Governance
We are a Charitable Incorporated Organisation (CIO) as registered with the Charity Commission.
Our Constitution sets out our Key Purpose or Object as being to reduce social exclusion as the extract below from our Constitution describes:
“To promote social inclusion for the public benefit by preventing people in the Midhurst Area from becoming socially excluded, relieving the needs of those people who are socially excluded and assisting them to integrate into society, in particular by:
1. Providing advice and assistance to people who are excluded from society, as well as the development of projects aimed at reducing exclusion.
2. Referring those individuals who are socially excluded to partner organisations.
3. Establishing a Midhurst Community Forum bringing together the multiplicity of charities, local trusts, local authorities, and others all serving the wider Midhurst area so that common issues and concerns can be shared.
For the purpose of this clause ‘socially excluded’ means being excluded from society, or parts of society, as a result of one of more of the following factors: unemployment; financial hardship; youth or old age; ill health (physical or mental); substance abuse or dependency including alcohol and drugs; disability; poor educational or skills attainment; relationship and family breakdown; poor housing (that is housing that does not meet basic habitable standards).
Note: “The Midhurst area” comprises the town of Midhurst and the fifteen rural parishes in the north-west of Chichester district within the County of West Sussex.”
Our values
At their first meeting in June 2021 the Trustees decided that the Hub should be a values driven organisation and that in addition to being non-judgmental and accountable for our actions, we should demonstrate:
Kindness
Humility
Respect
Discretion
Compassion
Annual report & Accounts
The financial year of the Hub runs from April to March. The Hub was first registered with the Charity Commission in June 2022, and its first Annual Report was produced in July 2023, incorporating a financial statement for the 2022/23 financial year. The same pattern will then be followed in successive years.
Policies and procedures
The Trustees have approved the following suite of Policies and Procedures and assigned a named Trustee to have oversight for each one. These are kept under review annually with review dates attached to the agendas for meetings throughout the year.
The six areas cover:
Health and Safety
Safeguarding
Equalities and Diversity
GDPR and data protection (includes client consent)
Complaints procedure
Volunteer Handbook (incorporates confidentiality agreement)
Impact
We are well aware of the need to demonstrate to funders, partners, and the local community the impact that Midhurst Community Hub might have, and the difference the Hub has made to individual clients and the wider community.
There is an enormous amount of research on the measurement of impact; see for example the work of NCVO, the National Lottery and New Philanthropy Capital that can be found here:
