Decide your charity's purpose
The charitable purposes should be considered at the outset (see ‘Check if setting up a charity is right for you’), as your registration application will require you to select one of the charitable purposes, which are set out in law (section 6 of the Charities Registration and Regulation Act 2019).
These include advancement of various public benefits, including:
- prevention or relief of poverty
- advancement of education, religion, health or saving lives, citizenship or community development
- advancement of, arts, culture, heritage or science, amateur sport
- advancement of human rights (including conflict resolution and promotion of religious or racial harmony, or equality and diversity)
- advancement of environmental protection or improvement
- relief of those in need
- advancement of animal welfare
- promotion of efficiency of the armed forces of the Crown, police, fire and ambulance services
The charity’s purposes must be within one of the descriptions of purposes above (as set out in section 6), and must be for the public benefit.
In writing your purposes for the registration documents, you should make sure that the purposes include:
- What the charity is intended to achieve
- How it will achieve those aims
- Who will benefit from those outcomes
- Where the benefits will extend to
Remember that those who wish to support, volunteer for, or use your charity’s resource as service user or customer will need to understand your aims and objectives. You should make sure that the purpose is written with the following in mind:
- Written in clear and simple language which is precise and can be understood by those supporting, volunteering for or with your charity, and which meet the statutory requirements
- State clearly what the charitable purpose is (all of those purposes, if more than one)
- Include an explanation of any jargon or technical terms which might not be generally understood, and clarify any statements or phrases which have more than one meaning
