There is a short pdf document for smaller charities that mainly invest cash covering the key areas of the Principles and some helpful additional information.

The Principles are intended to be a helpful resource. Trustees might choose to work through each Principle in turn, or focus on an area where they feel practice is weakest. The Principles make clear whether practice is 'Must', 'Recommend' or 'Consider', trustees may want to focus first on 'Must'. 'Recommended' actions can be explored but may be challenging for some charities in terms of capacity and resources. Selecting a small number of recommended actions most appropriate to the charity's context, capacity and resources may be more successful than attempting multiple actions. 

The Principles aim to be accessible to non-experts, with a comprehensive glossary of terms. As noted in the Principles, trustees should ensure the charity has access to sufficient expertise depending on the assets held. Principle 2 indicates what expertise might be needed depending on the amount and type of investments held, whilst Principle 4 looks at when and from whom charities might 'take advice'. 

Charities can work through the Principles based on their appetite and capacity. Some charities with between £1mn-£20mn in investments will have large numbers of staff, trustees with investment expertise and access to investment committee members and/or paid investment advice; other charities of this size may have no staff and limited access to investment expertise. Focus groups with charities during the development of the Principles indicated that charities with £20mn+ were likely to have, and expected by their peers to have, the capacity among trustees, staff and committee members to meet a wider range of recommended practice. Users of the Principles are encouraged to provide feedback on what works in their charity's context.

The Principles are not a legal or regulatory requirement and do not attempt to set out all the legal requirements. The Charity Commission’s ‘Investing charity money: guidance for trustees (CC14)' provides advice on the legal and regulatory expectations of charities in England and Wales in relation to investments. The Principles build on CC14, enabling trustees and staff to explore investment governance in the charity’s context, and setting out examples of how to tackle governance challenges. If users are not already familiar with CC14, they are advised to review this prior to embarking on the Principles. 

The Steering Group is made up of Charity Finance Group, Association of Charitable Foundations, National Council for Voluntary Organisations, Wales Council for Voluntary Action and the Secretariat of the Charities Responsible Investment Network.

Organisations on the Steering Group for the Principles represent over 18,000 charities in the UK across a broad range of asset sizes. Investment is an area of governance which charities report finding particularly challenging. The Principles are intended to be complementary to both CC14 and the Charity Governance Code. CC14 covers the legal and regulatory requirements. The Principles are much broader; with extensive explainers and examples, practice which is Recommended or for charities to Consider, and opportunities for deeper work by charities which have a large quantity of investments. The Principles follow the structure of the Charity Governance Code, focus specifically on investment governance, and wherever possible avoid replicating areas already covered in the Code. 

Many professional providers, including law firms, investment managers investment advisers and accountancy firms, produce very helpful guidance for charities. The Principles are different in that the focus is on a charity’s trustees and staff tackling internal governance before looking at the relationships with external professional providers. The Principles are also entirely by charities for charities – the funders are all charitable foundations, the Steering Group is made up of charitable membership bodies and the focus groups and consultation have centred the experiences of charity trustees, staff and committee members. Many resources which already exist do not cover the full spectrum of investment governance challenges, or have inbuilt assumptions about charity investments such as assuming endowments intend to exist in perpetuity. The Principles by contrast are intended to be comprehensive, to enable trustees, staff, committee members and others with a responsibility for or interest in investment governance to access broad learning and sign-posting. 

Yes, the Charity Commission is an observer to the project and reviewed the Principles throughout the drafting phases and the final version published on this website. 

Principle 3, Integrity, includes details of the Butler-Sloss judgement, and practice charities can undertake to explore conflicts between their investments and the charity's purposes, and reputational risks. 

Yes. Over 100 charities reviewed the Principles through a series of focus groups, user testing and an open consultation. There was also input from charity lawyers, chartered accountants, investment managers and investment advisers, and other relevant individuals and organisations.

These are terms commonly used by charities, both terms and defined in the glossary and in the section dedicated to responsible, impact and social investment. During the focus groups and consultation for the project, charities indicated that understanding how to explore responsible, impact and social investment within their charity's governance context would be helpful. 

Barrow Cadbury Trust; Friends Provident Foundation; City Bridge Foundation; Access – The Foundation for Social Investment; The Aurora Trust; The Mark Leonard Trust; The JJ Charitable Trust; Joseph Rowntree Foundation

See Using the Principles for more instructions. Some charities will already be enacting a majority of the recommendations, for others some of the recommended practice will be aspirational. Users should view the Principles as a tool for improvement and encouragement. See Downloading the Principles for more on how to share the Principles with trustees, staff and committee members. 

Professional providers can signpost clients to the Principles and help trustees, staff and committee members to work through the Principles relevant to their charity's context. 

The Principles are a new resource which will evolve based on feedback from charity users.

The Steering Group is keen to continue to develop the Principles and the examples/explainers based on feedback from users.