Warning over political charity campaigns

Conservative MP Greg Clark has warned that charities could become covert party fundraisers if political campaigning is allowed to become their "dominant" activity.

Appearing before the Commons public administration committee on Wednesday, the shadow Cabinet Office minister criticised new Charity Commission guidance saying that political campaigning must not be a charity's "sole or continuing activity".

Previously, it had stated that campaigning must not be a charity's "dominant" activity.

Clark acknowledged that charities want to "have as much freedom of manoeuvre as they can", but said the Charity Commission must ensure "that public trust in charity is strong".

"It needs to apply the law and act as an objective guide to the law," he argued.

He told MPs that once political campaigning became a charity's main activity "it becomes a pressure group".

And he warned that it could be "bad for public trust" if political activity "dominates everything else".

People "have an expectation that charities should be engaged in good work", Clark argued, and while pressure groups "do excellent things", he said that charitable status involved certain "expectations and privileges".

Talking of a "paradoxical situation" in which political donations were coming under increased scrutiny, he warned thaht charities "could be used as a front to divert funds" to political parties.

He pointed out that charity donors were exempt from regulations governing political donations - they did not have to be UK-registered or disclose their identity, and they were able to benefit from tax relief.

"There is a degree of public confidence at issue here, as well as some important issues of transparency," he argued.

Clark dismissed suggestions that he was a "lone voice" in objecting to the new guidance, insisting that it had "made things less clear".

He said it was "regrettable" that the commission had not taken the opportunity to clarify the law.

However, Brian Lamb, communications director at the Royal National Institute for Deaf People said that the guidelines had made things "much clearer" for charities.