Prince Andrew hands over £355k of his own money to sort out pay breach by his charity
- The Prince Andrew Charitable Trust (Pact) gave thousands to Amanda Thirsk
- His former private secretary accepted payment despite being an unpaid trustee
- Charities Commission said it was a conflict of interest and breach of charity law
Prince Andrew has had to pay back more than £350,000 to his charity after a watchdog ruled it breached the law by making ‘unauthorised’ payments to a member of his staff.
The Prince Andrew Charitable Trust (Pact) handed over hundreds of thousands of pounds to the duke’s former private secretary Amanda Thirsk, who stepped down after his disastrous Newsnight interview last year.
At the time she was also an unpaid trustee of the trust and accepted payments for work she was said to have done for it.
Prince Andrew has had to pay back more than £350,000 to his charity after a watchdog ruled it breached the law by making ‘unauthorised’ payments
On Tuesday the Charities Commission said this was a conflict of interest and breach of charity law. Andrew has now refunded £355,297 from his household funds to Pact, which is in the process of being wound up.
The trust was created to support his work in education, entrepreneurship, science, technology and engineering.
The Charities Commission identified ‘concerns’ about Mrs Thirsk being paid by the trust’s three trading subsidiary companies, of which she was also a director.
The payments were made between April 2015 and January this year via Andrew’s office, where Mrs Thirsk was also working as his private secretary.
The Prince’s former secretary Amanda Thirsk (right) received hundreds of thousands of pounds from the trust which was deemed to be a conflict of interest
She stepped down from her role after the Prince’s disastrous Newsnight interview (pictured)
According to charity law, trustees cannot also be paid to act as directors of a subsidiary company unless there is authority from the charity’s governing committee or authorisation by the Commission.
Helen Earner, director of operations at the Charity Commission, said: ‘We’re glad that concerns we identified are now resolved, after the charity acted quickly and efficiently to rectify these matters.’
Pact said in a statement on Tuesday that its former trustees had ‘inadvertently’ breached charity law.