Prince William helped launch the National Emergencies Trust last year, but he didn’t become royal patron of the NET until a few days ago. The idea behind NET is that it’s a safety net, a go-to fund for future or current emergencies, so that money is already there to be immediately dispersed as a tragedy or catastrophe unfolds. I have no shade for the NET, and I think it’s a good issue for William. He even made an Instagram video about the NET (with curious timing, but whatever). But here’s a bad idea: William and Kate using the coronavirus lockdown to embiggen and enrich their own Royal Foundation, using the NET as some kind of cover. Which is what this kind of sounds like?
The National Emergencies Trust said that £12.5 million had been distributed since the emergency appeal was launched with William’s help last month. Today, Wednesday 15 April, Sebastian Shakespeare of the Daily Mail has revealed that the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, have teamed up with a string of wealthy benefactors to help charities who are supporting those leading the fight against the coronavirus.
Shakespeare reports that William and Kate have been approached in recent weeks by a series of donors, who have offered funds to the pair’s Royal Foundation, which will hand out grants to the most worthy causes. A source tells Shakespeare: ‘Under William and Kate’s direction, the foundation has spent the past two weeks speaking to charities and groups who support emergency service workers. They’re working with a number of donors who have offered support. William and Kate are keen to ensure it goes to the services who really need it most.’
It is thought that Cavell Nurses’ Trust and The Care Workers’ Charity are among the groups to which the Royal Foundation will be offering support. It is hoped that grants will be awarded to some charities imminently, in order to allow them to roll out extra services. The source added: ‘Kate and William both realise help is needed quickly for many of these organisations’.
A few things. One, why are wealthy donors contacting William and Kate and not the other way around? Why are wealthy donors begging Will & Kate to take their charitable donations? Why is it that Will & Kate aren’t calling all of their contacts (heh) to direct funds and plead for wealthy people to give, to donate, especially to the NET? Two, if wealthy people are contacting Will & Kate, surely the best thing to do in an immediate, time-sensitive crisis would be for the Royal Foundation to simply tell those wealthy donors to give directly to specific charities? Why does the money have to be funneled through the Royal Foundation? Just to make Will & Kate look busy and embiggened? Three, what ever happened to Kate’s Struggle Survey? I guess we’re not supposed to wonder about that, even though the branding on that was that Kate was “credible” and it wasn’t just some dumb “vanity exercise” and that the survey would help direct Kate’s future work. I guess that’s over. She’s already on to the next thing: being keen about funneling donations to the Royal Foundation.
Photos courtesy of Backgrid.
So, they’re grifters? Gotcha!! There is no need whatsoever for them to be middlemen…why don’t people realize this? All that’s going to happen is that some of the donor’s money is going to disappear to W&K’s other floundering projects. Just like they tried to do with taking money from Meghan’s successful projects.
The Cambs are really so pathetic. The charities that they claim to value so much would be so much better off if the Cambs just made appeals on their behalf. I feel like their foundation is literally just a way to skim money.
I agree @Royalwatcher. Donations would be used far more efficiently if they were sent directly to the charities. There is no need for the middle men and if the middle men are so keen to use their platform to fundraise, then they can still go ahead and do that for the charities. Foundations require extra workers on to of the ones that are already required to operate a charity.
I’m interested in how everyone feels about Harry & Meghan’s foundation though. It seems to be one rule for the Cambridges and other for the Sussex’s.
I generally think foundations are inefficient middlemen, especially celebrity ones. Who knows what the Sussex entity will be? I don’t think it’s a foundation though.
I think that’s a bit of a strawman argument (one rule for Cambs and one for Sussexes) because we’ve already seen that they’ve treated their charitable endeavors completely differently! So why shouldn’t they be judged differently? Meghan released several completed projects where the benefits were clear while the Cambs just collect money and then claim they will decide best how and where to distribute it. And we know that they also shuffle money around within their foundation.
We also don’t know what the Sussexes org structure will be, so I’ll wait to offer an opinion about it. But from what we’ve seen, the Sussexes are more targeted and specific (and transparent!!) with their fundraising. Meghan’s projects were all done with one charity in mind and she was clear about how much was raised. Same with the way Harry has raised money for Sentebale (e.g.) with concerts and the like. I don’t see them following the Camb RF model where they are taking in money under one guise and then redistributing it as they see fit. But I guess I’ll have to wait and see what structure the Sussexes roll out. I would not be pleased if they set it up like the Cambridges’ RF…but I also don’t believe they will.
