Britain’s charities face hundreds of abuse claims every year amid claims aid staff are STILL sexually exploiting refugees

• 5,730 ‘serious incidents’ were reported to the Charity Commission in 2019/20 
• This is the same as 15 incidents every day and is a rise of 47 per cent on 2018/19
• The watchdog said the most common type of claim is ‘abuse and mistreatment’

Britain’s charities are facing soaring numbers of complaints of abuse and mistreatment.

A total of 5,730 ‘serious incidents’ – the majority concerning the safeguarding of vulnerable people, including sex cases – were reported to the Charity Commission in 2019/20.

This is the equivalent of 15 incidents every day, and represents a 47 per cent increase on the year before, according to the watchdog’s annual report. In 2018/19 there were 3,895 serious incidents.

The statistics come amid claims that aid workers are continuing to abuse and exploit refugees with Labour MP Sarah Champion saying she is shocked by claims that little is being done to stop it.

Safeguarding incidents are those which have ‘resulted in or risk significant harm to beneficiaries and other people who come into contact with the charity through its work’.

Britain’s charities are facing soaring numbers of complaints of abuse and mistreatment with a total of 5,730 ‘serious incidents’ reported to the Charity Commission in 2019/20

They can include serious sexual abuse, exploitation and harassment complaints, as well as cases of neglect, bullying or racial discrimination.

Britain’s foreign aid charities have been mired in a sex abuse crisis since it emerged that Oxfam workers had used prostitutes during a humanitarian crisis in Haiti after the 2010 earthquake there.

Earlier this week, the Daily Mail revealed that aid charities made 452 incident reports relating to safeguarding, of which three in five related to sex cases.

But today’s revelations suggest the problem is much more widespread among charities than previously thought – and is also a serious problem outside the aid sector. In 2019/20 there were 3,411 safeguarding incidents reported across the sector – nearly 60 per cent of the total.

The most common type of harm reported is ‘abuse and mistreatment’, the watchdog said. This includes sex cases but the report did not reveal the proportion. Other serious incidents included 897 reports of fraud and 43 claims that charity staff were linked to terrorism or extremism.

The commission’s annual report for 2019/20 said the ‘abuse and mistreatment of people’ remained the most prominent threats in the charity sector.

It also revealed that the number of whistleblowers breaking cover to speak out about practices at their charities soared by a third to 247.

The commission has used its regulatory powers against charities 1,962 times – up 5 per cent in a year. It has concluded 181 statutory inquiries into charities – up 17 per cent on the year before.

Britain’s aid sector has been mired in controversy for two years, with major organisations such as Oxfam and Save the Children admitting huge failings. This week the Mail revealed that significant numbers of staff at the Department for International Development had also been implicated for the first time. In 2019/20 there were 26 safeguarding cases reported.

Helen Stephenson (pictured), the Charity Commission’s chief executive, said: ‘Over the past few years, we have seen grave governance failings in some household name charities. As recent inquiries have shown, if charities fail in their responsibility to keep people safe, we will not hesitate to take action.’

The Charity Commission would not reveal which charities had sent in the most incident reports, but recently the watchdog has investigated serious failings at the Royal National Institute for the Blind, where children were found to be ‘at risk of harm’.

The regulator handed the charity an official warning following serious concerns about services provided at its Pears Centre children’s home in Coventry. The issues included medication errors, use of physical restraint and failure to answer questions on an unexplained injury to a child.

It has also launched an investigation into a charity-run cinema in Newcastle upon Tyne, which has been hit by allegations of sexual abuse and harassment.

Charities have to report all their ‘serious incidents’ to the Charity Commission.

Helen Stephenson, the watchdog’s chief executive, said: ‘Over the past few years, we have seen grave governance failings in some household name charities. As recent inquiries have shown, if charities fail in their responsibility to keep people safe, we will not hesitate to take action.’

… and aid staff ‘still exploiting refugees’ 

By Simon Walters for the Daily Mail 

The MP leading an inquiry into sex abuse scandals involving British aid charities said she is shocked by claims that little is being done to stop a repeat.

Horrific examples of continued sexual exploitation of women and children by aid workers have been given to the Commons international development committee.

Experts told MPs that, two years after it was revealed that Oxfam workers used prostitutes in earthquake-hit Haiti, the UK’s Department for International Development (DfID) has done ‘zero’ to boost safeguards for charity sector sex abuse whistleblowers.

The first meeting of the latest Commons investigation into sex abuse by aid workers was told that refugees are still being offered extra food for sex – and left to starve if they refuse. MPs heard that would-be whistleblowers are scared to expose sexual misconduct by aid bosses – and are gagged by being forced to sign non-disclosure legal agreements.

The committee’s chairman, Labour MP Sarah Champion, said she was ‘shocked’ and ‘disappointed’ that ‘sexual abuse and exploitation of [aid] beneficiaries’ is still going on. Tory MP Richard Bacon expressed his fury that ‘household name big charities with chief executives’ had done nothing to sort out the scandal.

Notorious: Roland van Hauwermeiren was involved in an Oxfam abuse scandal

In one of the most notorious foreign aid sex abuse scandals, Roland van Hauwermeiren, Oxfam’s director of operations in Haiti, was allowed to resign after admitting using prostitutes there following the devastating earthquake in the country in 2010. The Belgian went on to work elsewhere in the aid sector.

Professor Rosa Freedman, of Reading University, who advises the United Nations on combating sexual exploitation, told the committee it was time to stop regarding aid charities ‘as though they are angels out there doing good’.

She said while they do important work, ‘that does not mean they can operate outside the rules that apply to everyone else’. She added that most sex abuse claims against the UN involved its refugee camps ‘because there is no escape’.

Alina Potts, of the Global Women’s Institute campaign group, claimed that aid workers told women and girl refugees: ‘If you fall in love with me, I will give you more food.’

A woman at a refugee camp in Bangladesh was ‘abused by a man who threatened to stop her rations if she did not have sex with him’, she said.

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