The fundraising sector has responded to the controversy over Olive Cooke by tightening its standards, says Celina Ribeiro. But it would be more useful to talk about how to enforce existing rules and stop bad practice.

The Daily Mail expose of alleged wrongdoing at telephone agency GoGen has been storm cloud over the annual Institute of Fundraising National Convention. The front page piece, and its associated multi-media fall out, was foretold by anxious fundraisers on Monday as fishermen might await a tropical storm: with fear, curiousity, bravado and a sense that, anyway, we've probably seen it all before.

But this isn't a time for fear. It is a time for bravery in both standing up for what the sector does (and knows is) right and in meaningfully looking at reforming the things which it equally knows may not be quite right.

Bravery is not bravado. It isn't complaining that the public just don't get it. It isn't obstinately protecting one's market share at the expense of sustainability of the sector as a whole. It's being honest about how much and where changes to fundraising practice and standards need to be made. It's acknowledging that there is discomfort about some fundraising.   

The danger is, however, that fundraisers get so swept up in the minutiae of reforming the Fundraising Code of Practice that they ignore the elephant in the room: compliance and enforcement.

Let's not be knocked off our footing: the activity which makes the national press is often in breach of what is already a generally well thought-through Code. Yes, ambiguity has no place in the Code and needs ousting, but if there is a spate of house burglaries in an area, we don't seek to change the law on theft and trespass. We want the police to improve their patrols and we expect any caught wrongdoers to be prosecuted.

Similarly, charities – not just fundraisers – need to have an honest discussion about monitoring and compliance; how it's funded, what it looks like, who does it. The sector needs to be able to catch and address bad practice before donors complain and before Daily Mail reporters can submit phoney resumes to agencies. It needs to do this not only to avoid controversy, but to be able to respond to controversy with proof that the sector takes good fundraising practice very, very seriously.    

The sector cannot be distracted with fiddling with the commas and sub-clauses of the Code without addressing how to enforce compliance, or it may find itself outflanked by those who seek tough, top-down regulation. The threat of statutory regulation is as real as I, for one, have ever seen it.   

Whether there is a genuine appetite within austerity Britain to create and fund government regulation of fundraising, I'm not sure. More fiscally conservative is to use that threat to jolt the sector into something cost neutral to government, while enabling it to appear tough on big, bullying charities. But the sector must remain calm and considered.  

The sector has weathered such storms before, but it would be nice to have a sunny summer, full of strawberries and cream. While fundraisers feel under attack, they need to be proud and proactive. Such stories may crest and fall, but there is an undeniable undercurrent of donor discomfort. There is some discontent that charities will never be able to address because it is about a fundamental misunderstanding of charity and fundraising in the 21st century. Some, though, can be prevented. And must be.