Charity

A former senior manager at an addiction charity, who travelled overseas to avoid jail after defrauding the organisation out of almost £160,000, has been detained and returned to the UK for sentencing.  Donna Wells, 41, was employed as the service manager at Young Addaction Halton and used her position to transfer large amounts of money

The British Museum’s director, Hartwig Fischer, said today that he would step down from his role over the theft of multiple precious items from the museum’s collection. In a statement, Fischer described his presence at the museum as “a distraction”, a little over a week after multiple thefts reported to management in 2021 were made

The homelessness charity St Mungo’s has confirmed it has come to a pay agreement with Unite the Union, ending three months of strike action.  The new pay offer package, which was put forward by the charity on 18 August, will see 90 per cent of staff receive a total minimum increase of £3,125 in 2023-24.

One in four people believe giving to charity is an even more important priority during the cost of living crisis, new research has found. The independent media agency Medialab partnered YouGov in April to survey more than 2,000 adults living in Britain about changing behaviour during a prolonged economic downturn. It found that 25 per

The chief executive of Acevo has today accused the Home Secretary of using the Charity Commission’s statutory inquiry into Care4Calais to make “an irrelevant and politically motivated point about charitable purpose”. Following the publication of the regulator’s statutory inquiry findings into the refugee charity yesterday, Suella Braverman told The Telegraph newspaper that some charities “are

A lack of appropriate governance structures and properly defined roles allowed the former chief executive of the refugee charity Care4Calais to dominate the organisation without challenge, the Charity Commission has reported today. In the findings of its statutory inquiry, which concluded today, the regulator criticised the former trustees of the charity for serious historic misconduct

A charity that supports the mental and financial health of people working behind the scenes in film, television and cinema has increased its budget by £500,000 after an 800 per cent increase in applications for stopgap grants that support people in urgent financial need. The Film and TV Charity said the “unprecedented situation” was the

The Royal National Institute of Blind People (RNIB) has appointed Mari Jones at its chief operating officer. Jones joins the charity after a 16-year career in telecoms, most recently as emerging channels director at BT. She has several family members who live with sight loss, including her 10-year-old son, Finn. Jones said: “With deep lived

The Charity Commission has launched an inquiry into a drama school after it failed to comply with an official warning over its accounts. The Kogan Academy of Dramatic Arts has not filed accounts for 2019, 2020 or 2021, with the last available accounts filed in the financial year ending July 2019. The commission issued the

A corporate partnership between The British Heart Foundation and Royal Mail has enabled the charity to offer its helpline phone service free of charge for the first time since it launched 20 years ago. The helpline, which is available five days a week, offers expert information and support about heart and circulatory diseases and their

A military charity has suspended its operations after experiencing “reputational damage” that has “made operating very difficult”, according to its chair of trustees.  The Portsmouth-based charity Forgotten Veterans UK announced on Facebook that it had been “extremely difficult for the charity to run effectively” in recent months.  The Charity Commission opened a regulatory compliance case

A woman has been jailed after raising £34,000 for people affected by the Australian bushfires but only donating £10 to charity.  Cambridgeshire Constabulary said that in 2020, Kerry Palin, 27 and of Rushden, Northamptonshire, started an “equestrian-themed online auction on Facebook” which she claimed was to raise money for charity. The page exploded in popularity

The daughter of the record-breaking fundraiser Sir Captain Tom Moore received payments of thousands of pounds to her private company for work in the name of the Captain Tom Foundation, it has been claimed.  BBC Newsnight reported that Hannah Ingram-Moore’s family company was paid “thousands of pounds” for her involvement in the 2021 and 2022

The Charity Commission has announced statutory inquiries into two connected charities because of concerns about potential misconduct or mismanagement. Investigations have been launched into the Jewish education charities Dalaid and the Schwarzschild Foundation, which both operate out of the same building and share trustee Maurice Levenson. Levenson is also the chair of Dalaid, according to

Net income at Guide Dogs fell by 92 per cent last year, new figures show. The charity’s accounts for 2022 show its surplus dropped from £43m in 2021 to £3.4m last year.  The documents show the charity recorded an income of £142m in 2022, down £11m on the previous year. Guide Dogs said the 2021

