“Helen Harvie's extensive experience in the Third Sector is invaluable to any organisation. Her ability to deliver timely, relevant and cost effective advice is paramount. I have worked with Helen on various projects and she has my highest regard.”
Doug Sanders, Financial Adviser to the Third Sector.
“Helen has helped us with a range of governance advice, incorporation of our charity and the merger of two charities over recent years and her thoroughly professional and friendly service has been much appreciated.”
Arthur Birkby MBE, Chairman – Voluntary Support North Surrey.
“Helen understands the needs and the challenges facing the charity sector. She draws on her extensive experience to offer a proactive, problem solving approach. Her fixed fees ensure we achieve added value at a known affordable cost.”
Charles Haywood, Director – MacConvilles Surveying
“After struggling with the legalities of registering our existing Charity as a Company Ltd by Guarantee, we decided to use the professional knowledge of Helen Harvie. She worked with us to clarify each step, explained the process simply and communicated with the Charity Commission and Companies House on our behalf. I would highly recommend using Helen’s expertise.”
Nancy Williams, Director - The Studio ADHD Centre
“As a board of Trustees we have found Helen Harvie's counsel and advice to the charity invaluable over the years.”
Robin Hobson, Director – Laurence Gould
Andrew Hall, CEO of AQA, suggests that far-reaching reforms to GCSE’s and A-levels offers a great opportunity to ensure students secure correct grades. Hall states “This is a God-given chance to really, really make a quantum improvement in this”.
It has been suggested by the umbrella body Locality that, if local authorities commission services on a ‘local-by-default basis’, it could offer budget savings of £16bn a year. Locality, in partnership with Professor John Seddon of Vanguard, published the report entitled, ‘Saving money by doing the right thing: why ‘local by default’ must replace ‘diseconomies of scale’’. The report suggests that the systems used by local authority commissioner is inefficient and that that they need to ‘abandon unhelpful beliefs about ‘economies of scale’ and standardisation’. [read more…]
Following the defeat of the proposal to abolish cheques the government is again consulting on the way forward to bring cheque technology up to date. [read more…]
Following on from our last article, Sir Michael Wilshaw, Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Schools is pushing back against the right-leaning think-tanks Policy Exchange established by Michael Gove and Civitas who both publish their reports this month. Policy Exchange is investigating whether Ofsted is “fit for purpose”, and Civitas has suggested that the Government take away Ofsted’s powers to inspect free schools and academies.
At the start of the month The Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL) are to propose to Ofsted that they stop using inspectors from the private sector with a view to taking a lower key approach to school inspections.
The Charity Commission continues to focus resources on charities that are late in filing their returns. Of 61,000 charities with an income over £25,000 per annum, around 5,334 are listed as being in default. The Charity Commission instigated action at the end of 2013 against charities who have failed to file their accounts on time for two of the five previous years.
