No evidence the organisations were still active

Scotland’s charity watchdog has removed 31 organisations from its register.

The Scottish Charity Regulator (OSCR) said it had been working over the past few months, to identify charities which no longer meet the charity test.

Usually this means the regulator cannot find any evidence suggesting that the charity is still operating; and the charity has failed to communicate with OSCR.

Scotland’s charity register has some 25,221 charities on it.

Martin Tyson, OSCR’s head of regulation & improvement, said: “One of OSCR’s regulatory priorities for the period until 2026 is to focus on charities that fail to engage with the regulator and demonstrate to the public how they make a difference.

“Around 10-12% of charities on the Scottish Charity Register are failing to meet their legal duty to file annual accounts and engage with OSCR.

“These charities are failing to provide key information to the public about what they do and how they spend their money – and so there’s no evidence to show they are meeting the charity test.

“Over the last few months, work has been undertaken by a project team at OSCR to identify charities that we believe are suitable to be removed from the Scottish Charity Register under section 28 of the 2005 Act.

“The 34 charities which have been identified for removal so far have failed, over a number of years, to submit annual accounting information. This is one of the primary ways of a charity demonstrating it is providing public benefit, and the vast majority of charities comply promptly with this duty.

“The charities were given a period of 21 days to respond to our correspondence or to request a review of OSCR’s decision. Of these, only three responses were received, resulting in 31 charities being removed from the register today.

“The project team are actively looking to find more charities that will be suitable for removal, and hope to identify another batch of inactive charities soon.”