The Regulator Called Us an 'Untold Success Story' — I'd Prefer a Told One

The CIC Regulator’s annual report landed, and for the first time I can remember, the tone was almost upbeat. Two thousand seven hundred and twenty-seven new CICs approved in the year. Cumulative total pushing 12,000. The phrase that jumped out at me was “untold success story.”

Untold. That’s the word that got me. Because it’s accurate in two ways. Yes, CICs are an untold story in the sense that nobody in government or the media is telling it. But they’re also untold in the sense that the numbers themselves don’t fully capture what’s happening on the ground. The success is real, but it’s also unmeasured, unexamined, and unsupported.

The report highlights social investment as a key growth driver. And it’s true that the social investment market is growing — over £420 million a year flowing through CICs and asset-locked bodies, according to Big Society Capital’s data. That’s real money. That’s genuine progress from where we were in 2010.

But £420 million spread across 12,000 organisations is £35,000 each. That’s not investment — that’s pocket change. For most CICs, the experience of trying to access social investment is still one of rejection, frustration, and incomprehension. The market is growing at the top end. At the grassroots level, where most CICs operate, it’s barely touched.

The Social Investment Tax Relief expansion this year is a genuine step forward. Raising the investment limit to £1.5 million and seeing CICs represent about 25% of SITR deals by number is evidence that the mechanism can work. But SITR is a tax relief, not a capital injection. It makes investment more attractive to investors, but it doesn’t create the investment products that CICs need.

The Regulator’s report is right to celebrate the growth. I just wish there was more to celebrate about the support infrastructure. We’re 12,000 organisations strong and still untold. At some point, we need to graduate from untold success to told success — and that means someone with power and resources actually paying attention.