Reports Of Committees
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2230.1965.tb01048.x |
| Date | 01 January 1965 |
| Published date | 01 January 1965 |
| Author | D. M. Emrys Evans |
REPORTS
OF
COMMITTEES
THE
REPORT
OF
THE
CHARITY
COMMISSIONERS
FOR
THE
YEAR
1963
“
CHARITY,”
said a Member of Parliament a few years ago,
“
is
the most important thing in the land.” Few people would disagree
with this
in
spite of the fact that the Welfare State has
‘‘
over-
taken
”
many aspects of the work of charitable organisations and
those who devote considerable time and energy to them. Probably,
it is true in spite
of
this, for charity is
no
longer a question of
satisfying one’s conscience
or
performing
‘‘
good works
”
under
some moral duty,
nor
is it even a question of using the idea
of
charity to achieve some redistribution of wealth
so
as to iron out
the worst consequences of inequality. Today, in the context of
our
Welfare State, charity may well be more important than ever before.
The essence of charity is voluntary, as distinct from state, action
and it has been said that
‘‘
democracy without voluntitry cxertion
and voluntary idealism loses its soul.” Thus, voluntary action
can be looked upon as one way of keeping a relatively passive and
unfeeling governmental machine
‘‘
in touch.” But this
is
not to
argue that government and charity should go their own separate
ways and hope for some beneficial effect as
a
coincidental conse-
quence. In an age when we are more conscious than ever before
of the need to ensure efficient utilisation of our resources, it is
natural and imperative that we should suggest that some means
should be devised which would have this effect without at the
same time depressing individual voluntary effort. It was with this
objective in mind that the last Labour Government set up, in
1950,
a Committee under the Chairmanship
of
Lord Nathan to determine
how best charitable resources might be employed and to establish
the relationship between these and state services.
As
a
consequence
of the findings of this C~mrnittee,~ the Charities Act,
1960,
eventually became law.4
This Act reconstituted the Charity Commissioners as its principal
agents in achieving its objects. The Commissioners, who had made
their first appearance in
1853,
were given the task of ensuring the
best use of charity resources
for
the benefit of the community and
were provided with the machinery to consider the activities of each
charity in relation to other charities and the statutory services
operating in the same field of
elf are.^
There are two aspects to
1
Mr
John
Morison,
M.P.
See
H.C.Parl.I>eb.
1‘01
622
(1960),
col.
430.
2
T,ord
Longford, quoted
by
the Nathan Committee.
3
Published
in
December
1952
:
Cmd.
8710.
4
8
&
9
Elm
2,
c.
58.
5
See
Report
for
1963,
para.
2.
See note
3
below.
For
a detailed exposition
on
the Act, see Nathan,
The
Charztaes
Act,
1960.
85
To continue reading
Request your trial