Small Charitable Donations and Childcare Payments Bill — House of Commons, 2016-11-15
Topic: Macroeconomics
Eleanor Fulton Laing (Conservative, Centre-right): With this it will be convenient to discuss the following: New clause 2— Review of operation of gift aid matching rule— ‘(1) The Small Charitable Donations Act 2012 is amended as follows (2) After section 16, insert the following— "16A Review of operation of gift aid matching rule (1) The Chancellor of the Exchequer shall, no later than the end of the 2017-18 tax year, undertake a review of the operation of the gift aid matching rule (2) As part of the review of under subsection (1), the Chancellor of the Exchequer shall consult charities and other organisations that he considers relevant about— (a) the role of the gift aid matching rule in preventing fraud and abuse, and (b) the appropriateness of the Treasury exercising its order-making powers under section 14(2) (3) A report of the review undertaken in accordance with this section must be laid before each House of Parliament by the Chancellor of the Exchequer (4) In this section, "the gift aid matching rule" has the same meaning as in section 14(3)." This new clause requires the Chancellor of the Exchequer to review the gift aid matching rule and to consult charities and other organisations on the appropriateness of exercising the Treasury’s powers to amend or abolish that rule which limits the amount of top-up payments to which a charity is entitled by reference to the amount of gifts made to the charity in respect of which it has made successful gift aid exemption claims. New clause 3—Regulations on local branches and groups— ‘(1) The Small Charitable Donations Act 2012 is amended as set out in subsections (2) and (3) (2) After section 5(1) (general provisions on meaning of "connected"), insert— "(1A) This section is subject to the provisions of regulations made under section 5A (regulations on local branches and groups)." (3) After section 5, insert the following— "5A Regulations on local branches and groups (1) The Treasury shall by regulations prescribe organisations in which local or regional branches or groups may not be considered to be connected for the purposes of sections 4 and 5 (2) The Treasury shall publish the first set of draft regulations made under subsection (1) no later than 31 October 2017 (3) Before publishing draft regulations under this section, the Treasury shall consult— (a) the Scout Association; (b) the Guide Association; (c) the Combined Cadet Force Association; and (d) such other organisations as appear to the Treasury to be relevant." This new clause requires the Treasury to identify organisations with local or regional branch or group structures in order that those local and regional branches or groups can be separately eligible under the scheme, and to consult certain organisations about the regulations in draft. New clause 4—Abolition of Gift Aid donations threshold— ‘(1) The Chancellor of the Exchequer must carry out an assessment of the impact on charities and Community Amateur Sports Clubs of amending the Gift Aid Small Donations Scheme so as to remove the 10% Gift Aid donations threshold that must be met in order to access the Gift Aid Small Donations Scheme, including an assessment of the differential impact on different sizes of charities and Community Amateur Sports Clubs concerned (2) The Chancellor of the Exchequer must lay a report of the assessment before the House of Commons within six months of the passing of this Act." Charities and CASCs must give gift aid exemption claims on donations received in order to make a claim under the Gift Aid Small Donations Scheme. The total gift aid donations must be at least 10% of the amount of the small donations on which top-up payments are claimed. This new clause would require the Chancellor to assess the impact of abolishing this requirement.