Trustees at the British Museum have launched an independent security review after precious items, some dating back to the 15th century BC, were found to be missing, stolen or damaged. A member of staff has been dismissed and the museum said it would be taking legal action against the individual, the charity said in a

The combined pension liability of the largest charities in England and Wales rose by £2.5bn over the past year, new figures show.  A report from financial advice firm Hymans Robertson finds that the aggregate defined benefit liabilities of the largest 40 charities in England and Wales by annual income totalled £12bn in their most recent

London-based charities that support women and girls experiencing domestic abuse and sexual violence are being invited to apply for a share of £3m.  Sadiq Khan, the Mayor of London, said the funds were part of a £117m investment to support this cause. The £3m fund will provide two-year grants of between £30,000 and £100,000 for

Donations by text message to charities fell by 28.1 per cent last year, latest figures show.  Data published by the Phone-paid Services Authority shows the amount donated was £35.9m in the year to the end of March, down from £50m in the previous year. It is down from a record £65.8m in 2020/21. The report, which

Girlguiding UK will press ahead with proposals to sell its five activity centres, affecting almost 100 staff.  The charity said in May that it was planning to sell the sites because they had been losing money for years and would cost more than £20m to bring up to standard. It has this week confirmed it

The chief executive of MSI Reproductive Choices has received a £233,068 bonus in 2022 – doubling his annual salary. The reproductive healthcare charity’s annual accounts for 2022, which were filed with Companies House last week, show bonus payments to Simon Cooke rose from £229,068 last year. His base salary is £233,068, the accounts show. The

The Bone Cancer Research Trust has appointed Will Burchell as its new chief executive. Burchell, who joins from the same role at the Nottinghamshire Deaf Society, succeeds Mat Cottle-Shaw, who has become chief executive at Rotherham Hospice after eight years at the trust, the last almost two as chief executive. The Bone Cancer Research Trust,

Charities have welcomed a decision by the Mayor of London to boost cash support to change their vehicles to ensure they are compliant with the expansion of the Ultra Low Emission Zone scheme. Sadiq Khan announced last week that he would increase the funds available under the associated scrappage scheme by £50m to £160m. As

The conservation charity the Yorkshire Dales Rivers Trust is set to receive a donation of almost £24,000 from a farming business that was found to be illegally spreading waste sludge.  The Environment Agency said J E Hartley Ltd, of Thorganby, near York, had submitted an enforcement undertaking after repeatedly spreading waste sludge on its own

SOS Children’s Villages UK has filed a serious incident report with the Charity Commission after undercover footage showed fundraisers working on its behalf appearing to break the fundraising code.  An investigation conducted by WalesOnline involved a reporter seeking work at two connected agencies called Vantage and Solution Cardiff.  The companies were raising funds for SOS

A UK charity has pledged £29m to train thousands of young people in heritage skills. The cash injection comes from the Hamish Ogston Foundation, which said it was the largest single commitment to the cause ever made.  The funding will pay for up to 2,700 new young people in the UK and across the Commonwealth to

A group of advice charities have launched a summer campaign to highlight a threat posed by “imposter firms” that they say are trying to cash in on their names. StepChange, Citizens Advice and the Money Advice Trust are concerned that rogue companies are running copycat advertisements online that look very similar to their own official

The defunct telephone fundraising agency Listen left legacy debts of more than £3.3m to unsecured creditors, including thousands of pounds to the housing and homelessness charity Shelter, documents show. The details have been revealed in documents submitted to Companies House last week by the firm of liquidators appointed to wind down the business. Listen, which

CAF Bank has defended its financial position after a national newspaper reported it had made “significant paper losses” on investments last year.  The Financial Times reported over the weekend that CAF Bank, which supports more than 14,000 charities, had “amassed significant paper losses on its bond holdings in the wake of rising interest rates”.  It

The Scout Association has earmarked more than £1m from its reserves to cover the costs of evacuating thousands of UK campers from an international gathering in South Korea. Tens of thousands of teenagers at the World Scout Jamboree in the south-western county of Buan have been removed from the campsite because of issues including extreme