The Government, in its response to the Joint Committee's Report, indicated that it agreed that the Attorney General should be able to refer matters to the Tribunal but has not commented on the Joint Committee's recommendation that the Charity Commission should also have such an ability.

It is considered that the role of the Tribunal could very usefully be expanded to give both the Attorney General and the Commission a power to decide of their own volition to have matters (whether specific or generic) referred to the Tribunal for interpretation in the public interest, perhaps where they see a strand of cases which on their own might not individually lead to referrals to the Tribunal but where, collectively, it would be helpful to have the general principles reviewed in order to assist in the development of charity law.

Recent examples of situations where it might have been helpful for the Commission to have such a Tribunal to whom it could have referred such cases include the review by the Commission of whether amateur sports clubs could or should qualify for charitable status (where the Commission had to wait to deal with this issue until a suitable test case became available). In this way it would be possible for the Commission (or the Attorney General) to be proactive in using the resource of the Tribunal, and to give it an important role in the continuing development of charity law, rather than simply waiting for appeals to be made to it against specific decisions.

Rather than have this important power contained in the Regulations for the Tribunal to be made by the Lord Chancellor, it is thought appropriate to have the general principle inserted into the Act, with any necessary procedural and other details to be included within the Regulations.