Prince's Trust donation to Tories under scrutiny

Finance | Celina Ribeiro | 9 Mar 2009

The Charity Commission is investigating whether the Prince’s Trust may have broken charity law after it gave money to an organisation connected to the Conservative Party.

The charity, whose founder and president is Prince Charles, is currently in discussions with the Charity Commission over a £10,050 payment to Women2Win, a members association of the Conservative Party, in 2007.

Women2Win, which is backed by David Cameron and promotes women as candidates in the party, received the payment following a fundraising lunch hosted by the Prince’s Trust and attended by Lady Thatcher at the House of Commons in October 2007.

Women2Win had agreed to find guests, who would pay to attend, in exchange for splitting the revenue – a total of £20,100 from 12 guests.

The women’s organisation received over £50,000 in donations for the year 2007 – the largest donation coming from the Prince’s Trust – and in turn donated nearly £30,000 to the Conservative Party.

Tories ‘ready to refund if required’

In the event that it is asked to return the money to the charity, Women2Win has declared it has siphoned off £10,050 ready to refund if required.

A spokesman for the Prince’s Trust told Charity News Alert that the charity had no relationship with Women2Win, but rather with Anne Jenkin, a supporter of the Trust, the founder and treasurer of Women2Win and the wife of Tory MP Bernard Jenkin.

After a lunch with Lady Thatcher was auctioned off to raise money for the Trust, Jenkin told the charity that she would be able to raise yet more money by selling more seats to the lunch for £1,675 each, and the proceeds from the additional seats would be split between Women2Win and the Prince’s Trust. The Trust’s spokesman said that guests who paid for the seats were fully aware of where their money was going.

The spokesman also repeated assertions from the Trust that its board was not involved in the planning of the lunch, but that the event and subsequent payment were the result of an “over-enthusiastic fundraiser”.

Charity Commission and Trust representatives will be meeting this week to discuss the situation and any possible outcome.

Who's Who: Celina Ribeiro

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