Should charities exist at all, or should the state do everything?

The debate in brief

This is the most fundamental question the charity sector faces, and it predates the modern sector itself. If the purpose of charity is to meet needs that the state does not, should the correct response be to fix the state rather than to build a parallel infrastructure of voluntary organisations? The argument has deep roots. Oscar Wilde wrote in 1891 that "charity creates a multitude of sins" and that the proper aim of society should be to reconstruct itself so that poverty becomes impossible. More recently, academics and commentators have argued that the growth of the voluntary sector -- particularly in areas like food banks, homelessness services, and welfare advice -- is evidence not of a healthy civil society but of a retreating state. The counter-argument, equally long-standing, holds that a society in which all provision flows from the state is not a free society at all, and that the voluntary sector's value lies precisely in its independence, its capacity for innovation, and its ability to represent interests the state overlooks.

Quick takeaways

The arguments

Charity is a symptom of state failure

The most direct version of this argument holds that every charity meeting a basic human need -- food, shelter, warmth, legal advice -- is evidence of a political choice to underfund public services. When the Trussell network distributes 2.9 million emergency food parcels a year, or when rough sleeping rises for the twelfth consecutive year, or when Citizens Advice handles a record number of debt queries, the voluntary sector is not supplementing the state. It is substituting for it.

This critique draws on a long intellectual tradition. The Webbs, Tawney, and the architects of the post-war settlement all recognised that charity, however well-intentioned, cannot deliver universal entitlements. Clement Attlee, before he became Prime Minister, wrote in The Social Worker (1920) that genuine social provision should come as a right established by law rather than as a gift dependent on a donor's goodwill, arguing that legal entitlements were less "galling" than charitable allowances "terminable at [the donor's] caprice." The creation of the NHS, national insurance, and universal secondary education were all, in part, acts of taking provision out of charitable hands and making it a right.

The contemporary version of this argument focuses on what has happened since 2010. Local authority spending on preventative services fell by more than 40% in real terms between 2010 and 2020, according to the Institute for Fiscal Studies. Charities did not choose to fill those gaps; they were drawn into them by the scale of unmet need. The risk is that a well-functioning voluntary sector becomes politically useful precisely because it makes austerity bearable. As long as food banks feed people and homelessness charities house them, the pressure on government to restore adequate public provision is reduced.

The pluralism case: independence, innovation, and voice

William Beveridge, the architect of the welfare state, did not see state provision and voluntary action as opposites. His 1948 report Voluntary Action argued that a strong welfare state needed a strong voluntary sector alongside it -- not to deliver what the state should provide, but to do what the state could not. Beveridge identified the voluntary sector's distinctive contributions as pioneering (trying new approaches before the state adopted them), advocacy (giving voice to needs the state had not yet recognised), and mutual aid (enabling people to organise collectively for their own benefit).

This pluralist tradition remains the strongest intellectual case for charity. A society in which every service, every campaign, and every form of collective action is run by the state is not a society most people would want to live in. Charities provide a space for citizens to act on their values outside the machinery of government. Hospices, for instance, were pioneered by the voluntary sector -- Dame Cicely Saunders founded St Christopher's Hospice in 1967 -- and have continued to innovate in palliative care in ways that NHS provision has often been slow to match. Environmental campaigning, disability rights, and the hospice movement itself were all driven by voluntary organisations long before the state acted.

NCVO has consistently argued that the sector's independence is its defining characteristic. The Civil Society Almanac (2024) emphasises that the sector's legitimacy depends on its distance from both the state and the market. When charities become, in effect, subcontracted delivery agents for government, they lose the very quality that makes them valuable. The Charity Commission's guidance on public benefit likewise defines charitable purpose in terms that go well beyond gap-filling: the advancement of education, religion, health, citizenship, the arts, science, and human rights are all recognised charitable purposes that have nothing to do with compensating for inadequate welfare provision.

