HC Deb 15 July 1960 vol 626 cc1880-1
Sir L. Ungoed-Thomas

I beg to move, in page 6, line 12 to leave out from purposes "to the first" be "in line 13 and to insert" of taxation and rating ".

I can deal with this Amendment extremly briefly, although it is an important point. The Bill provides that: An institution shall for all purposes other than rectification of the register be conclusively presumed to be or have been a charity at any time when it is or was on the register of charities. That means that, even though it subsequently turns out that it is not a charity at all, that it was entered by mistake, or anything of that kind, and that it should never have been on the register, nevertheless it is for all purposes—we need not bother about the rectification of the register point, because the Amendment does not affect that position—conclusively presumed to be a charity. One cannot argue otherwise. One cannot say that it was done by mistake or argue the toss about it. It is conclusively presumed to be a charity.

The Amendment limits that conclusive presumption to purposes of rating and taxation. In other words, it limits it to strictly Governmental purposes. If a Government Department—because the Charity Commissioners are now to be civil servants under the Home Office—with Government responsibility enters a charity on the register and therefore accepts it as a charity, there is some force in the reasoning that it should know exactly where it stands. It should not be prejudiced by what has been done in the form of accepting its registration, and, therefore, it should be conclusively presumed to be a charity for the purposes of taxation and rating as long as it is on the register.

We accept that. What we do not accept, and what the Amendment is designed to knock out of the Clause, is the conclusive presumption in other cases that it is a charity. The ordinary case is that of where a testator or a settlor gives something to a charity, and if that gift is not an effective gift to a charity then it is to go to residue, or to the next-of-kin, or to other private persons interested. It then turns out, it having been thought to be a charity, and the registration having been accepted by mistake, that, nevertheless, during the period in which it is registered, it is conclusively presumed against the next-of-kin and against the residue to be a charity.

We say that that is completely wrong. The Legislature should not intervene in that way to make a conclusive presumption against private persons in their rights.

It being Four o'clock, further consideration of the Bill, as amended, stood adjourned.

Bill, as amended (in the Standing Committee and on recommittal), to be further considered upon Monday next.