1st Philanthropy Australia Conference-Advertorial
20 February 2003 at 12:02 pm
A UK charity called ShareGift that collects unwanted shares and donates the money to other registered charities will be under the spotlight in Sydney next month at the 1st Philanthropy Australia Conference.
Elizabeth Cham, the National Director of Philanthropy Australia says ShareGift is an exciting, original idea, that is stunning in its simplicity. She says nothing like this is operating in Australia and the challenge of introducing a similar scheme here must be considered.
Cham says it’s an example of creative, innovative philanthropy at its best and its creator Claire Mackintosh (The Rt. Hon. the Viscountess Mackintosh of Halifax) and co-founder of ShareGift, will address delegates at this year’s Philanthropy Australia Conference.
Mackintosh, a former investment manager and Matthew Orr, a stockbroker, came up with the scheme. They knew that an enormous pool of unwanted small shareholdings existed and that no simple solution was available to share holders who wanted to get rid of their small holdings.
They believed that most people in this situation would be only too happy to give these nuisance holdings away to charity if an easy way to do so existed.
The result has been a resounding success. In 1996, its first year of operation, ShareGift gave £16,000 to UK charities. In its last financial year (2001-2002), it donated a total of £1.4 million to charity, making ShareGift one of the top 150 grantmakers in the UK.
The 1st Philanthropy Australia Conference is a two-day forum (17-18 March, 2003) bringing together national and international practitioners involved in the philanthropic sector. The conference theme is Nothing Ventured, Nothing Gained: Venture Philanthropy for the Common Good and promises to deliver all the major issues of the day in the area of private, corporate and community giving in Australia.
Principal sponsor of the conference is JBWere, a long-standing member of Philanthropy Australia.
Keynote speakers and plenary speakers will provide overviews and perspectives from different disciplines and provide the foundations for participatory forums.
VIPs set to address the conference include Monica Patten, president and CEO, Community Foundations of Canada, Dorothy Scott, Ian Potter Foundation, Rupert Myer, The Myer Foundation, Dr. Michael Gilding, author of Secrets of the Super Rich; and Prof. David Birch, Director, Corporate Citizenship Research Unit, Deakin University. Leon Davis, Chair of Westpac Bank, will also join a panel of business leaders to discuss issues unique to corporate foundations.
Other speakers will include Katie Lahey, Chief Executive of the Business Council of Australia, and Bill Scales, Group Managing Director (Regulatory, Corporate and Human Relations) and Chief of Staff at Telstra who will take part in sessions on Corporate Philanthropy.
Mary Wooldridge, Chief Executive Officer of the Foundation for Young Australians, will discuss Managing Change in Philanthropic Trusts. Mark Lyons, Professor of Social Economy at the University of Technology, Sydney will take part in a session on Recent Research and Public Policy in Australian Philanthropy.
The key social event is the conference dinner at the WatersEdge located in the historic Rocks area in Sydney on Monday, 17 March with special guest speaker, David Gonski. Gonski is a serving member of the Prime Minister’s Community Business Partnership and a member of the Committee of Inquiry into Charitable and Related Organisations.
For more details check out the conference website: www.www.philanthropy.org.au/whatson/conference.htm.
