Someone is disqualified from being a trustee (or holding certain senior manager roles) in a charity under certain conditions. The rules are changing. Do you, your board and your team know the rules?

Automatic disqualification bars someone from being a trustee on a charity board if certain conditions apply. From 1st August 2018 these rules are being extended. So you need to start acting now to check out whether you and your team are meeting the rules.

From 1st February the ability to apply for a ‘waiver’ to get selective and specific exemptions from disqualification is possible.

These rules are pretty significant in scope, so your charity needs to be mindful of them. The key article to read though quickly is this one from NCVO which outlines the rules now and the way the rules are changing: https://blogs.ncvo.org.uk/2018/01/25/automatic-disqualification/

And a full article on KnowHowNonProfit gives you all the details you need to know.

Essentially more reasons are being added to the list of reasons someone cannot serve as a trustee, but also the rules will soon extend to certain senior managers roles too.

It’s worth thinking about getting confirmation from your current Trustees that they are legally able to serve and should not be disqualified. Also make sure you’re assessing this when new Trustees apply to join your board and that you refresh the assessment regularly.

If you have issues, there are ‘waivers’ that can be applied for now. So make sure you understand these new rules.

The rules you need to read are here https://www.gov.uk/guidance/automatic-disqualification-rule-changes-guidance-for-charities

There’s a useful chart here outlining the issues that force disqualification.

Don’t ignore these rules – act now.

If you are someone with a conviction who now thinks you might end up being disqualified under the upcoming rules changes, then you need to be acting now and not ignoring it.

Unlock have today (1st Feb) issued new guidance that will help you. Start by reading their press release here.

And their guidance document – “Leading Charities with conviction” is in two versions (for charities as a .pdf – http://recruit.unlock.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/Charities-guidance.pdf

And for individuals, as an info page – http://hub.unlock.org.uk/knowledgebase/leading-charities-with-conviction/#click-here-for-the-index-of-this-page)