Advocacy through the media

26. October 2005 Czech Donors Forum

Czech Donors Forum

The Czech Donors Forum (CDF) is a non-profit initiative, which provides support and leadership to the donor community in the Czech Republic. Its mission is to support the development of organized philanthropy and to serve the Czech donor community (360 foundations, 900 foundations without endowment, corporate and community donors)

CDF central spheres of interest

consolidation of foundations and endowment funds creation of conditions favorable for corporate giving improvement of the legal environment of philanthropy, namely the advocacy of the possibility to allocate 1% of tax promoting best practice

1 % Project

Reasons of creating 1 % Project

Major foreign donors leaving the Czech Republic To find new local and more balanced resources of support for NGOs To diversify NGOs income To strengthen position of non-profit sector in the society

CDF roles

Elaborate 1 % law Getting consensus Campaign and advocacy

Elaborate 1 % Law
In 2003 CDF sets the Legal group of experts Legal group prepared the legal basis of the 1% Law (the Amendment to Income Tax Law) CDF prepares analysis of the political background, economical analysis, experiences from the CEE In 2004 CDF passes 1 % Law to the legislative process

Getting consensus
CDF sets the Advocacy and Communication groups Advocacy group prepared the strategy of promotion Communication group prepared the campaign strategy

The communication campaign and advocacy

Two main goals
Inform NGOs, media, political representatives (media campaign) Promote the 1 % Law (negotiation with the government boards, political representatives)

Communication campaign
1 % for better life

Target groups of the campaign

NGOs Media Politicians Tax offices Ministry of finance

Methods of the campaign

Internet (www.rozhodni.cz) Press information Public opinion research Radio, TV Newspapers Seminars, conference Individual meetings (NGOs, politicians) Print materials (leaflet, brochure)

Public opinion research

In June 2005 CDF carried out public opinion research 509 respondents in age 15 69 years Question Would you like to have an option to allocate 1 % from your taxes to public benefit NGO? More than 50 % of respondents said yes (54% of them women, 46 % man)

Advocacy
Creating Initiative for 1 % Negotiation with the Ministry of finance Negotiation with the Government (council committees) Negotiation with single political parties

Initiative for 1 %
The Initiative for 1 % is an informal grouping of non-governmental non-profit organizations, which support the implementation of the option to transfer 1 % of personal income tax (by physical entities) for public benefit activities.

The arguments of the advocacy

1% adoption is political statement 1 % distribution mechanism of minimum load for the Tax offices administration 1 % involves the citizens to the public policy 1 % brings new local sources for NGOs

DMS project

What is DMS

DMS means a donating SMS standard service branded as Donors Message Service DMS is a traditional public collection using the modern technologies DMS is implemented by CDF for all NGOs in the Czech Republic

DMS and VAT

From technical reasons DMS is burden with VAT prepaid cards VAT is charged upon credit purchase regardless of purpose or later use Contract possibility to separate Law on VAT and Law on Donations Tax donations are tax exempted

DMS and VAT

Operators and CDF set to solve VAT issue and initiated cooperation with Finance Ministry DMS public campaigns Tatra Mountains and Tsunami brought public attention and awareness Public pressure to solve the VAT issue (January May 2005 the national newspapers 38 times published VAT issue)

Advocacy
Operators and CDF put together Expert Group Members of Expert Group 1 tax consultant from each operator and representative of auditors company from big 4 Preparation of VAT issue solution: shortterm longterm

Shortterm solution
Refund of VAT (collected from public campaigns) by the Government was proposed by CDF and achieved in the form of exceptional state subsidy for NGOs organizing campaigns
Government committed by Act to prepare long term solution

Longterm solution
Expert Group elaborated Amendment to VAT Law together with the Finance Ministry Amendment was presented to the House of Representatives and approved

Reasons of successful advocacy

From the beginning of DMS project CDF pressed to solve VAT issue CDF insisted on publishing the price of DMS apart from VAT (30 CZK+VAT) to inform about this the wide public Big public pressure CDF and all the 3 operators joined in solving VAT issue

More information on the legal program

www.donorsforum.cz