therecruitmentjunction.co.uk

Complaint and escalation

The Commission's letter explains that a senior assessment manager, who had not previously handled the case, was asked to review the original assessment. They looked at the complaint submitted in early July 2025, follow up emails, and the Commission's first reply in August.

This confirms that the concerns about The Recruitment Junction were not ignored or treated as a single email. They were logged, revisited and assessed at a senior level, with dates that now sit on the regulatory record.

Why no direct enforcement action

The Commission decided that the issues did not reach the threshold for opening a formal regulatory case. It referred to section 16(3) of the Charities Act 2011, which requires it to use limited resources in a way that is efficient, effective and economic.

That decision is a resource judgement, not a clean bill of health. The underlying concerns about public funding honesty, data handling, equality duties and safeguarding still exist and are being followed up through other regulators and legal routes.

What the CEO said

During the dispute, The Recruitment Junction's CEO told a disabled service user in writing that the charity did not receive public funding. That statement was important, because it framed TRJ as a small, donation led charity rather than an organisation benefiting from council and commissioner payments.

At the same time, FOI work on this domain showed that Newcastle City Council alone had paid over £130,000 to TRJ in recent years through programmes such as Community Led Local Development and the Newcastle Fund.

What the Commission confirmed

In its November 2025 response, the Charity Commission stated that TRJ's own website and open source material make it clear that The Recruitment Junction does receive public funding. That finding matches the FOI evidence already published on The Reasonable Adjustment.

In simple terms, a regulator has now confirmed in writing that the CEO's claim of no public funding was not true. For a charity that relies on public trust and public money, that contradiction is a serious governance and credibility issue.

For a deeper breakdown of the funding trail, see the funding page on this domain and the article Fact Check: Does The Recruitment Junction Receive Public Funding?

Trustee notes and Subject Access Requests

The complaint to the Commission raised concerns about TRJ's refusal to disclose relevant trustee minutes and its handling of a Subject Access Request under UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018. The CEO claimed that all data relating to the service user had been deleted shortly after a limited erasure request, which created a clear conflict with later SAR rights.

The Commission did not investigate the details of this itself. Instead, it stated that issues around trustee notes and Subject Access Requests belong with the Information Commissioner's Office. That is an explicit acknowledgement that these are information rights questions, not just customer service complaints.

The case is now with the ICO. Further detail is set out in the evidence and SAR related articles on The Reasonable Adjustment.

Pre action protocol and the courts

The Commission was also asked to consider whether TRJ's blocking of email addresses, deletion of data and refusal to engage with correspondence had obstructed the pre action protocol for potential legal proceedings.

The response was clear. The Commission said that alleged obstruction of pre action protocol is not within its remit and is a matter for the courts. That line matters because it recognises that the behaviour complained about is something that can properly be examined in a legal forum, rather than being dismissed as vexatious.

Alongside this, TRJ declined to engage with ACAS Early Conciliation, which allowed an employment related claim to be issued. That timeline is part of the wider casefile hosted on The Reasonable Adjustment.

What is now on file

The Commission's letter confirms that the information shared about The Recruitment Junction is being kept on the charity's records. In practice, that means there is now an official note that:

• a disabled ex offender referred by probation raised detailed concerns about TRJ's conduct
• those concerns involved equality, safeguarding, data rights and public funding honesty
• a senior assessment manager reviewed the case and decided how to allocate Commission resources

Why this matters for funders and partners

When funders, commissioners, or regulators look at The Recruitment Junction's history, this case is now part of the context. It does not prevent anyone from working with the charity, but it removes the option of saying they did not know there were serious questions about how a disabled service user was treated.

This domain exists so that those questions are not confined to private inboxes. It links the Commission's response to funding records, complaint handling and public claims, so that people making decisions about money, partnerships and referrals can do so with a more complete picture.