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Charities Act
Update: Agreement reached on parish registration as charities
An agreement has been negotiated with the Charities Commission as to how Presbyterian parishes can register as charities.
Co-operative ventures are not covered by this process and will receive advice from the Uniting Congregations of New Zealand.
Registration will be handled at the national and presbytery level. Each presbytery needs to complete an application covering all of its Presbyterian parishes and submit this to Assembly Office. The deadline for this application closed in October 2007.
The Assembly Office have lodged these applications with the Charities Commission. The registration process is expected to take about three months.
Once registration is completed, presbyteries will be advised of their registration number, which they will pass on to parishes. This number will be required in future correspondence and documents for tax purposes.
The registration will cover the parish and its regular committees, as well as any Boys Brigade Company attached to the parish. However, it will not cover any separate legal entities of the parish, such as trusts. The parish must submit separate applications for any stand-alone trust. Further advice on this is available from Assembly Office by contacting Doug Langford.
Please read the letters sent to parishes and presbyteries outlining in greater detail the reasons for this approach and the actions they need to take to comply with this process.
Click here to read the letter sent out to all parishes and presbyteries
Click here to read the letter sent to presbytery clerks
What is the Charities Act?
The Charities Act was passed into law in April 2005.
The Charities Commission has been established to oversee the Act, and the overall driver behind the legislation is a desire to uphold public trust and confidence in the charitable sector by increasing its accountability to donors, the public and the Government.