Flickr/Shrieking Tree. Some rights reserved.
There are over 164,000 registered charities in England and Wales, with a combined annual turnover of over £64bn. The best known, such as Oxfam, have become giant organisations, with trading activities that are generally run as separate businesses. Three quarters have an annual income of less than £100,000, and many are micro-organisations relying on a handful of volunteers. One worthy example is the National Exotic Hedgehog Rescue Service (“We specialize in African Pygmy Hedgehogs, Long-eared Hedgehogs, Lesser Tenrecs, Greater Tenrecs and Common Tenrecs, although we will take in any spiny/prickly creature”).
The Charity Commission for England and Wales has a giant task simply in keeping track of so many different organisations of such varied size and motives, with activities in every corner of the world. Simply by maintaining a central register of them all, with names of officers, records of their activity and (except for the very smallest) published accounts, the Commission performs an essential task of public scrutiny and helps to weed out the criminal and the incompetent.