So in general, i’m not that well versed in charitable giving, nonprofits, foundations, etc.
My concern here though isn’t the idea of giving to a middleman – if you don’t know where to best direct your funds, giving to a middleman that you trust to best distribute those funds (i.e. an organization with knowledge of which smaller charity/organization needs what and what are specific community needs) seems like a good idea.
my issue is that we haven’t seen THIS foundation do anything really noteworthy in terms of fundraising and then distributing money, especially with H&M gone. Given that the foundation’s finances were supposedly a big part of why the Sussexes split from KP last year, I am side-eyeing will and kate for this. It definitely seems like a way to boost the fundraising for the foundation and there appears to be no promise that the majority of the money donated right now will go to other charities/organizations.
We have very little real information on what Harry and Meghan intend to do with their organization, so I do not know how anyone can give an opinion.
This is a pretty typical practice for big dollar donors. Donating to a foundation relieves them of any culpability if the charity misuses the funds. It also saves them the effort of doing research to determine which charities to support and how much to give.
As I recall H&M said directly that they would not be setting up a foundation but instead creating another type of non-profit entity. What that is or how it will work remains to be seen.
Harry and Meghan are far more transparent in their finances than the shady RF, also they’re private citizens, if anything they do flops, they don’t have grandma’s daddy’s or eternal taxpayer funds to fall back on. Also can we stop putting the weight of the world on Meghan and Harry, their finances don’t match even Sophie and Edward’s let alone FFK, FK and the entire RF.
The money is in part going to go towards throwing parties so that Kate and William can get their picture taken with people from the various charities. Some money will of course be donated to actually help the charity. And money will also be kept in reserve for the Foundation to use elsewhere (yacht race).
Where did the regatta money go? Did they ever say how much was raised?
Think of them like the United Way. I’ve worked closely with a major stateside UW and let me tell you I will never donate to such a clearinghouse. Part of your donation goes to a cause specifically under their umbrella of causes and part of it goes to administration costs and overhead (E.g., big donor parties and events and thank you dinners). Give directly to the charity. They may also do this with your donation, but at least they get 100% of your money, not 75 or 50% after the funnel organization has taken its cut.
@Nic919. I’ve seen nothing about any money being raised. The best I’ve seen is people trying to minimize what was spent on the event.
It looks like it was just a big expensive photo op.
You’re asking the right questions BUT I am glad that the Cambridges are funding and getting donations. Phone calls and messages are great as a morale boost but PPE is something that’s actually going to keep the safe – not saying morale boosts aren’t important but both are needed.
If it is going through the foundation I just hope it gets to the charities ASAP. But this is a good thing to do.
They say the donors are approaching Will and Kate to make them look popular and desirable, that people are begging to work with them on something. They have to appear more popular, desirable and robust than you know who.
Rich people asking richer people to give a tiny fraction of their wealth to poor people. And they all do it for some kind of clout or to ease their guilt at hoarding resources. It’s grotesque. Wealth should be automatically redistributed so the poor aren’t at the mercy of the whims of the wealthy.
I can’t disagree with any of this.
I am on board with wealth re-distribution. No one needs to be a billionaire, or a multi-millionaire. Let’s start by redistributing all the wealth/goods/lands stolen by the BRF!
I agree with you on the redistribution completely. The 0.1% have way too much money and the inequity has increased exponentially in the last 50 years.
That said I do not buy that rich people are randomly contacting twit and twat to give money to the foundation. Rich people often like to give money directly to get credit for it themselves. Why hide their efforts in the weird royal umbrella grift scheme.
I imagine that there are promises of future royal appearances or the like, which would explain why someone like the Duke of Westminster is bypassing the foundation, because he prob doesn’t care about being seen with William and Kate. But other rich people/celebrities might.
@Becks1, it is interesting that Prince George’s godfather is bypassing the Foundation and donating directly. Hmmmm….
And here I thought they did it for the tax break. Silly me
Yes!
Everything they do comes across as disingenuous and an attempt to stay one step ahead of Harry & Meghan in perception and in the news cycle. The one-sided competition is all very obvious now.
This ^^ all of this ^^. That’s exactly what it is. The news is out that H&M have donated £90,000 and now of course William and Kate are raising money! Of course they are! Ugh. If I see one more green outfit from this Ireland tour I’ll be ill.
