The competence of the Charity Commission has been questioned following a report by spending watchdog The National Audit Office (NAO).
They concluded that the Charity Commission was failing to investigate abuses properly, wasting taxpayers’ money and putting the good name of the charity sector as a whole at risk.
The commission oversees more than 160,000 charities in England and Wales. Its annual budget has decreased by 40% in real terms to £22.7m over the past seven years.
In a separate report, the NAO concluded the Charity Commission should never have allowed The Cup Trust to register as a charity in the first place and was then too slow to act when problems emerged.
The Charity Commission has been criticised for not vetting charities properly prior to registration and then being slow to act once the charity is established and problems appear.
The regulators are concerned that in order to maintain public trust, the Commission needs to be more vigilant and effective, particularly in the most serious cases. The Cabinet Office have commented that they will now launch a consultation “to address any gaps” in the Commission’s legal authority.