(a charitable company limited by guarantee)
Registered Charity No. 1054914
Company Number 3182826
In our budget for 2006/7 we anticipated breaking even on unrestricted funds, in the end we achieved a surplus of over £43,000. This was due to the fact that we reduced costs for support and for marketing by a total of £21,000; we received £10,000 more than budgeted of other income and we had considerable success with income for events, exceeding our targets by £15,000, During 2006/7, excluding donated services, overall expenditure increased by over 19% whilst net incoming resources increased by nearly 11% compared to 2005/6.
Our key areas of income are membership fees, events, training, and policy. Membership income increased from £376,453 in 2006 to £418,370 in 2007. This 11% increase was due to roughly 5% growth in members and 12% growth in corporate subscribers. We also increased subscriber fees by 10% and member fees by approximately 4%. Although half of our income comes from membership fees it is essential for future growth to diversify income sources and develop reliable income streams. This was the first year of our £60,000 grant from the Charities Aid Foundation Collaborative Fund over three years from 2006 to 2008. We have used the first tranche of £20,000 to take forward our regional development.
The increase in expenditure from unrestricted funds (again, excluding donated services) was 20%, compared to an 11% growth in unrestricted income. Increase in costs is due in part to direct service provision (increased costs of conferences and Annual Fundraising Dinner) but also increased salaries and premises costs (we increased the amount of space we rent half way through the year to give ourselves more breathing room in the office and to allow for possible expansion in the coming year) and an increase in unrecoverable VAT. Employee related costs fell from £55,343 last year to £6,390. This was due to the high recruitment costs last year when we recruited six staff including the Chief Executive. This year we only recruited two posts and costs were significantly lower.
The restricted fund is made up only of the ongoing depreciation of fixed assets on the CRN project. The restricted funds carried forward (£2,083) represent the net book value of fixed assets relating to the CRN. The unrestricted general fund ended the year up from £241,298 to £284,769, which at 33% of unrestricted charitable income is at the top end of our previous reserves policy. During the year the Board revised the reserves policy in line with the new strategic plan for growth over the next three years. Consequently we have set a budget for 2007 in line with the Board’s intention to reduce our reserves to the agreed level over the next three years (see reserves policy below).
All staff are directly engaged in activities in furtherance of the objects of CFDG and their cost has been allocated accordingly. Governance costs – which include an allowance for the value of donated venues and refreshments – increased by 31%. This was the result of the extra costs of the AGM and the legal advice in preparing for it. There were also significant costs for Trustee training and – for the first time – recruitment. There was also more than average senior staff time devoted to governance during the year. The cost of generating funds relates solely to putting on our Annual Fundraising Dinner, which raised £94,900 in support of our unrestricted programme.
Page 13 - Annual Report and Financial Statements 2007