The dignity objection and its limits

A distinct strand of the argument holds that charity is inherently demeaning -- that receiving help as a gift, rather than as an entitlement, diminishes the recipient. This critique has particular force in the context of food banks, where people must typically be referred, often means-tested, and sometimes required to demonstrate need before receiving a parcel. The language of gratitude that surrounds charitable giving can reinforce power imbalances rather than address them.

But the dignity objection applies unevenly across the sector. Many charities are not in the business of giving things to people at all. Advocacy organisations, community groups, membership bodies, arts charities, environmental campaigners, and research institutes all operate without the donor-recipient dynamic that the dignity critique targets. The objection is strongest precisely where charities are most clearly substituting for state provision -- which brings the argument back to the first position rather than establishing a case against the voluntary sector as a whole.

The evidence

The empirical picture is more nuanced than either side sometimes allows. The UK voluntary sector's total income is approximately £69 billion per year (NCVO Civil Society Almanac, 2024). Of that, roughly £18 billion comes from government -- a substantial share, but not a majority. The sector employs around 978,000 people and engages an estimated 16.3 million volunteers.

International comparisons are instructive. The Nordic countries -- often cited as the gold standard for state welfare provision -- maintain large and active voluntary sectors. Sweden has approximately 250,000 registered non-profit organisations. Denmark's voluntary sector employs around 120,000 people. The existence of a comprehensive welfare state does not, in practice, eliminate the voluntary sector; it changes what the sector does. In Scandinavia, charities focus more on culture, sport, advocacy, and mutual aid, and less on substituting for basic welfare provision. That distinction matters: it suggests the question is not whether charities should exist, but what they should be for.

In the UK, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation's work on poverty and the social safety net has repeatedly shown that the growth of charitable crisis provision correlates with the erosion of statutory entitlements. The expansion of food banks, debt advice services, and emergency housing provision since 2010 is not a sign of voluntary sector vitality. It is a direct consequence of benefit freezes, sanctions regimes, and cuts to local authority budgets. Conversely, areas where the voluntary sector has historically been strongest -- medical research, hospice care, environmental protection, arts and heritage -- are areas where charitable activity genuinely adds to what the state provides rather than replacing it.

Current context

The Labour government elected in 2024 has taken steps that bear on both sides of this debate. The restoration of some local authority funding, the expansion of free school meals eligibility, and the launch of the Crisis and Resilience Fund in April 2026 all represent a partial reversal of the retreat from state provision that characterised the 2010s. If successful, these measures should reduce the burden on charities acting as emergency substitutes for public services.

At the same time, the Civil Society Covenant published in July 2025 explicitly recognises the voluntary sector's independent role and commits government to protecting its advocacy function. The Covenant's language draws directly on the Beveridge tradition: the state and the voluntary sector as partners, not competitors, with the sector's independence treated as a feature rather than a problem.

However, structural pressures remain. The Charity Commission's register shows a net decline in charity numbers for the sixth consecutive year, with smaller organisations disproportionately affected. The employer national insurance increase from April 2025 added an estimated £1.4 billion in costs to the sector. And the shift from grant funding to competitive contracting, documented extensively by NCVO and the Lloyds Bank Foundation, continues to pull charities toward a delivery role that blurs the line between voluntary action and outsourced public services.

Last updated: April 2026

What this means for charities

Every charity leader should be able to answer the question: would this organisation still need to exist if the state were doing its job properly? For many organisations, the honest answer is yes -- because their work involves innovation, advocacy, community building, or cultural activity that the state is not well placed to deliver. For others, the honest answer is more uncomfortable: they exist because the state has withdrawn, and their growth reflects political failure rather than civic success.

That does not mean those organisations should close. People need food today, shelter today, advice today. But it does mean that charities substituting for statutory provision have a particular obligation to campaign for the conditions that would make their crisis work unnecessary. The Trussell network's explicit commitment to working toward a UK where food banks are no longer needed is a model for this approach: delivering immediate relief while refusing to accept that relief as a permanent settlement.

