Regulator warns charities over election campaigning

Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission (ACNC) commissioner Sue Woodward nominated advocacy, public trust and volunteering as key issues for the sector this year.

Woodward urged all registered charities to follow the rules on advocacy.

“Charities are allowed to advocate and run campaigns, and they often do. History shows their voice makes a valuable contribution to significant conversations on a range of issues,” Woodward said.

However, she stressed, “there are limits to the way advocacy can be conducted”.

In short, she said that charities:

• must ensure activities and public comments align with a charitable purpose
• must not oppose, promote, support, advocate for, or donate to a particular political party or candidate
• may rank and compare the policies of parties or candidates if in line with a charity’s purpose
• must avoid breaching laws such as defamation and trespass.

Woodward indicated that the regulator would take a measured approach to enforcement.

“If we find rules have been broken, we take a proportionate approach to compliance. In the majority of cases, we help charities to understand where they have gone wrong and help them get back on track.”

She pointed to the regulator’s advocacy and campaigning guidance for further information.

Trust central to charity success

Woodward said that maintaining trust must be a focus for both charities and NFPs in 2025.

“Trust is the foundation of Australia’s charity and NFP sector. It underpins donor confidence, volunteer engagement and the overall effectiveness of charity activities. While charities are traditionally viewed as one of our most trusted institutions, this can’t be taken for granted.”

She noted that the 2025 Edelman Trust Barometer Global Report showed a decline in public trust across all sectors – including NFPs and charities.

While the trend wasn’t exclusive to the NFP and charity sector, people had become less trusting of their leaders and institutions, she said.

“In fact, since the ACNC’s inception in 2012 we have seen time and time again that the people involved in charities do the right thing. Most non-compliance is low level and doesn’t stem from any bad intent.”

Woodward said the ACNC’s mission was to maintain, protect and enhance public trust in the Australian charity sector, and it was “using a variety of approaches to achieve this mission”.

According to her most recent column, these approaches included:

• regulatory and compliance work
• promoting transparency through the Charity Register
• supporting good governance
• addressing challenges such as cyber security.

But she said all charities should “commit to ethical conduct, effective governance, and transparent operations, [and] they must actively demonstrate these to the public and stakeholders.”

Sector must do more to revive volunteering

Finally, Woodward nominated volunteering as a vital issue for the sector in 2025.

“Volunteers are the beating heart of the charity sector. In the coming year the challenge of attracting and retaining volunteers will continue to be a significant challenge.”

She said the ACNC’s latest Australian Charities Report showed that about 51% of registered charities had no paid staff, with smaller charities and “basic” religious charities most reliant on volunteers.

While volunteer numbers had risen nearly 300,000 to 3.5 million in the latest data, that still represented a big drop from 2018, when the sector had 3.77 million volunteers.

She said the biggest drop had been experienced by very large charities, and Woodward described the issue as a “persistent challenge”.