Parishes find Charities Registration Evening invaluable
The Diocesan Office has been working with the Charity Commission (NI) to ensure that when parishes in the Dioceses of Down and Dromore and Connor come to register as individual charities with the Commission, the process will be as straightforward as possible.
After an initial pilot session, a batch of 8 parishes, 4 from each diocese, was guided through the process at the Jethro Centre, Lurgan, on Tuesday 28 October. This is the first in a series of evenings around both dioceses, where up to 10 parishes will be registered at a time.
Registration is compulsory under the Charities Act (NI) 2008 and the diocesan office has done a lot of work to standardise the procedure and produce a manual for use on the night. it remains then for every parish called to send their Honorary Treasurer and another member of the Select Vestry, armed with a laptop and their homework completed!
Diocesan Secretary, June Butler, worked on the training document with the Commission and then brought Nicola Brown (CREED Ireland) on board.
‘Nicola has been commissioned by the RCB to help the parishes in the dioceses in Northern Ireland,’ explained June. ‘She has developed the programme with us and then will roll it out to the other dioceses when we have completed Down and Dromore and Connor, hopefully by the summer.’
The parishes attending were grateful to be taken through the process step by step with the opportunity to ask questions at any point.
Gwen McCann Hon Treasurer of St. John’s Lurgan found the guidance notes to be, ‘really clear, easy to follow and concise.’
Jill Lester, Hon Treasurer of Lisburn Cathedral said, ‘It’s been a really invaluable evening. I’m really glad we didn’t have to do this on our own!