Following a formal vote at our recent Shareholders’ Meeting, we are happy to announce that One Care has now officially converted to a Community Interest Company (CIC). We chose to convert primarily to improve our success rate when seeking to win NHS contracts and to open doors when engaging with the wider NHS system. In addition, we believe that this change better reflects who we are and what we do as a federation, representing BNSSG general practices and bringing benefit to our local communities.
What is a Community Interest Company?
A Community Interest Company (CIC) is a special form of a non-charitable limited company, which exists primarily to benefit a community or pursue a social purpose, rather than to make a profit for shareholders.
Although One Care has initially set up as a limited company (with BNSSG practices as our shareholders), we have committed not to pay dividends to shareholders. Instead, we reinvest any profits back to general practice in BNSSG. This is fundamental to our and BNSSG practices’ principles and, as such, CIC status is a perfect fit. For these reasons, a number of other GP Federations and similar organisations have converted to CIC status.
What was the process for converting to a CIC?
Having reviewed the benefits, the One Care Board – with representatives from practices across BNSSG – recommended to our shareholders that we convert to a CIC. In order to do this:
- a special resolution was put to all practics to be voted on
- 51% of practice needed to vote in order for it to be valid
- more than 75% of those who voted were in favour, so the resolution was passed
Once the resolution was passed, we applied to become a CIC, submitting an application form (CIC37) to Companies House stating our company’s aims and why its activities would benefit the community. Our application has now been accepted.
If you have any further questions about what is means for One Care to become a CIC, please don’t hesitate to get in touch!