On top of that, the Duke of Westminster’s gifts. They had to appear to be doing something or, well, people might see them for who they are.
Of course, yes. This “me too” and one-upmanship on the Cambridges’ part is becoming detestable. And so is the media kissing their asses.
@Bren, Exactly this. The Sussexes are nowhere near UK, but they seem so present in everything Royal related. Everything the Cambridge’s are doing seem in direct competition to what the Sussexes are doing, or what they think they will do. The Sussexes set up their own foundation apart from the Cambridge’s for a reason. They should be looking to the Princes Trust as their model for working or even merging with it, since William is Charles’ heir. Have no idea how their foundation operates but they always like to announce things before the structure is fully in place.
This is so dumb. Like people with that much money can’t figure out where to donate their money? And what about Charles? He seems to be running the more legit foundation why aren’t they calling him? I hope they have to report all those big donations and where the money winds up.
Using the pandemic to fill their pockets you mean.
Since Harry and Meghan left The royal foundation they have zero initiative that generates money
Could it be a way to replace the funds,or lack of funding for their foundation? Wasn’t this a bone of contention with Sussexes? Increasing the foundation’s funds may make it seem that their was money all along. No one will question in time of crisis
The financial reports will explain everything so there is nothing the Cambridges can hide.
Previous financial reports showing the Royal Foundation to be a mess have been released only to be ignored by most.
I Don’t believe for a second that donors approached William and Kate. If that was the Kate what was the mess about meghan’s Cookbook benefits?
Didn’t they tried to keep a part for will and kate’s Foundation?
To avoid taxes and look good?
My goodness that photo of Kate is nightmarish.
I think it’s possibly the worst picture of her ever published. And she’s wearing probably the worst clothes she’s ever selected in them–double whammy of awfulness.
She looks like she stepped out of the 1940’s.
It really is. I always think she is getting ready to snort. All of her looks for their Ireland tour were awful.
Her hair needs a trim and the headband looks awful. IMO
Typically in a crisis such as this one, it is fundraisers who reach out to donors looking for an increased donation. I buy that Bill and Cathy know lots of rich people who might want to help and don’t know how but why on earth would they approach them? I mean, these two are at best morons and at worst grifters who are running the royal foundation into the ground.
I would dispute your point that giving directly is the most impactful strategy for donors though. Investing in umbrella organizations can be really smart, especially as they can help organizations under the auspices with capacity building, and also can play a more effective role with lobbying and advocacy(which the sector needs increased help from the government right now because the staggering increase in demand of front line supports). Or even a model like a federated funder, providing backbone support to organizations. That being said, the Royal Foundation is a hot mess and has shown no capacity to fulfill either of these roles. Yikes. People would be much better off putting their dollars into the hands of other orgs.
I think that it is important to note that the Royal Foundation can’t lobby the government for anything – the royals have to been seen as apolitical. That can be a big stumbling block for royals who want to do significant social work, like fx CP Mary of Denmark with her Mary Foundation. She can’t do the kind of lobbying but she can, and she does, work on projects in co-operation with some of the really big charitable foundations and organizations in Denmark, like The Velux Foundation and the Danish Red Cross.
They’re not apolitical and you know it, they may claim they are but when conservatives and Magats and nationalists are in their core group you know which side they’re on
Hence why I wrote “have to be seen”. That is the fiction on how the British monarchy works. There’s no reason to be snide. And why do you mention MAGATs – that is a US phenomenon that has no bearing on whatever political clout the British monarch has.
The Monarch has inherited privileges that should be abolished. However, Liz has been very very careful not to meddle in the governance and politics of the nation. Other monarchies, in countries with written constitutions, are much more curtailed when it comes to the powers of the monarch. Fx the Swedish King has zero constitutional powers (not even the formality of signing new laws), his office is purely ceremonial. However, Britain doesn’t have a written constitution, only a large and complex set of precedents, which also means that the extent of the Monarch’s powers is ambiguous and a lot rests on unwritten rules. Old privileges and powers of the office have survived past universal suffrage, such as the Monarch’s right to prorogue Parliament (she really shouldn’t have that power), a coronation ceremony (which has no place in a constitutional monarchy), etc.
