In November 2020, the 成人快手 Shared Data Unit reported experts' fears that thousands of smaller charities across the UK could cease to exist in the new year, following a shift in the nature of giving.
The cancellation of all participation events since March had seen overall donations to non-NHS charities drop by 46% on a leading fundraising site.
But our analysis found that smaller charities - without the reserve levels of their larger counterparts - were at greater risk of having to cease operating entirely.
The leader of the Charities Aid Foundation (CAF) said the declining income from collection tins, charity shops and community events such as fetes and raffles had already hit the incomes of smaller operations by 鈥渉undreds of millions of pounds鈥�.
Even though he said overall giving in 2020 was up by 拢800m compared to 2019, the majority of those funds were absorbed by NHS charities.
Meanwhile, a poll carried out among 580 charity bosses in April found only a third had enough funds to meet running costs for the next three months.
The Small Charities Coalition said parts of the sector faced a 鈥渟low death鈥�, the true scale of which would not be realised until early in 2021 when that grant funding ran out.
Methodology
For this investigation, we used a variety of sources:
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Polling on charitable giving conducted by YouGov
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Data released by Virgin Money Giving.
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鈥淧ulse polling鈥� carried out during the pandemic by the Charities Aid Foundation and the Small Charities Coalition
Data
We shared a containing analysis of the data above and key interviews with the Small Charities Coalition, the Charities Aid Foundation, Virgin Money Giving as well as local charities Yorkshire Cat Rescue Centre and Designability in Bath.
We also shared a , allowing local titles to assess the scale of the small charities sector in their area.
Partner usage
The 成人快手 Shared Data Unit makes data journalism available to the wider news industry as part of the 成人快手 Local News Partnership.
Stories written in print and online by partners based on this research included:
- Liverpool Echo: 25 November 2020
- Gainsborough Standard: 6 November 2020
- Cannock Chase Radio: 6 November 2020
- Tenby Today: 2 November 2020
- Hexham Courant: 6 November 2020
- South Wales Evening Post: 7 November 2020
- Bath Chronicle: 7 November 2020
- Gedling Eye: 6 November 2020
The story also featured on the 成人快手 England homepage as well as the morning bulletins for 成人快手 Radio Lancashire, 成人快手 Radio Cumbria and 成人快手 Radio Shropshire.