The Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations is the membership organisation for Scotland's charities, voluntary organisations and social enterprises. Charity registered in Scotland SC003558. Registered office Mansfield Traquair Centre, 15 Mansfield Place, Edinburgh EH3 6BB.
A new addition to the SCVO Pro Bono Service
It’s Pro Bono Week! – a global celebration of professional services for the public good, and here on SCVO’s Information Service we’re celebrating a new addition to our very own Pro Bono Service
We’re pleased to announce that Turcan Connell will be joining our panel of experts to offer up to two hours of free advice to SCVO members with an income of less than £500,000. Since we started the Service over ten years ago, we’ve dealt with over 700 enquiries from SCVO member organisations covering subjects that range from charity law and governance, to property and employment law advice. In total the Service has provided nearly 1,400 hours of professional expertise to organisations who may otherwise have been unable to access legal advice.
The most popular enquiry area has always been governance and charity law. Our partner legal firms have helped organisations deal with any number of issues, from giving legal advice on amending a constitution or navigating a merger, to finding a way through a dispute with a parent charity or setting up a trading subsidiary.
Running a charity can be tough, and there’s never enough money in the kitty. That’s why we’d like to say a huge thank you to all of the legal firms who partner with us to deliver this essential service to the sector. Burness Paull, Gillespie MacAndrew, MacRoberts and Stronachs all provide fantastic support and expertise, not only to SCVO member organisations, but also to the SCVO Information Service. This service will now be expanded with the addition of Turcan Connell.
And let’s not forget that SCVO also offers free VAT and Tax advice to members too, by partnering up with Saffery Champness and Scott Moncrieff to give guidance on a variety of topics such as Gift Aid and how to improve your VAT position. Both our VAT and Tax Experts and our Legal Eagles offer their expertise at regular SCVO seminars throughout the year. This year our seminars have focussed on Safeguarding and setting up trading subsidiaries, and we’re planning to cover a new range of topics for next year.
We’ll be running an event with our legal partners at The Gathering next February. But in the meantime, if you’d like to know more about what the SCVO Pro Bono Service can do for you, contact the Information Service.