Lol I have recently discovered that fergie had the same headband has Kate during 80s. As for the foundation , I cant with these two. Lol even sussexsquad raised 21000 usd for archie bday and will donate to food bank or something. Keen cambriges are pathetic and their fans are even more pathetic. They cant even raise a shit for their keen . All their defense is keen is beautiful , wonder mother and one day she will be queen. Other than that nothing. Even more pathetic is that they lurk here all day and they discuss how Sussex stans are crazy . Instead of saving or donating to Kate charity. Lol her struggle survey is typical example is that she is not that popular and cant ask people to take survey for 5 minutes . Its 0.3% of people took that survey of 60 million people that too most are taken from overly keen Kate stans from other countries. Pathetic
https://images.app.goo.gl/MKfU3N57ofWdoCcd6
I have to say, their PR people are making them look really good to the general public right now. When this whole mess goes away, this will stay in the collective memory of the British public. No shade on what they are doing.
I really want hope the Sussex’s to come back with morale boosting campaign. Just wish they never joined their current PR company and went with an organisation that was a bit more progressive.
@Tila: I think a Marc Bolland esque PR person is needed for the Sussexes. Someone with some ruthlessness who just has one goal in mind – make their client(s) look good. So I understand people’s apprehensions about Sunshine & Sachs but perhaps people who could get the job done efficiently without much emotion was what the Sussexes had in mind.
The Sussexes can bring the empathy and emotion into their work by themselves.
Hiring ruthless Mark Bolland types would infect an entire organization turning it into something no longer recognizable to the founders or potential donors.
I wouldn’t want Marc anywhere near the foundation/charity. But for general purposes like stopping rumours I think someone like him isn’t a bad choice.
Mark Bolland shut down rumors by playing the game with British tabloids. There’s a price to be paid for that and Charles is still paying the debt.
He’s also the same man who turned Camilla from the “most hated woman in Great Britain” who had fruit thrown at her when she walked down the street to the Camilla you hear about today.
I don’t agree with his methods nor should I think the Sussexes should use them. But you can’t deny his results
@sofia Yes and Bolland threw William and Harry under the bus to get those results. Now look at Charles relationship with his sons today. Was it worth it? Only Charles can answer that.
We’ll have to agree to disagree on this.
How do you know Ken Sunshine isn’t better than Mark Boland?
I don’t think everybody bought into the Camilla is great spin. There are people who can’t stand her and will never show up at any of her appearances. Considering how Bolland threw Harry under a bus to help Charles image, maybe another person could have been hired by Charles to work to counter all the negativity about Harry and Meghan.
I don’t know, William got ripped pretty hard recently and his coronavirus comments are still in the ether. They can’t even speak to a specific amount being donated to a specific charity either. It’s all vague nonsense and when others are donating direct amounts to specific charities or organizations it all looks pretty empty. I don’t think anyone but royalists will care what these two do.
Are they *really* being seen so positively by the public??? Or are you getting duped by the image the British media is projecting for them? Beyond the royalists and the sycophantic press, how often has the general response to Will and Kate’s actions actually been clearly positive? I can’t even think of one instance where reactions to them over the past month have been better than ambivalent or a blase “oh that’s nice”. They’ve even been mocked at one point with those ridiculously staged “working from home” photos.
While the ” story” is they were approached, may be the Keens asked friends to do it This gives the “appearance” that they were asked.
Could it be a way to replace the funds,or lack of funding for their foundation? Wasn’t this a bone of contention with Sussexes? Increasing the foundation’s funds may make it seem that their was money all along. No one will question in time of crisis
How’s the Art Room these days? Bet it would love £50k funnelled into its coffers…
I work in charity fundraising (not for the royals!). While I don’t know the full details of this I will say that in the last few weeks I have seen many direct approaches from people and companies who are looking for ways to help and who want guidance on how/where they can make an impact. There are many different and important causes and some people find it better/easier to give where there is an organised effort being made, or where pooled resources/matched giving or can help make a bigger impact. This can be especially true where corporate donors are restricted by policies (they might only be able to give to certain things or types of organisations). Sometimes larger foundations have better resources to identify needs, filter requests or identify areas of most urgent need so they can be a really helpful tool.
There is an article today on how the Duke of Westminster has donated 12.5 million pounds to the NHS. It is the largest personal donation to the cause and goes directly to the NHS charity, already established, split between frontline support and research. In the articles, it’s mentioned that he is a close friend of the Cambridges and godfather to George. So there’s one rich contact who bypassed the Cambridges’ foundation.
This story is clearly another case of the Cambridges needing to be seen as being associated with giving, despite not giving themselves.
