Prince reduces charity work
THE Prince of Wales is stepping back from some of his charitable work as he approaches his 70th birthday, while devoting more time to filling in for the Queen, The Daily Telegraph can disclose.
Accounts filed by the Prince of Wales’s Charitable Foundation show that total grants handed out to good causes backed by the heir to the throne have more than halved in a year from £7.7 million in 2016 to £3.1 million in the 12 months to March. Clarence House said Prince Charles had decided to “review” his charities in the run-up to his 70th birthday later this year. The decline in donations is due in part to the review and reflects his increasing workload in supporting the monarch.
The Prince attended 546 engagements last year, more than any other member of the Royal family, just as the Queen, 91, has been scaling back her state duties. The Prince is also expected to represent his mother at the Commonwealth Games in Australia in April. His charitable foundation distributes
money to a series of charities. The accounts filed at Companies House show the foundation cut funding to some of the Prince’s best known causes.
The donation to the Prince’s Foundation for Building Community was cut from £1.6million in 2016 to £545,000; the Royal Drawing School’s donation fell from £439,000 to £93,000; and the money spent on a trust for Dumfries House, a stately home saved from ruin by the Prince, fell from almost £3.1million to £152,000.
A Clarence House spokesman said: “The approach of the Prince’s 70th birthday provided a sensible opportunity to review his charities to ensure that they continue to deliver the maximum benefit for those people they were set up to help.
“The review was also designed to ensure the Prince’s personal involvement was at the right level and had the right focus.”
It is understood that the review of the Prince’s charities is focused on ensuring that the organisation is fit for the future. However, the uncertainty has meant that some charities have halted their requests for funding, which has lowered the amount of grants given. It is expected that the foundation will announce that some of its charities will merge while some will become independent organisations.
“This will ensure that the charities become more sustainable with less necessity for the engagement of HRH on a day-to-day basis, and will contribute in building a lasting legacy of his philanthropic work over many decades, and ensure that beneficiaries’ needs will continue to be met”, the foundation said in its annual accounts. The foundation receives its funding from the Prince’s organic food business, Duchy Originals, and from AG Carrick Limited, a company which owns the rights to his watercolour paintings and manages the commercial opportunities at Highgrove, the private residence of the Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall near Tetbury, Gloucs.
A G Carrick, which is named after the pseudonym used by the Prince to display his lithographs and other works, made £5 million in sales last year and donated £663,000 to the foundation. Meanwhile, Duchy, which has a partnership with the supermarket chain Waitrose, made pre-tax profits of £3.2 million, all of which were transferred to the foundation.
Despite an increase of income from the two firms, there was a reduction in overall donations to the foundation, resulting in a 15 per cent fall in the foundation’s total income to £8.1 million last year.
However, because of the reduction in grants, the foundation posted a net income of £1.9 million for 2017 compared with a deficit of £1.9million the year before.