A government scheme to allow regulatory decisions to be delegated to staff will reduce administrative and decision-making burdens in Northern Ireland, the regulator has said.

The Charity Commission for Northern Ireland’s scheme of delegation report was published by the Department for Communities last week after the law came into effect on 13 February.

The Court of Appeal judgment of February 2020 in the case of McKee and Others v Charity Commission for Northern Ireland ruled that all commission decisions had to be made by a board of commissioners rather than staff. 

It rendered void decisions made by staff members in areas such as charitable registration. 

The regulator said the ruling “significantly changed” how it operated and previously warned of delays in its casework following the landmark ruling. 

The Charities Act (Northern Ireland) 2022 addressed this by allowing certain decisions to be delegated to staff once a scheme of delegation was drafted, consulted on and approved by the minister for communities.

A public consultation ran from March to June 2023 and had 28 total respondents, with half responding on behalf of organisations and representative bodies while the other half were individuals.

“Overall, 16 respondents were in favour of the introduction of a scheme of delegation and 12 were against,” the Department for Communities report said.

“Those in favour expressed the view that a scheme of delegation would speed up processes for charities and bring the commission’s approach into line with other charity regulators, albeit with the protections provided for higher risk decisions in the 2022 act.

“Those that were not in favour, in most cases, cited the need for more time for the cultural changes recommended by the Independent Review of Charity Regulation to take effect and their belief that poor decisions had been made by staff in the past.”

Where the scheme allows delegation of a regulatory decision to staff, all the administrative actions and decisions associated with that decision might also be conducted by staff, the government report says.

Where the scheme does not allow for delegation of a regulatory decision to staff, they may conduct all the research and other administrative acts required before bringing a recommendation to the decision-maker.

Decisions cannot be delegated below the specified level as set out in the scheme but can be escalated above the specified level of delegation in the scheme.

The regulator could take any decision, whether delegated or not.

“The scheme is expected to have a positive impact on the thousands of charities regulated by the commission,” the CCNI said.

“While internal commission processes must now be updated in line with the scheme, the administrative burden around decision-making within the commission should be reduced.

“This, in turn, is expected to speed up decision-making, allowing charities to receive quicker responses to, for example, casework or registration applications.”

The scheme will now be formally adopted by the regulator’s board of commissioners, who will review it in full at their next meeting, the regulator said.

The full scheme and the Department for Communities response can be found here.