A governance code and financial reporting a must for charity sector

The Governance Code, alongside the best forms of financial reporting, have to be brought together in a mandatory charter, writes Fergus Finlay.

IT’S been a while since I had such a reaction to anything as the piece I wrote here last week. I said that I was fed up, as an Irish citizen, with the shenanigans of all sorts of organisations that we, the citizens, help to fund.

And it was time, I said, that the government of the day called a halt, by deciding that in future they won’t give a penny to any organisation that refuses to adhere to a straightforward code of decent practice. There should be no exceptions to this rule, and it should be based on a clearly understood and explicit charter. Not a charter of best practice — but of basic practice.