For funders, the implication is that supporting a charity's advocacy and campaigning capacity is at least as important as funding its service delivery. A grant that keeps a food bank running is valuable; a grant that enables it to build the evidence base and political relationships needed to shift policy addresses the underlying cause.

Common questions

Did the founders of the welfare state want to abolish charities?

No. William Beveridge, the principal architect of the post-war welfare state, published Voluntary Action in 1948 specifically to argue that the new system of universal provision needed a strong voluntary sector alongside it. Beveridge saw the voluntary sector's role as pioneering new approaches, giving voice to unrecognised needs, and enabling mutual aid -- functions that the state could not perform.

Is it true that charity is demeaning?

The critique has genuine force in contexts where people must demonstrate need to receive help, particularly in food banks and emergency aid. But it applies poorly to the majority of the sector, which includes advocacy organisations, community groups, arts bodies, environmental charities, and research institutes. The dignity concern is strongest where charity is substituting for universal entitlements, which is an argument for better state provision rather than against the voluntary sector as a whole.

Do other countries with strong welfare states still have charities?

Yes. The Nordic countries -- Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Finland -- all maintain large voluntary sectors alongside comprehensive state welfare. The difference is in what those sectors do. Scandinavian charities focus more on culture, sport, mutual aid, and advocacy, and less on emergency crisis provision. This suggests that a well-funded welfare state does not eliminate the need for charity; it changes charity's purpose.

What would happen if all charities closed tomorrow?

The immediate impact would be severe. Around 990,000 jobs would disappear. An estimated 16.3 million volunteers would lose their roles. Services ranging from hospice care to legal advice to youth work would cease. But the thought experiment also reveals how much of the sector's work is genuinely irreplaceable by the state -- not because the state could not fund similar services, but because the independence, community roots, and specialist expertise of voluntary organisations cannot easily be replicated by statutory bodies.

Is the growth of charities a good thing?

It depends entirely on what is driving the growth. An increase in community sports clubs, arts organisations, or environmental campaigns reflects civic energy. An increase in food banks, debt advice services, and emergency housing charities reflects welfare failure. The headline number of registered charities -- over 170,000 in England and Wales -- tells you very little without understanding what those charities are doing and why.

Should charities campaign for their own redundancy?

In some cases, yes. Organisations that exist primarily to meet needs the state should be meeting have a particular obligation to work toward the conditions that would make their crisis services unnecessary. This is not a call for self-abolition but for strategic clarity: the most effective charities in this space combine immediate service delivery with sustained advocacy for systemic change.

Key sources and further reading

• Voluntary Action -- William Beveridge, 1948. The foundational argument for a strong voluntary sector alongside the welfare state, written by the architect of that state.

• The Social Worker -- Clement Attlee, 1920. Attlee's early argument that legal social entitlements are preferable to charitable provision at a donor's discretion, written before he entered parliament.

• The Soul of Man under Socialism -- Oscar Wilde, 1891. The literary origin of the argument that charity perpetuates the conditions it claims to address.

• UK Civil Society Almanac 2024 -- NCVO. The most comprehensive statistical overview of the voluntary sector's size, income, workforce, and funding sources.

• Annual Report and Accounts 2024/25 -- Charity Commission. The regulator's overview of the registered charity landscape, including trends in charity numbers and compliance.

• The State of the Sector -- Lloyds Bank Foundation, ongoing. Regular research into the financial health and sustainability of small and medium-sized charities, with particular attention to the impact of government commissioning practices.

• UK Poverty 2025 -- Joseph Rowntree Foundation. Evidence on the relationship between poverty, welfare provision, and the role of charitable crisis services.

• Civil Society Covenant -- HM Government, July 2025. The framework defining the relationship between government and the voluntary sector, including commitments on independence and advocacy.

• Voluntary Action: A Report on Methods of Social Advance -- Beveridge, 1948 (full text). Available via the LSE Library digital collections for those wanting the original rather than summaries.