Mr Oak, 26/10/2011
I can understand why in their self interest the Charity Retail Association are resisting having a cap imposed, but perhaps they should accept it with good grace, as I believe many of us in the general population would rather see charity shops have the rate relief removed entirely. I live in the relatively affluent South of the country, and even there, the talk is always of how we have FAR too many charity shops on our high streets, as a typical member of the public, I wholeheartedly agree. In a high street a few hundred yards long we must have around a third of it taken up by charity shops. Whenever a shop becomes free, a new business takes it, so there seems to be little justification at least around here for seeing charity shops as a saviour of any description. These charity shops often only seem to survive because they have free labour from volunteers, and rate relief funded by all of us. This HAS to stop. I have no problem with a sensible number of quality charity shops selling quality items, but there doesnt seem to be much point clogging up the high street with businesses which could not survive without being funded by the tax payer through relief. The article says they fill shops that would otherwise be void. Well to my mind, if this leads to voids, this may be no bad thing in a recession. Voids will help to keep shop rents down, helping existing shopkeepers who have to pay their rates. It will also help keep rents down for new businesses that could set up in these empty shops. Also, how much does it really benefit these volunteers? How many of those working in charity shops such as Help the Aged would be better off actually earning a wage in Asda, so they dont need the help of such charities in future themselves? Often the poor are encouraged to give most by charities, whether it is via rate relief on shops paid for from their taxes, pressure from chuggers, and cynically manipulative television adverts designed to pull at the heartstrings. Life expectancy is long, and many of these people should perhaps make some money for their future. Charity shops should not be permitted to use volunteer labour, they should be required to pay the minimum wage. And as for the argument about recycling, well these days there is ebay, and if people want to recycle their items they can sell them online, and probably get more for it. If they wish, they can still donate the proceeds to the charity of their choice. They can give items to the school fete. This would achieve the same result without blocking retail outlets on our high street with businesses that are not strong enough to make their way without charity from all of us through rate relief, and denying retail space to people who need to help us grow our economy out of recession. Lets have a smaller number of great quality charity shops. Lets make them destinations people want to go to, where you can get a bargain on a quality second hand item, rather than depressing places full of dowdy rags and dismal dusty naff ornaments. As Adam Smith recognised, we are a nation of shopkeepers. How foolish then, to allow one of our most valuable resources to be stifled by shops that could not hold their own in a competitive market. Remove ALL rate relief to ALL charity shops. Those that then survive will deserve their place on the high street, because they will at long last have to meet the needs of the public without surviving at its expense. We will be shopping there. Who knows, this could spark the creation of a new social business structure to rival the Co-operative. The Charity Retail Association should be embracing the change, do we really want the retail equivalent of British Leyland filling our high streets?

Mary Powell, 26/10/2011
I notice that the research has failed to mention the fact that many charity shops also sell brand new, branded items in direct competition with shops in the High Street who have the overheads that charity shops don't, thus creating a highly unlevel playing field. I suspect this is what Mary Portas was referring to and what this article has not addressed.

brian sore, 26/10/2011
It should be noted that shop rates have to be paid by the owner when their shop is not tenanted. Charity shops in the main pay no rent and the owner is relieved of the rate burden which can be critical if there is no other income. In the present economic climate shops are not letting.

Mr Oak, 26/10/2011
Brian, The market simply has to find its level, If a property owner cannot sell, he lowers his asking price, the same should happen for shops. It is simply not true to shops are not letting. Shops are letting very well in this area, and if anything the excessive number of charity shops are holding back the growth of independent shops and businesses on the high street. I have no issue with quality charity shops, who pay their way and pay their staff, and provide a service that consumers want. If they need a rate relief to survive, surely that just demonstrates that the public do not want them enough, and they do not just their place on the high street. If they do not need the rate relief to survive, then in these straightened times, they should not be getting it. In the same way that councils are allowed to put inactive properties back into use, the same should happen with retail premises. Perhaps the best way forward is if a council receives a realistic proposal with a business plan for a new shop where a charity shop currently is located, the council should remove the rate relief from the charity shop. The charity shop then must pay the full rates. If the charity is not prepared to pay the full rates, that shop should close, and the charity of course could open another charity shop elsewhere where it is not blocking a business willing to pay full rates. This would mean that charity shops would end up occupying the least attractive rentable properties, which is only reasonable considering they get rate relief.

