REVEALED: How National Trust is sitting on £1bn fortune
As it raises tenants’ rents by up to 10,000 per cent...
THE National Trust is sitting on investments worth more than £1 billion while pleading for donations and raising rents for tenants by up to 10,000 per cent, The Mail on Sunday can reveal.
Despite the conservation charity’s vast financial reserves, it is running a series of multimillion-pound appeals to raise funds for restoration projects.
The astonishing portfolio of investments in commodities, bonds, hedge funds and property is guarded by half a dozen leading fund managers.
Revelations about the charity’s enormous investment pool come after it told hundreds of leasehold tenants they faced ground rent increases of up to 10,000 per cent. One 87-year-old was told his rent would leap from £148 to £15,000 a year.
The rent row is the latest in a series of controversies that have hit the 122-year guardian of Britain’s heritage. Earlier this month, it was forced into an embarrassing U-turn after banning volunteers from meeting the public if they refused to wear gay pride rainbow badges.
According to the National Trust’s most recent accounts, in the year to February 28, 2016, the total value of non-pension investments was £1,008 million. It received £522 million in income in the same period, including £51 million left in wills and £178 million in membership income. The charity spent £540 million in the same 12 months with a dozen staff earning six-figure salaries. Under-fire National Trust Director General Dame Helen Ghosh, who has been in the post for five years, announced last month that she would be stepping down next year. Despite the investments portfolio, the charity is appealing for donations for a number of ‘vital’ restoration projects. It is running a ‘Protect Special Places’ appeal, saying it needs to look after buildings damaged by damp, as well as coastlines hit by erosion. It is also asking for cash to support a £5.4 million project to repair the roof of The Vyne, a Tudor palace in Hampshire. The Trust said: ‘Around 80 per cent of investments are held in restricted funds, meaning they can only be spent on specific places or purposes. The charity also has to keep a proportion of funds as general reserves… This is good governance.’ It added that it would consider forgoing ground rent increases where it considered leaseholders had been misled. The Tenants Association of the National Trust said: ‘It’s disappointing for our members to read that £1 billion is squirreled away while their rents continue to increase to stratospheric levels.’