Trustees at a £30m charity were able to “hijack” the organisation under the noses of the regulator, former board members have claimed.
The previous trustees of the Actors’ Benevolent Fund, who say they were illegitimately ousted from the charity last year, accused the Charity Commission of “sit[ting] on its hands” since the bitter dispute arose six months ago.
They were responding to the commission’s announcement yesterday that the ABF’s existing board will stay in place and must call fresh trustee elections by the end of the year.
The regulator made its decision after opening a compliance case into the charity, following complaints that the ABF had been acting unlawfully following an annual general meeting in December where the new board was elected.
Third Sector has seen an email relaying details of the commission’s decision-making process in this case, which acknowledges that amendments passed at the December 2022 meeting did not legally take effect and that the new trustees were, for a period, not validly in place.
The commission did not respond to the content of this email. It acknowledged yesterday that there was a “breach in the process” when trustee elections were held in December but said it would appoint the trustees who received the most votes in their posts.
The ousted trustees – including the likes of Penelope Keith and James Bolam – said that, by confirming the new board, the commission was appointing people who had “caused all the problems” for the charity.
The ABF yesterday hit out at what it called “the failings of the fund’s previous leadership”.
The commission is understood to be frustrated at the level of public resources that have already gone into attempts to resolve the dispute.
The ousted trustees said in a statement: “It is extraordinary that the Charity Commission can sit on its hands while a group of people hijack a £30m+ charity under its nose.
“Since September 2022 there have been two failed general meetings – the second, the AGM, has left the charity without any trustees and acting unlawfully.
“Last week the Charity Commission seemed to be implying that it had acted to remedy the situation when it became aware of it. This is nonsense.
“The commission has been supervising these people for over a year. When the commission received an email four months ago, on the very day of the AGM, 12 December 2022, to point out that the charity had no trustees – what did they do? They did nothing.”
They added: “And now, if you can believe it, the commission has apparently used its power to put these people into the posts they could not manage to get themselves into.
“The Charity Commission keeps saying charities need to maintain public trust and confidence. That certainly hasn’t happened in this case.”
The commission said it had nothing further to add to the statement it issued yesterday, when it announced its decision and asked “all parties to this dispute to move forward together in the interests of the charity and its beneficiaries”.