Richard, 27/10/2011
I wonder if Mr Oak or Mary Powell would feel the same way if they ever needed to be helped by a charity that relied on charity shops to make money. Also, just wanted to select some points from Mr Oak's posts: "Also, how much does it really benefit these volunteers? How many of those working in charity shops such as Help the Aged would be better off actually earning a wage in Asda, so they dont need the help of such charities in future themselves? " Good work experience and the chance to meet people and do some good. Many volunteers are unemployed, retired or working part time. There aren't enough jobs around for everyone to just go and work at Asda. "Often the poor are encouraged to give most by charities, whether it is via rate relief on shops paid for from their taxes, pressure from chuggers, and cynically manipulative television adverts designed to pull at the heartstrings. " If the number of charity shops decreases or remains stagnant while demand for services, the number of chuggers may increase. Chuggers are rude and do not help the image of a charity. I want chugging to decrease. Don't you? "And as for the argument about recycling, well these days there is ebay, and if people want to recycle their items they can sell them online, and probably get more for it." Not everyone has access to the Internet. "Voids will help to keep shop rents down, helping existing shopkeepers who have to pay their rates. It will also help keep rents down for new businesses that could set up in these empty shops." This makes no sense. If void shops keep the rates low, then the rates will not be kept down for new business that could set up, as once they set up the rates will go up. "I live in the relatively affluent South of the country, and even there, the talk is always of how we have FAR too many charity shops on our high streets, as a typical member of the public, I wholeheartedly agree. In a high street a few hundred yards long we must have around a third of it taken up by charity shops. " Where you live does not seem typical of the many areas in the South I have been to.

Mr Oak, 27/10/2011
Richard, "I wonder if Mr Oak or Mary Powell would feel the same way if they ever needed to be helped by a charity that relied on charity shops to make money." I am not against charities collecting, or charity shops. I just think there should be more of the effective charity shops, and many less of the poor quality charity shops which must make very little for their respective charities (eg the sums generated by the charity shop which Mary Portas went to help out befvore she turned up were not impressive). "Not everyone has access to the Internet." Well that isnt true, there are schemes to fund internet access for everyone and provide cheap computers, there are public libraries, and often schools open up their libraries and computer facilities for the local community. Plus, there are car boot sales where a much better range of goods are sold often much cheaper than in charity shops, if there is anyone who doesnt have internet access, or does not wish to buy and sell online. "Voids will help to keep shop rents down, helping existing shopkeepers who have to pay their rates. It will also help keep rents down for new businesses that could set up in these empty shops. - This makes no sense. If void shops keep the rates low, then the rates will not be kept down for new business that could set up, as once they set up the rates will go up." No, it makes perfect sense, if the economy recovers, then rentals and rates will increase as you would expect, having been kept down by the balance of supply and demand, and by government decisions respectively during the tough times. I'm not suggesting that charity shops are taking over, just that it is inappropriate for poor quality charity shops to be allowed to blight our high streets, when if they had to pay their rates and pay their staff they would have to address how they met a public need rather more effectively. A good charity shop should be able to support itself under a level playing field, or it is not serving customer needs sufficiently well. There are many typical retail shops which are owned by chains, and I would welcome seeing more independent shops, though not for any anti-capitalist agenda, as any shop needs to make a profit, for charity or otherwise. This is why charity shops shouldnt be subsidised to fill retail outlets which could be sites for new business start ups. Equally there are poor quality retail spaces which really should be flattened and redeveloped, and should not be kept on life support by charity shops, when redevelopment could bring investment and growth to an area. When I suggest the workers would be better off getting a wage, you will note that I suggest that charity shops should give them at least minimum wage, that way they could choose to donate any of their wages if they wish, but you dont end up with massive section of retail space not generating tax revenues for the economy, and those revenues are sorely needed to support public spending. Yes, I would like to see less chuggers. Far better to donate money direct, rather than create excuses for charities to create empires that eat up the funds that should go to the good cause. Ebay is a good route to recycle, and both buyers and sellers are encouraged to give to charity. The amount generated for charity is as much as the seller wishes, it is very easy to do charity sales where it is advertised that a percentage or all the proceeds go to a particular charity. There are significant sums that go to charity in this way. On our local high street the number can vary from time to time, but it does feel like it dominates the high street when one of every say six shops is a charity shop,perhaps a third may be a bit of an exaggeration - but if I went and counted now, it wouldnt surprise me if there were more than one in six. Better that we lose some of the poorly performing charity shops and end up with fewer higher quality offerings. Think of it as natural selection. If you have no selective pressures on the charity shops, they risk degenerating into something which no one wants, needs, or uses. By contrast, if a charity shop has to pay its way by paying its staff, and paying its rates, that would be a wake up call to many many poor charity shops that they would need to get commercial. It may end up with local shops having more competition, but they couldnt complain, as the charity shops will be paying their way. I actually think the focus it would bring to the sector would mean that the retail charity sector would end up generating more money for good causes, not less. We could end up with many more shops which have similar ethical principles to say the Co-op and John Lewis, which would be a good thing.

