Charities

The team is multi-disciplinary, advising charity clients on matters relating to all aspects of their constitutional, governance and operational needs. Our team's background and experience delivers advice that is not only technically excellent but, above all, practical. Many of our team also advise public bodies, commercial entities and high net worth individuals and, accordingly, are familiar with the contracting, funding, gift and legacy issues that charities commonly encounter.

We have a reputation for making complex issues seem simple, for delivering clear and concise advice, and for our cost-effective service. We also have a reputation for delivering excellent seminars on specialist topics and our core legal advice offering is complemented by our suite of in-house training for charities via our Shaping Excellence programme.

We offer comprehensive advice to all our charity and social enterprise clients including advice on:

• all areas of charity law and regulation
• legal structures/collaborations/mergers and restructuring
• charity set up and incorporation
• contracting arrangements
• trading and subsidiaries
• charity retail and Gift Aid for charity shops (including structuring for tax efficiency (trading advice),  property advice, GDPR and health and safety)
• ecclesiastical law
• procurement and state aid
• tax 
• regulatory and governance
• public law, Judicial Review
• disputes and litigation
• trustee duties and responsibilities 
• compliance, investigations and enforcement (including Charity Commission investigations and serious incident reporting)
• employment, health and safety, safeguarding
• immigration law for charities and churches
• funding, fundraising, sponsorship (including tax and VAT issues affecting sponsorship, fundraising events and commercial participation and GDPR issues)
• intellectual property, trade marks, data protection
• legacy administration, contentious legacies, and trusts
• construction, property and planning (including permanent endowment, strategic development and advising on mission-related investment and occupational interests of endowed charities)
• social enterprise (in particular, innovative corporate structuring advice).

Our approach

We are empathetic, understanding our clients’ objects and aims, rationales and restrictions, but are also commercial and practical. We mirror our clients’ needs to focus on outcomes and solutions, while taking into account client budgets, regulations and reputation. We recognise the impetus to “get things done” so that our clients can concentrate on their core purpose and mission.

Newsletters

We produce a variety of newsletters covering changes in legislation, topical news and issues affecting our clients. You can download the latest issue of Essential Trustee, our newsletter for charity trustees and senior management, from our newsletter page. If you would like to automatically receive future issues please register your details.

Charity trustee induction and refresher training

We deliver a rolling programme of virtual training via Zoom for charity trustees. This course provides charity trustees with essential legal training to enable them to comply with law and best practice in fulfilling their duties and furthering the success of the charity. For more information, please visit our training page and to sign up for an upcoming seminar please visit the events section of our website.