Charity Trustees and Employees and Political Candidates
Supplemental to the recent article on “Elections, Charities and Places of Worship” another conflict charities may encounter is how to manage their obligations if a trustee or employee decides to run as a political candidate (referred to as a “trustee/candidate” in this article).
The Charity Commission states the following about political activity and campaigning by a charity trustee or employee:
Candidates who run for election often have close ties to the community and may have current or previous involvement with local community groups or charities. While trustees or charity employees can run as political candidates, this relationship may cause people to think that the charity is aligned with a particular political party. This risk can be greater when senior employees such as a chief executive or a trustee are associated with a political party.’
Where this occurs, the trustees will need to consider the potential conflict of interest and assess the risks for the charity in terms of both reputation and legal liability of the person taking on both roles simultaneously. They should put in place policies and procedures to mitigate the risk to the charity. The individuals in question should be explicit about whether they are acting and speaking on behalf of the charity or as a parliamentary candidate, and charitable funds should never be used by a charity trustee or employee for their own campaigning purposes.
Charities should also have a social media policy which outlines the expectations placed on employees and trustees with regard to the use of the charity’s social media accounts and of their own personal accounts. See our guidance on charities and social media for more information.[1]
Whilst it is not clear that in such instances the trustee/candidate is mandated to cease to act as a charity trustee (or employee in such instances) it is advisable that a number of steps are taken to manage actual or perceived conflicts of interest:
- The charity should assess the risks and conflict of interest (actual and apparent) that arise from having the trustee/candidate running in the election. Reasonable steps to mitigate such risks should be taken based on the risks identified.
- The trustee/candidate should declare their conflict at all meetings and excuse themselves from any parts of the meeting/votes which would be conflicted/perceived to be a conflict of interest.
- The charity should not host nor distribute campaigning materials of the trustee/candidate. It would not be sensible that the charity premises act as a premise for the undertaking of political activity for the trustee/candidate. For example, a centre for coordinating the distribution of political leaflets.
- Hosting hustings or debates should not be limited to the trustee/candidate. In order to demonstrate political impartiality, they should include candidates from as wide a political spectrum as possible.
- The trustee/candidate should not use resources, materials or data owned/held by the charity to further their campaign.
- The trustee/candidate should not use the charity premises to run their campaign from, nor given unfair or preferential treatment in using the premises as a commercial hire.
- If the charity is a religious charity the trustee/candidate should avoid using their religious platform (i.e., sermons/teachings) to promote their political candidacy.
Where the trustee/candidate is a trustee or employee of a school it may not be possible to avoid making the premises available to them free of charge. This is because certain schools are required to make their premises available to candidates free of charge (regardless of whether the candidate has any link to the school).
LBMW has a specialist Charities team which can provide practical guidance and assistance for Charities on their compliance obligations. Please contact us for more information on how we can help.
For more information, please contact Khalid Sofi (Khalif.Sofi@lbmw.com), Ian Blaney (Ian.Blaney@lbmw.com) or Rebecca Martin (Rebecca.Martin@lbmw.com)