Are you willing to donate a portion of your salary to charity?

A university professor is suggesting making charity boxes illegal, setting up a system where a donation is automatically deducted from wages and launching a national debate on fundraising. 

Former dean Andrew Azzopardi believes it is time to reframe the role of NGOs from that of charity to social justice and dignity.

He believes that having people beg on national TV stations and expose the most painful details of their lives to access support reveals the failure of the system in a country where the economy is reportedly booming.

Azzopardi has written to the president of the Malta Council for the Voluntary Sector, the Commissioner for Voluntary Organisations, and the chairs of the Social Affairs Committee and MCESD. He also copied in the ministers for the voluntary sector and social policy, the shadow minister for volunteering and MPs. 

"If Malta is truly affluent, then no one should need to parade their hardship to survive.

"If dignity matters, then charity models must change. And if leadership exists, it must now show itself. International experience shows that it is possible to fund NGOs, social projects, and individual needs without humiliating beneficiaries, exhausting volunteers, or relying on spectacle," Azzopardi said, urging for an honest, public conversation about transitioning away from outdated, shame-based fundraisingpractices.

What is Andrew Azzopardi recommending?

1. Convene a national debate to critically examine existing charity: fundraising models, confront the ethical cost of exposure-based appeals, explore sustainable, dignity-first alternatives and clarify the respective responsibilities of the state, civil society, and the public.
2. Automatic micro-donations via payments: Platforms in countries like the Netherlands and Sweden enable citizens to opt in to small automatic donations through digital payments, quietly generating reliable revenue without public solicitation. We already do this in some places of work to pay for our union membership – maybe it is time to incentivise this system.
3. Participatory public funds: In some countries, citizens decide how portions of public funds are allocated to community projects, democratising funding and reducing reliance on street appeals.
4. Social impact bonds/results-based funding: Develop innovative platforms that use results-based financing where funds are released only when measurable goals are met, improving accountability and donor confidence.
5. Charity lotteries
6. A more thorough and organised product/item donation platform/s: Donors contribute needed products instead of money, redirecting support into essential supplies without financial barriers or stigma.
7. Strengthen crowdfunding for specific projects: Digital platforms can help raise loads of money in a transparent and regularised way without the needof public begging.
8. Cause-related marketing campaigns: Business-aligned giving can support public good at scale by capitalising on their ‘giving’ initiatives
9. Cooperatives: Strengthen the concept and bring it into the social sector.
10. Social Enterprise Act: This is a law enacted to govern social enterprise organisations whereby entities combine commercial activity with a social purpose.
11. Charity collection boxes become illegal
12. MCESD should place the issue on its agenda as a matter of urgency
13. Parliament's Social Affairs Committee should discuss this matter at the earliest possible opportunity, with a view to convening a national public debate culminating in a national convention on charity fundraising.