for various reasons say that they cannot properly do so—was covered as well.

This is a very short point. I am a little puzzled as to why the draft Bill which survived scrutiny by the Joint Committee should have been altered in this way. I hope that the Minister will pay attention to the wishes of the Charity Commission, which would find it useful if the amendment were accepted. I beg to move.

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

My Lords, as one who was a member of the Joint Committee under the excellent chairmanship of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, I share his puzzlement as to why this change has been made to the draft Bill. I have no wish to repeat the words of the noble and learned Lord, but those of us in opposition do not fully understand why such a change should have been made and we invite the Minister to explain that if he can, and to say why, after the Joint Committee recommended acceptance of the draft proposal, and given that, as we have heard, the Charity Commission wants this change, the original wording of the draft Bill should not be reinstated. There is little more to say than that. I look forward to the Minister’s response.

[The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office (Lord Bridges of Headley) (Con)]

My Lords, I, too, will keep my remarks relatively brief, by reason of the conclusion that I have come to as a result of what the noble and learned Lord and the noble Lord have said.

The provision corresponding to Clause 8 in the Bill made reference to “unable” in the manner proposed by this amendment. The Charity Commission asked for the change following several cases where financial institutions holding charity property were contractually unable to transfer it to secure its proper charitable application but would have been willing to do so. As the noble and learned Lord said, the Joint Committee which considered the draft Bill supported the provision.

However, as is noted in the report, the Charity Law Association, while it did not oppose the change, questioned whether the meaning of the word “unable” was sufficiently clear and whether banks in such situations were really unable to transfer charity property, or simply unable to breach a contract to do so. Therefore the Joint Committee recommended that the Government consider the inclusion of some form of statutory protection for a financial institution in cases where compliance with a Charity Commission direction in these circumstances might constitute a breach of its contract with a charity. The Government therefore followed this recommendation and amended Clause 8 to provide for such statutory protection. Since the clause was aimed at dealing with financial institutions which are contractually unable to transfer property, this statutory protection was considered sufficient and the reference to “unable” was omitted.

The amendment tabled by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, proposes to reinstate the reference to “unable”, as we have heard, and further examples have been provided as to when this would be needed beyond the contractual liabilities of banks. I also note what the noble and learned Lord said about his conversations with the Charity Commission. In light of this, I am happy to give further consideration to the amendment and to return to this on Report.