Charities and social enterprise

Charities and social enterprise - illustration

Our charity lawyers are all about helping you thrive in a changing world. From employment and IP issues to innovative fundraising, acquisitions and internationalisation, we help charities achieve their goals.

How can charities and social enterprise flourish at a time of extreme uncertainty? Hire and retain the right people? Adopt digital processes and technological innovation? The challenges facing the sector are complex and interrelated but with their extensive experience, our lawyers will help set you up for success.

We focus on helping in three ways:

  1. Manage the everyday challenges - Workforce. Contracts. Accountability. Intellectual property. Estates.
  2. Support through the one-off major events - Mergers. International ventures. Innovative fundraising projects.
  3. Make the important decisions - Be your critical friend. A second pair of eyes, guiding your decision-making.

Our lawyers

Over 120 of our lawyers work for our charity and social enterprise clients, including specialist teams in charity law, philanthropy, employment, contested legacies, and alternative financing.  

Our experience

We support charities through every stage of their journey and have worked in each of these areas with charities and social enterprise: 

Establishment - We can help with registration, governance and finding the right structure when you first set up.
People - We will support you with developing your HR policies, recruitment, pensions, conduct and disciplinary issues.
Estates - Leases, purchases and development work are all areas where we have helped charities that are growing or starting out.  
Intellectual property and data - Our work in this area includes compliance, disputes and commercialising your assets.
Regulation - As your operations grow, we will help you manage relationships with the many regulators.
Growth - When you are trading, merging, looking for alternative fundraising, developing philanthropy efforts and setting up international ventures, we can support you with your ambitious plans. 

Our clients

We act for a wide range of charities including education & research organisations; health, medical research charities and hospices; philanthropy, legacies and charitable foundations;  museums, heritage and art organisations, as well as local regional and community not-for-profit charities and social enterprises.

Our clients include:

  • Institution of Engineering and Technology
  • Wellcome Trust
  • British Council
  • Institute of Mechanical Engineers
  • Coalition of Epidemic Preparedness and Innovation (CEPI)
  • Childrens Investment Fund Foundation
  • The Board of Trustees of the Science Museum
  • Livability
  • Stratford upon Avon Town Trust
  • Livery companies
  • Religious charities
  • Sports

Legal resources you may find useful

Our charity blog keeps the industry up to date on the latest developments.

Did you know?

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