Children in Need’s chair has quit over payments to charity
Children in Need’s chair has quit over payments to charity LGBT Youth Scotland.
It seems that £466,000 in grants was awarded to the organisation, starting seven months after James Rennie, the then chief executive of LGBTYS, was convicted of child sex assaults in 2009.
And this year Andrew Easton, who co-authored schools guidance for LGBTYS, was convicted of sharing indecent images of children including newborn babies.
According to the Telegraph, Rosie Millard quit as chair of Children in Need, accusing that charity of “institutional failure” over the matter and criticising its chief executive, Simon Antrobus. She said he did not respond with the “necessary level of seriousness”, claimed he only cut the funding out of fear of negative publicity and alleged that, on hearing about the abuse, he had said it ruined his enjoyment of a Bruce Springsteen concert.
Ms Millard, 59, said grants to LGBTYS were only suspended in May after she alerted them to the 2009 case, and, following a review, funding was withdrawn three months later.
The Telegraph states:
A BBC Children in Need spokesperson said: “Nothing is more important to us than the safety of all children and young people.
“When allegations were made in relation to LGBT Youth Scotland, their grant was immediately suspended with the full support of the Board and a review began. In order to do this thoroughly and fairly the review took three months and culminated in the decision to withdraw funding.
“The Children in Need Board of Trustees are supportive of the actions taken by the CEO and senior leadership team and stand by the decisions made.
“Rosie at all times retained the Board’s support. In the wake of her resignation, in order to ensure any lessons learned are captured, the Trustees have instigated a review of ways of working between the Board and Executive in which Rosie has kindly agreed to participate.”
But this is strange:
Mhairi Crawford, chief executive of LGBTYS, told the newspaper Millard’s resignation letter “demonstrates the ideologically driven nature of her attacks on our organisation”.
Crawford said: “We are pleased to see confirmation that Children in Need’s investigations into the work of LGBT Youth Scotland found nothing to report. Time and time again, those with anti-inclusivity motives point to historic allegations in attempts to destroy our reputation.
“Allegations that have been investigated and cleared by Police Scotland, and proven to have had no link to our work.”
If there was nothing to report, then why was funding withdrawn? And while the 2009 case may have been historic, that can hardly be said of something that happened this year.
On the other hand, if Police Scotland investigated and cleared LGBTYS representatives of wrongdoing, then (again) why was funding withdrawn?
It seems to This Writer that more has been left unsaid than said, and the public deserve a full explanation.
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‘Something must be going on’. ie ‘there’s no smoke without fire’ isn’t what I’d call investigative journalism. The ex head was jailed 15 years ago, grants began after he was jailed and WELL after he was sacked. The other case was of someone who was a user of the charity and participated in a publication. At no time did he have any responsibility or a job within the charity. Millard pressed, 15 years after the fact, for an investigation. They relented despite there being no suspicion of wrongdoing. AFAIK they have found no evidence of such either. It’s easy to smear without evidence but harder to report facts. This feels like another ‘Culture Wars’ manufactured smear. I’m disappointed you decided to participate.
You misunderstand. We have one charity that insists there has been no wrongdoing, quoting police investigations to prove it, and another charity that apparently dragged its feet over investigating, then did so and apparently found wrongdoing, raising questions about both the original reluctance and the eventual decision. It is reasonable to ask such questions.