Good Governance
Berihu Mohammed examines the Code for the Voluntary and Community Sector
The ‘Good Governance – A Code for the Voluntary and Community Sector’ was produced in 2005 by a group of second-tier voluntary organisations, among them the NCVO, and the Charity Commission with funding from the Home Office. Although the Code is not mandatory, the Commission is encouraging charities to adopt it and or at least use it as a general guide to how they should conduct their affairs.
The Code is aimed primarily at the board of trustees as the governing body of an organisation. It deals with the way trustees work with one another; with the chief executive and senior management; and other internal and external stakeholders such as service users and funders. The central purpose is to help organisations become more effective, transparent and accountable.
The Code is based on seven overarching principles:
- Good Governance
These principles are too broad to be of any use in running an organisation so The Code breaks them down into a number of secondary principles to help explain the issues and give some indication of their practical application. For instance ‘Principle 3: High performance’ is supported by a number of ‘sub-principles’:
- Good Governance
The principles underpinning the Code are rooted in good common sense but we would have seen more interest had it been accompanied by a model of good governance with examples of how the principles might be put into action.
