Charitable Registration

Jim Dobbin Excerpts

Tuesday 13th November 2012 Westminster Hall

[Several hon. Members]

rose—

[Jim Dobbin (in the Chair)]

Order. I thought you were applauding me there—[Interruption.] You were. I have five applications to speak. I intend to call the shadow Minister at 3.40 pm, so that gives Members an idea of how long everyone can speak for.

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[Several hon. Members]

rose—

[Jim Dobbin (in the Chair)]

Order. I remind everyone that we will have to limit speeches to about four minutes, to get everyone in.

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[Mr Jackson]

My hon. Friend makes an intelligent point, as did the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent South (Robert Flello), who is not in his place. Are we really going to inflict a massive audit process on people who have better things to do: helping the most vulnerable people, in a practical, pragmatic way? There is an issue of fairness as well. Are we to sit by and let an unfashionable minority—a minority that in general people do not understand—be picked off by the apparatus of the state, with such asymmetry? If we are talking about public benefit, is it really a public benefit that my constituents’ taxes are effectively being used to hound people who do good in society? That is not a good use of those taxpayers’ money.

My hon. Friend the Member for Harlow made it clear that the Charity Commission has some serious questions to answer. As I said earlier, it undertook 20 public benefit assessments between 2009 and 2011, and we need at the very least to re-examine what those achieved and what the ultimate agenda is. It is wrong and inappropriate for the state apparatus to be used against the people whose great work in our communities we have all seen.

I will say just two more things, because others want to speak: we must have a moratorium on any more assessments, until we have properly clarified the law with Ministers, if necessary by way of primary legislation, so that we do not have a grey area between Parliament and the pernicious actions of the super-quango that decides it will cast people out and cause them not to be viable in their communities. That is imperative for the House. Also, it is time that the Attorney-General was invited to invoke his powers to sort out the situation in the interim. The issue is not just defending Christianity: it is defending all faith communities, and it is about fairness and equity. If parliamentarians are here for nothing else, we must defend those things.

[Jim Dobbin (in the Chair)]

I must reduce the speaking time to three minutes now.

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[Mr Sanders]

I am not a lawyer, but if I were, I am sure that I would say it was arbitrary.

[Jim Dobbin (in the Chair)]

If the two remaining speakers will keep their contributions to two minutes, they can both speak.

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[Mark Durkan]

I fully endorse the point made by the hon. Gentleman. We should remember that the legislative buck stops with us, and we will have the opportunity to draw a parliamentary line under this in a couple of weeks’ time.

[Jim Dobbin (in the Chair)]

I thank Members for their discipline in what has been an amazingly busy debate. I now call the shadow Minister.

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[Mr Hurd]

I have very little time and I would like to close on the third substantive point: is the process fit for purpose? The hon. Member for Edinburgh East (Sheila Gilmore) rightly said that this issue had been reviewed by the Government. We asked Lord Hodgson to review all the regulation and legislation affecting the sector. His preliminary conclusion was that the system that we have at the moment would be difficult to change, because there is a substantial challenge in trying to condense hundreds of years of case law into a rigid, fixed definition of public benefit in this place. His view was that it was better to stay with this flexible system, which can evolve over time and whereby things are determined by case law. We are reviewing that recommendation. This debate has certainly contributed to that. My position is that we will publish an interim report as a response to Hodgson, but we want to hear in particular the evidence from the Public Administration Committee, which has been looking into the issue. However, this debate has been extremely helpful.

I, like most other hon. Members in this Chamber, would like this issue to be resolved speedily. It has dragged on too long. I share hon. Members’ concerns about the cost that that imposes on the Brethren. Whatever the rights or wrongs of the decision, I urge all who are involved to get this issue resolved as quickly as possible.

[Jim Dobbin (in the Chair)]

May I ask those members of the public who are leaving to do so quietly so that we can move on to the next debate?