Ousted trustee to be reinstated
The Charity Commission found itself at odds with the restructured First-tier Tribunal (Charity)...
...which rejected all of the seven grounds given by the regulator for its earlier decision to remove Nagendram Seevaratnam as a trustee of the Sivayogam temple on 27 March 2008.
The commission had maintained that evidence of mismanagement and misconduct was sufficient grounds for his removal to ‘protect the property, affairs and reputation of the charity and its future administration’ and relied on its powers under s.18(2) Charities Act 1993. One concern was the reliance of the charity on short-term loans and inappropriate contractual arrangements relating to them.
The tribunal did not agree with this decision, although it did concede that some mismanagement and misconduct had taken place – just not enough to justify the appellants’s removal and ruled he should be reinstated immediatedly. It had received a letter on 18 August 2009 from the charity’s other trustees saying they would welcome this and that they would consider it ‘a privilege to work along with him’.
The tribunal said it was also ‘most concerned’ to hear that evidence submitted to the regulator by Seevaratnam demonstrating he had implemented adequate procedures for selecting and monitoring funding recipients in Sri Lanka had not even been translated.
Author: Clarissa Dann
Clarissa Dann was the editor of Caritas as well as an HR and management online service,he People Bulletin until July 2011.
She is now the editor of the specialist trade finance magazine, Trade and Forfaiting Review which can be viewed at www.tfreview.com but does write on charity finance and investment from time to time.
Clarissa has a background in legal and professional publishing, as well as business journalism and holds an MBA from
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