Not quite as exciting as Brexit, but perhaps a welcome distraction! This quarter, the key highlights are:
Register of Persons with Significant Control (PSC Register)
UK Companies and LLPs have been required to prepare and maintain a PSC Register since 6 April 2016. If you haven’t prepared yours yet, then our April briefing may help. Your PSC Register will need to be filed with the ‘confirmation statement’ which replaced the annual return from 30 June 2016.
When filing the new confirmation statement, companies will be required to include information from their PSC Register in addition to:
Gender Pay Reporting
Gender pay reporting was implemented in 2010, on a voluntary basis, as part of the ‘Think, Act, Report’ scheme. However, mandatory reporting is expected to be required from 1 October 2016 and will require employers with at least 250 employees to publish details of overall gender pay gap figures, as well as the number of men and women in each of four pay bands and information relating to gender bonus gaps.
The requirements will not apply to public sector employers initially, so they won’t catch local authorities or schools maintained by the local authority, for example. However, they are likely to catch housing associations, care providers, charities and multi-academy trusts with a number of schools (a full list of excluded employers is here). These requirements are also likely to be extended to the public sector in due course. It is expected that the first reports will need to be published in April 2018.
Modern Slavery
Many of our clients are working on their Modern Slavery Statement at the moment – see our detailed briefing for help with yours. We also have a toolkit prepared to help with the process – it includes:
Please get in touch with us if you’d like to find out more.
Charity Data Sharing
In September last year the Information Commissioner announced that his office was launching an investigation into data sharing in the charity sector, following the press reports that a charity sold the personal details of a dementia sufferer.
In January, the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee published a critical report on their investigation into charity fundraising, reserving particular criticism for trustees. The fundamental concern, underlying the 2015 fundraising controversy, was whether the charities concerned were using personal data in a way that was legal, ethical and consistent with their stated values. The report states that charities need to have a robust and effective governance structure to ensure that the trustees can have confidence in the ethics and methods of the fundraising that is carried out on their behalf.
Trustees need to make sure that they are aware of the law surrounding data sharing and understand what their duties are. New Data Protection law is on the horizon within the EU (General Data Protection Regulation - “GDPR”) - our Jane Burns summarises the main points here. It is likely that this will come into force in May 2018, albeit potentially for a very short time whilst the UK negotiates its exit from the EU. The UK will then need to decide whether to update the provisions of the Data Protection Act, or to adopt the GDPR into UK law.
Spotlight
Registered charities: to convert or not to convert?
Until the Housing and Planning Act 2016 (the “Act”), the impact of direct regulation by the Charity Commission was seen by many RPs as largely an additional body to which to report; the HCA took on the majority of the regulatory burden and liaison with the Commission was limited to trigger events, such as proposals to start remunerating Board members.
However, as a result of the provisions in the Act removing the disposals consent regime, we are speaking to many of our registered charity RP clients about the impact of Charity Commission regulation on their ability to realise the full benefits of these new ‘asset freedoms’. In particular, the Charities Act 2011 requires registered charities to take additional steps when disposing of assets otherwise than in pursuance of their charitable objects. This may particularly impact on groups that are looking at disposing of assets to commercial entities in the group – or perhaps more widely as part of a strategy to streamline their asset base.
One potential solution is to convert from a company registered with the Charity Commission to a community benefit society exempt charity, using the statutory conversion process in section 115 of the Co-operative and Community Benefit Societies Act 2016. Changing status in this way is not straightforward and it would be a significant step for an RP. The advantages and disadvantages must therefore be weighed carefully – relevant issues include:
We have assessed the pros and cons of conversion for a variety of governance structures and scenarios, so if this is something you’re considering we’d be delighted to discuss this in further detail with you.
Please get in touch with Sarah Greenhalgh if you would like any assistance.
Residents are now unable to make applications to prohibit landlords from seeking to recover the cost of legal proceedings through the service charge on behalf of other residents, without consent.
Natalie Barbosa summarises some of the legal challenges facing fundraisers in the charity sector.
We hosted a breakfast roundtable with Insider Midlands magazine that had attendees from a range of organisations addressing housing needs in the Midlands. The discussion explored JVs in more detail.
The decision of the Court of Appeal in The Harpur Trust v Brazel & Unison has made clear that employers can no longer legally calculate part-time holiday based on 12.07% of hours worked over a year.
Social landlords are seeing a rising number of Equality Act defences to possession proceedings. A recent Court of Appeal decision helps shift the likelihood of such defences succeeding.
On 31 July, the consultation period ended on MHCLG’s proposals for reforming the building safety regulatory system set out in the 'Building a Safer Future' document. We have submitted our response.
For decades now, fewer and fewer services provided by local authorities have been delivered directly by them. However, over the last couple of years, there are signs that this tide is changing.
The Government commissioned an independent review of the Modern Slavery Act 2015 in July 2018. The outcome was published in May 2019 which highlighted areas for improvement.
In 2017, the NCVO commissioned a review of the tax reliefs available to charities. The brainchild of this review was published on 17 July 2019 in the form of the Charity Tax Commission report.
In 2014, the Charity Commission released its first guidance for charities on reporting serious incidents. The Commission has recently updated this guidance.
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