John Abrami, 29/10/2011
Mr Oak You have said nearly everything I would want to say. Please send a copy of your exc. letter to the Prime Minister. He will be bombarded by the puny, partial defense put up by the Charity Retail Association. The Charities do do excellent work. We support that. We support them - in all legitimate ways. They have their own outlets. Door-to-door collections. Lotteries. Appeals. Voluntary associations of helpers. Newsletters. Websites. Celebs in tow. The strong draw to philanthropy in people. What ordinary retail business can call on all this, or on the financial muscle the big charities have? Demelza got into Rochester High Street because it was able - by its very successful fundraising - to offer significantly more to the landlord - Rochester Cathedral in this case which should have had the moral fibre to behave differently - than the local retailer who wanted to expand into the (large) premises. I have supported Demelza's superb work in the past but have withdrawn out of disgust at this - only one word for it - greed. Without a qualm they have added stress to retailers already under severe stress. Good work does not give them the right to do what they - or their professional commercially psyched-up fundraising directors - want. They want to play the business game. Fine. Play it honestly, fully. Pay rates, wages and tax. One thing Mr Oak left out. The Charities even have HMRC on their side. HMRC in fact recommend what amounts to a tax dodge. In their own words:"Tax relief on trading profits . Any profits that your charity makes from trading activities - selling goods and services to customers - may be taxable. However, there are some exemptions, depending on the nature of your trading activities. If your profits from trading activities aren't exempt from tax you'll need to tell HMRC Charities about them and pay any tax that's due through a tax return. ... However, if your trading activities aren't covered by tax exemption, your charity may want to consider conducting all or part of these activities through a subsidiary trading company and transferring some or all of the profits of that company back to your charity as a donation." Pardon me!? Further. How much does rates relief cost us taxpayers NOW? The 1995-6 figures are it cost Government £435 million to enable the charity shops to raise £95 million for charity. (Cf Joint Committee for the draft Charities Bill. Minutes of evidence. Mr Alambritis qns 420-440. Further, there is scope in this time of re-cycling good stuff and downturn for people to set up legitt. businesses in second-hand goods. The Charities make this very difficult. In sum. The Charity shops have become parasites on the High Street, on hard-working retailers who are backbone to the economy, on the naivete of good-hearted people and on the tax-payer. More retailers would speak up but they are afraid they will feel the backlash of naive customers who do not know what is going on.