Charity Commission

John Hayes Excerpts

Wednesday 11th November 2026 Commons Chamber

[Sir John Hayes (South Holland and The Deepings) (Con)]

The hon. Lady is making a bold and brave case. As she knows, she has recently become a bit of a heroine of mine following a recent and well-publicised speech. Is not the problem here the Charity Commission? I do not know if it has the resources, the means or the legal powers required, but, in a variety of cases that I have drawn to its attention on woke causes—about which we might not agree—it seemed to be highly ineffective. She is talking about a very local case, but she is highlighting a bigger point in doing so.

[Ashley Dalton]

I thank the right hon. Member for his contribution. That is the point that I am making: whether the Charity Commission has the powers, resources and ability to act. I fear that the story I am laying out today is far from unique across the country.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir John Hayes]

There is a fundamental difference between others raising concerns and a Member of the House doing so. We do this all the time, do we not, in respect of public bodies, Government Departments and so on? That should be given an appropriate degree of weight by the Charity Commission, because we speak for our constituents.

[Vicky Foxcroft]

I agree. The Secretary of State and I discussed the possibility of presenting this as a test case to establish why it is taking so long to be resolved, and we will explore that further.

In the 2025 spending review, in recognition of all of the challenges faced by the Charity Commission, we gave it a 25% uplift in funding, which is backing a three-year transformation programme to manage rising demands on its services. I know that it has been criticised recently by both the Committee of Privileges and the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee for its approach to reports by the Public Service Ombudsman, which made findings of maladministration in two cases. The commission has apologised unreservedly to Parliament in response to the Committee of Privileges report, and has accepted the report in full. I have confidence in the commission’s leadership, and I know that the board is taking action to address the concerns raised by the reports and to learn lessons for its handling of similar cases.

The Government keep the Charity Commission’s powers under regular review, and are committed to strengthening them where needed. On 14 October, the Government published a consultation proposing expanded charity trustee disqualification powers, which will help to protect charities from extremist abuse.