The Regulator for Charities in England and Wales
(Version December 2006)
In 2002, the Government’s Strategy Unit published the report Private Action, Public Benefit. One of the report’s recommendations was to introduce the Standard Information Return (as it was then named) for charities with an annual income above £1 million; this recommendation responded to an identified need to make accessible and relevant information about charities publicly available.
In its response to the Strategy Unit report in 2003, Charities and Not-For-Profits: A Modern Legal Framework, the Government supported the recommendation. It was agreed that the Charity Commission would develop and introduce the Summary Information Return (SIR).
We consulted the sector on developing the SIR and accompanying guidance notes, and incorporated the resulting form into the Annual Return (as Part C) from 2005 onwards for relevant charities.
The objective of the SIR in its current format is to provide better information to the public about the activities of the largest charities, boost public confidence and create a focus for performance improvement.
The Charities Act 1993 and the Charities (Annual Return) Regulations 2005 together require charities with an annual gross income 89 exceeding £1 million in the previous financial year to complete the SIR and submit it to the Charity Commission. We are therefore responsible for ensuring that charities comply with this requirement.
The SIR is intended to summarise information on all a charity’s activities, including any activities of subsidiary undertakings that it controls and accounts for within its consolidated accounts.
We ask grant-making charities or charities that are joint ventures 90 to extract information from their consolidated accounts ‘explaining how the aims, strategies and objectives of the funding relate to your charity not to those of the grant or funding recipients’ 91.
Following the Commission’s consultation with charities, certain important principles 92 were agreed that underpin the purpose of the SIR form. These are as follows:
The information will:
The information should:
The information must:
SIR 2006 - PDF English (379kb)
The following glossary of terms is taken from the Guidance Notes and is reproduced here for reference.
Achievements: things that have been accomplished by the charity.
Activities: anything done using resources belonging to the charity or under its control, and including all of its work and services.
Activities for generating funds: trading activities undertaken by the charity specifically to generate incoming resources. They include:
Aims: the changes the charity plans to achieve, or the differences it wants to make.
Annual objectives: the intended goals the charity intends to achieve during one year to accomplish its aims and further its strategy.
Benchmarks: criteria by which to measure something, such as the outcomes of charitable activity.
Beneficiaries: persons, people or bodies who may benefit under charitable trusts.
Charitable activities: work undertaken by the charity to meet its charitable objectives. They exclude the costs of raising funds to finance the charity’s activities and its governance costs.
Charity trustees: the people who, under the charity’s governing document are responsible for the overall control of the charity and for ensuring that it is properly managed. In the charity’s governing document they may be called trustees.
Fundraising activities: activities associated with generating incoming resources from all sources but excluding charitable activities. They include the generation of Voluntary Income, undertaking Fundraising Trading and providing non-charitable services to generate income.
The income from these activities is categorised in the charity’s Statement of Financial Activities either as Voluntary Income or as Activities for Generating Funds. The costs of these activities should have been categorised in the charity’s Statement of Financial Activities either as Costs of Generating Voluntary Income or as Fundraising Trading.
Governance arrangements: arrangements made by the charity’s trustees for the management and control of the charity and its activities.
Gross Income: is the total recorded income of your charity from all sources including income received for restricted purposes. It does not include any capital gains derived from investments or any revaluation of fixed assets in the year. The details provided on this form should be consistent with the statutory accounts of your charity and will equate to the total incoming resources of your charity, as shown in its Statement of Financial Activities.
Impact: the broad, longer-term effects of the charity’s work.
Incoming resources from charitable activities: any incoming resources that are a payment for goods or services provided for the benefit of the charity’s beneficiaries. They include income from:
Indicators: well-defined, easily measurable information, which shows how well the charity is performing.
Inputs: the resources and activities which are used within the charity to create the services offered, for example, staff and volunteers’ time, use of equipment etc.
Investment income: incoming resources from investment assets, including dividends, interest and rents received from investment property. It excludes realised and unrealised investment gains and losses.
Key activities: the most important activities carried out by the charity.
Milestones: key events in progress towards meeting aims and objectives.
Mission: tasks or duties that the charity wants to achieve.
Objectives: the intended goals the charity intends to achieve to accomplish its aims and further its strategy, usually over a period of years.
Other incoming resources: all the charity’s incoming resources other than those categorised as Voluntary Income, Income from Activities for Generating Funds, Investment Income and Incoming Resources from Charitable Activities.
Outcomes: the changes, benefits, learning or other effects that happen as a result of the charity’s services or activities.
Outputs: the activities, services and products provided to users. They show the volume of work undertaken, representing the direct products of the charity arising from its activities.
Plan: a written description of the steps the charity intends to take to achieve certain things. See also Strategy.
Qualitative information: information that is primarily descriptive and interpretative.
Quantitative information: information that is primarily numerical.
Results: the outcome or consequence of actions taken by the charity. They may either be financial or non-financial.
Services: the goods, grants, information and activities the charity provides for its users.
Service Users: anyone who uses or benefits from a charity’s services or facilities, whether provided on a voluntary basis or as a contractual service.
Stakeholders: any person, group, or organisation that has an interest in, or expectation of, the charity.
Strategy: a planned way of achieving longer-term aims. A medium to long-term strategy usually covers a period of three to five or more years.
Targets: Goals or objectives that are set by the charity at the beginning of a period and are then used to measure achievements.
Trustees: see charity trustees.
Values: a set of principles, which a charity seeks to apply both in setting its mission and aims and in its day-to-day operations.
Vision: means the ideal towards which the charity is working.
Voluntary income: incoming resources provided to the charity for which the charity is not expected to provide anything in return. Voluntary income includes:
Year: the year for which the Summary is prepared. This is usually the same year for which the Trustees’ Annual Report and Accounts have been prepared.
The SIR Guidance Notes are the main resource that charity trustees and staff can use to help them complete the SIR form. We also publish all completed SIR forms on our website and you may find these useful when completing your SIR form.
The Charity Commission for England and Wales
The Charity Commission also produces a wide range of publications and website guidance giving information and advice to charity trustees and the public on issues relating to charity law, regulation and best practice. The full list of publications is on our website and in our publication CC1.
How to get in touch with us
More information about the Commission and a range of guidance for charities can be found on our website or by contacting Charity Commission Direct:
Telephone: 0845 300 0218 (calls charged at local rate)
Minicom: 0845 300 0219
Email
By post:
Charity Commission Direct
PO Box 1227
Liverpool
L69 3UG
Cabinet Office (2002): Private Action, Public Benefit: A Review of Charities and the Wider Not-for-Profit Sector reviewed the legal and regulatory framework of the not-for-profit sector, of which charities form the majority. Available at:
http://www.strategy.gov.uk/downloads/su/voluntary/report/downloads/strat-data.pdf
Charity Commission (2004): Transparency and Accountability (RS8) presented the findings of an analysis of the information provided in the Annual Report and Accounts and the Annual Review of a sample of 200 of the largest charities.
Home Office (2003): Charities and Not-For-Profits: A Modern Legal Framework was the Government’s response to Private Action, Public Benefit in which the Government accepted almost all the recommendations in Private Action, Public Benefit and outlined how it intended to take those recommendations forward. Available at:
Opinion Leader Research for the Charity Commission (2005): Report of findings of a survey of public trust and confidence in charities presents the findings of a survey commissioned by the Charity Commission to help it better understand what gives the public trust and confidence in charities.
89. Please refer to the Glossary of terms at Annex C for a definition of gross income.
90. Joint venture activities will be included in consolidated accounts.
91. Guidance Notes refer.
92. Guidance Notes refer.