Starting up: Question about trustees

vicky77 wrote on Sep 09, 2010

I am in the process of setting up a parent-led charity in my area. I am getting confused about trustees. I haven't got many people at present that I can fully rely. I was wondering if there are law against both myself and my mother-in-law being trustees.

I have looked through alot of literture from the Charity Commission and have done lots of internet searches but can't find an answer.

Please can you help

Thank you

Vicky

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HRBird wrote on Sep 09, 2010

Hello Vicky,

You may find the following signposting for trustees and conflicts of interests useful. Trustees have a responsibility to ensure that they act in the best interests of the charity. If it is only you and your mother-in-law who are trustees I guess there could be a real or perceived conflict of interests which might be better to avoid if you can. I'd suggest you give the Charity Commission a call for guidance - they're usually pretty helpful.

http://www.charitycommission.gov.uk/About_us/Contacting_us/default.aspx

You might also want to look at the NCVO pages: they have an online guide to trustee recruitment for small organisations. If you make a proper recruitment campaign for trustees to join you, this may help you to compose a board with all the different skill sets you'll need for your organisation: http://www.ncvo-vol.org.uk/trusteerecruitmentforsmallorganisations

I hope this helps.

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vicky77 wrote on Sep 10, 2010

Hello HRBird

Thank you for advice I have looked at both those pages. I think I will need to recruit trustees via a proper campaign as this would be in the best interest of the charity. I was thinking of holding a steering meeting to establish the aims of the charity so i give have more structure when recruiting. I have looked at the charity commission information for smaller charities and I am using the constitution example. However, at the moment the interest from other people in the charity are people who at this time need the support of the charity. Although I know they can be recruited as user-trustees I need those three key trustees, but as I don't need to register until I have £5000 can I set up the charity as the founder, get the aims created with the people already interested and go from there.

Thanks again

Vicky

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HRBird wrote on Sep 10, 2010

Hello Vicky,

Thanks for your post. If you're literally just starting out, you might want to do it in a more informal way to begin with, for example, organising your activities and getting your plans together - before deciding whether to register as a charity. In practice, there are lots of legal forms for ethical activity and it may be that once you've got your services sorted, you know how you want to run it and you're starting to run it, you can find a legal form which best fits what you're pursuing. The Get Legal website provides a really helpful means of assisting you with these decisions: http://www.getlegal.org.uk/home/issues-you-should-consider.html

Sometimes, people jump into a legal form and it's not until much further down the line that they realise the implications - for example with reporting requirements to different bodies, tax, applying for funding, how much control the founder has, whether the founder can get paid or not, what you can do with profits, whether you have personal liability for the activities you're taking up. There's lots of choice.

Maybe the Get Legal website will help. There's a free decision tool too, which can give an indication of your best potential structure for you to read up a bit more about in your research.

http://www.getlegal.org.uk/user/registers.html

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jhizamineV wrote on Oct 07, 2010

Thanks for your post now I have a little idea about doing some charity works. Many defines charity as work that has something to do with people from high class socialite to low class person. But for me it is the act of giving something special out of you, which is I know not everyone’s cup of tea. However it’s rewarding for the individual doing it and the recipient of the benefits. I believe that you don't have to be a part of the socialite to do some charity works, anyone can be an active part of it in their own little but special ways.

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Subject: Starting up: Question about trustees