Why I started this site

Several years ago I was invited to join the management committee of a small local charity. An invitation I found very flattering and was pleased to accept. Had I known then what I know now there is very little chance I would have accepted.

I had no knowledge of charity governance and didn’t realise that I would be a trustee nor was I told that I would be a trustee with legal duties and responsibilities. In fact, I and several others were told that we weren’t “proper” trustees despite being listed on the Charity Commission website as trustees.

The four longest serving trustees had decided some years earlier that they were “The Trustees” and had sought to reinforce this by commissioning a local law firm, at a cost of £2500, to produce a legal document purporting to reinforce this. Myself and two other committee members were not at all happy and the response of the “gang of four” was to exclude us from many important decisions.

The Charity’s Treasurer had always point blank refused to let anyone other than herself have oversight of the accounts and bank statements which seemed to be accepted by all committee members without argument. It was pretty much made clear that any persistence would result in one all mighty row. The main theory put forward for her compulsive secrecy was her embarrassment at being incompetent and I have no doubt it was a factor. However various strange occurrences supported our suspicions that there was something very wrong.