In Reply to: Charity warning posted by antoine on Friday, 4. March 2005 at 18:56 Bali Time:
I do understand the point you are making but there is just a bit more for committees etc in Australia to become an incorporated body than what you have stated.You have only touched the surface.This is not the place to go into detailed areas of taxation law & what is completely involved in becoming an incorporated body but it can be quite a complicated issue to handle without the proper professional advice.
I am stating this information not to be contary in any way but in case any well intention person thinks they may wish to get together with a group of friends & do this & they may thinks it is a simple or straight forward matter.
Very briefly any incorporated bodies in Australia must have a registered constitution & have a clause in their constitution that is commonly referred to as a " wind up clause" other wise it can not become an incorporated body.This clause is to clearly state what happens to assets if or when things wind up.
Many clauses are expected to be in a standard constitution including clauses about the AGM & the fact that members can not benefit financially or otherwise from being part of the association/group,certain circumstances are excluded but are too involved to mention.
I do not know much at all about the laws involved re this matter in other countries & whether they are the same as ours,so will not comment.I expect very few of us would be knowledgeable on this issue re overseas laws.I also feel in many professional matters " a little bit of knowledge can be a dangerous thing". Re overseas charities & groups being listed in Australia - I doubt that.
Unfortunately many people can be caught up with giving out of the goodness of their hearts & not always know where their money is going to if they make donations overseas.One always needs to exercise caution & common sense.The other side of the coin is that in Australia many organisations legally "swallow" a fair percentage of the donations they receive in legitimate admin costs.Many people feel strongly about this type of thing.
There's even been a fair bit of talk in the media re people like Cherie Blair & other big name speakers taking the lion's share of donations when they speak at charity functions.In some ways I feel we can't fell fully confident that these days even when we give to a registered charity in Australia that the money we give will 100% go where we hoped or intended it to.
Please don't think I'm being contary I am just trying to advise that matters can be more complicated than what the average person thinks if they do not deal with these types of things professionally.If you have a gripe with an organisation in Australia you can ask for it to be looked into - re an group overseas there is probably very little can be done.
I would expect the reason certain threads are deleted if /when a persons name or organisation is mention in a derogatory manner is because of possible slander & deformation of character issues that our esteemed FA is aware of & does not wish to be involved in.I would respectfully suggest we all keep this in mind.