Does a parish council have the power to set up a Charitable Trust?

Question

A parish council owns a piece of land and has problems raising sufficient money for its maintenance. It is exploring the possibility of forming a charitable trust to raise finances rather than using the Precept. Does the council have the power to set up a charity for this purpose?

Answer 1

The charitable trust would need to have explicitly charitable objectives, it could not simply raise funds to support the operation of the parish council. A number of possible objectives is given at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/example-charitable-objects.

Apart from that, I do not know of an objection to a council creating a charitable trust.