More than 1,200 charities had their charity registration revoked last week for repeatedly failing to meet their reporting obligations. The charities that had their charity registration revoked failed to submit two Annual Information Statements to the ACNC.
Submitting an Annual Information Statement each year is a requirement to maintain charity registration.
Read more about the revocations.
The ACNC can impose financial penalties for late lodgement of the Annual Information Statement, or revoke charity registration when they become ‘double defaulters’ for failing to lodge two Statements.
I encourage all charities to check the Charity Register, acnc.gov.au/charity, to ensure they are up-to-date with their reporting requirements.
2019 Annual Information Statement
The 2019 Annual Information Statement is now available for charities to submit online through the Charity Portal.
Charities who operate on a 1 July to 30 June financial year have until 31 January 2020 to submit the 2019 Annual Information Statement.
Charities are urged to submit their Annual Information Statements as early possible to avoid service delays if they need to contact the ACNC for help.
We have published a helpful guide to assist charities complete the Annual Information Statement.
Read the 2019 Annual Information Statement guide.
Governance resources
We recently launched our ‘governance hub’, a single point on our website where you can find all our charity governance resources.
The governance hub is home to our important governance resources, including information on the Governance Standards, including the self-evaluation tool, the External Conduct Standards, the new Governance Toolkit, the Small Charities Library and our Governance For Good and Managing Charity Money guides.
I encourage charities to visit our website, and check out these resources.
The list of governance resources will be updated over time, so make sure to come back and see what is new.
Opportunities to have your say
The Attorney-General’s Department has invited members of the public to contribute submissions on a package of legislative reforms on religious freedom. The Bills will amend the Charities Act 2013. Submissions are open until 5pm AEST 2 October.
The reforms include:
- Religious Discrimination Bill 2019
- Religious Discrimination (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2019
- Human Rights Legislation Amendment (Freedom of Religion) Bill 2019.
Find out more and have your say.
The Australian Accounting Standards Board (AASB) has issued Exposure Draft General Purpose Financial Statements – Simplified Disclosure for For-Profit and Not-for-Profit Tier 2 Entities (ED 295). ED 295 proposes a new Tier 2 disclosure framework that will replace the existing Tier 2 Australian Accounting Standards – Reduced Disclosure Requirements framework. The ACNC will be making a submission and we encourage charities, professional advisors and other interested stakeholders to also make a submission to the AASB.
Next free webinar
Our next free webinar will be held on 24 September.
This month’s webinar will look at the importance of charity governance, including some simple and effective things a charity can do to make sure it is well governed to support achievement of its aims.
Charity governance is an extremely important topic, and I encourage charities to register for this webinar. I am confident that you will find it helpful.
Find out more, or register your attendance on our website.
Here, you can also view the videos of all of our previous webinars and download the slides.
Best wishes,
The Hon Dr Gary Johns