The Secretary of State for the Department of Digital, Culture, Media and Sport wishes to appoint three Board members to the Charity Commission for England and Wales.
DCMS is committed to eliminating discrimination and advancing equality of opportunity in its public appointments. We particularly encourage applicants from underrepresented groups, those based outside London and the South-East and applicants who have achieved success through non-traditional routes. This ensures that boards of public bodies benefit from a full range of diverse perspectives and are representative of the people they serve.
About the Charity Commission for England and Wales
The Charity Commission is the independent registrar and regulator of charities in England and Wales. Its role is to register and regulate the charities in England and Wales, and to ensure that the public can support charities with confidence. It regulates over 169,000 registered charities and £84.1bn of charitable income. A non-Ministerial Department, it is based across four sites, employing approximately 470 staff and in 2021-22 had a budget of circa £30m. Its current Strategic Plan comes to an end in 2023.
As registrar, the Commission is responsible for maintaining an accurate and up-to-date register of charities. This includes deciding whether organisations are charitable and should be registered. It also removes charities that are not considered to be charitable, no longer exist, or do not operate.
As regulator, the Commission has both compliance and enablement functions. It is responsible for investigating and monitoring charities’ compliance with charity law and regulation; it takes enforcement action when there is malpractice or misconduct. It also provides online services and guidance to help charities run as effectively as possible, ensuring charities meet their legal requirements, and makes appropriate information about each registered charity widely available.
About the role of the board and its members
The Board is ultimately responsible and accountable for the Commission. The Chief Executive is responsible for the operational management of the Commission and is the Accounting Officer. The Board reserves some specific high-risk regulatory decisions to itself.
The main tasks of the Board are to ensure that the Commission:
effectively fulfils its statutory objectives, general functions and duties and appropriately exercises its legal powers
is accountable to Parliament, the courts, and the general public regulates independently, proportionately and impartially and acts in good faith and in the public interest
delivers its services within its funding agreement The Board achieves this by setting the Commission’s strategic direction, approving its budget and business plans, and setting the risk framework and policies within which the Chief Executive and her team operate and/or follow and for which they are held to account
In doing this, Board members will:
give proper time and attention to their roles and responsibilities
use their skills, knowledge and experience to inform collective decisions
abide by the Commission’s Governance Framework and observe the highest standards of propriety in fulfilling their responsibilities
ensure that they operate in accordance with governance best practice and Nolan principles of standards in public life
participate in an annual appraisal of their own performance with the Chair
The Board is supported by three committees, whose chairs and members are largely Board members, working alongside members of the Executive. The Commission’s Governance Framework is available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/charity-commission-governance-framework
The Current Board
The current membership of the Board is:
Orlando Fraser KC (Chair)
Tony Cohen
Imran Gulamhuseinwala OBE
Ian Karet
Will Lifford
Paul Martin CBE
Joanne Prowse
Helen Stephenson CBE (Chief Executive)
Ann Phillips
Pippa Britton
More information about the Charity Commission’s Board can be found here.
This post is regulated by the Commissioner for Public Appointments. For more information, please refer to the
Commissioner’s website