There is a very cute story about a 99-year old vet who is doing laps in his garden on his walker to raise funds for the NHS. So far, he’s raised 5 million pounds. I doubt he is thinking of giving the money to Wills & Kate so it can be passed out.
ok… so why don’t they just do it? this habit they have of announcing things they are planning to do, which afaik rarely come to fruition, is so bizarre but they always seem to get credit for effort. all the details about their prowess and keenness could still be shared after the fact.
Why do something when they get praised for being keen about something? It is perfect for their work-shy ways.
This is their MO. An easy PR boost about them being keen about a cause, and then hoping that the public doesn’t pay enough attention to remember that there was little or no follow-through.
They’ve gotten away with this for ages and they’ll continue to get away with it because the press still bash the Sussexes, which seem to generate a lot of clicks.
Why can’t they do like the Sussexes? They solicited funds from their fans but instead of asking fans to give through them, they encouraged people to donate directly to charities in need. The Cambridges are such hypocrites. Give to us but we’ll never donate not even a penny of our own money. Their hand is always stretched out to demand, give us, give us, give us, never do they ever donate!!! No wonder Australia didn’t want their sorry arses to go there, they just keep taking, taking and taking some more without ever giving anything back.🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄
The Sussexes never solicited funds from their fans. Their fans showed initiative and started their own fundraising campaigns.
Yes the fans showed initiative first last year by creating the Global Sussex Baby Shower. Harry & Meghan acknowledged the grassroot campaign created by fans and then they highlighted additional organizations that the public could make donations to in lieu of sending gifts.
Will & Kate would never solicit their followers for charity because most of their followers are fake and paid for.
It makes sense that people approach an established foundation as they don’t want to do the legwork of who needs money, who’s still operating etc. That way a foundation pools the money and it gets distributed and the person donating probably gets a tax receipt. I don’t see the conspiracy theories here others do. I’d much rather see people giving money to established foundations with oversight than dodgy GoFundMes that pop up with GoFundMe taking a big, big cut.
People donating large sums of money will check out the Foundation’s reputation, and last I read the sharks were circling the RF.
Every time I see that hysterical laughing hyena shot of Kate in Ireland, I get freaked out and a bit scared. She’s so unnatural. I guess she’s still nervous doing her job.
The Cambridges Royal Foundation always makes me think of the Trump foundation – a cover for dodgy financial mismanagement. There are reasons why the RF had several FD’s since it was founded and also why the auditors did not have anything good to stay about how its run and how the money is managed.
Trump used his charitable foundation of line his own pocket, pay off pron stars, pay legal fees and buy paintings of himself – wanna bet Willileaks was upto something similar.
I think you may be right and I wonder if that’s part of what the reporters kept alluding to over the winter – the “big secret” they cant talk about for legal reasons – extreme mismanagement (or corruption?) going on at the royal foundation. I’m not sure how much the average British person would care if it was “just” mismanagement but I would imagine more blatant “lining the pockets” would be a big deal.
There is definitely more to the story of the money from the cookbook being diverted away from HUB. If the royal reporters were actual journalists and not court stenographers they would have been looking into this ages ago.
It doesn’t actually say that they will be donating anything though. It just says that they hope grants will be distributed to charities. They’ve been speaking with charities and donors, but how long does it take to write a freaking check? I also don’t like that Will and Kate will chose the most worthy causes. So which ones will be unworthy? And how much will these charities actually receive? If they actually do what they say they will great, but everything in this article just sounds so vague. Nothing is clear cut.
I said weeks ago in another comment that they should on the phone STAT garnering support from their very/moderately/whateverly rich friends to go to where it’s needed MOST. For example food banks, PPE supplies, children’s books/toys/schools supplies and, to tie it into their mental health initiatives, phone support for people who are suffering depression, anxiety, even people in abusive relationships who are finding isolating dangerous. So much could have been started many weeks ago but they’re just doing it NOW?!?!
lol no wonder they rushed to put this little announcement out🤦♀️that £90thousand donation from Sussexs wedding must’ve triggered them. The keenbridges were for years accused of misappropriation of funds. Just read the annual reports. Alot of the joint money was spent on Bill’s projects which mostly didnt even make it to launch date!
The money “raised” so far includes £5mil from government+additional grants & funds that were pre existing from different charities. I’m certain that they will try to funnel some of the money for their own interests in the disguise of maximising the value!
I wish they would dig into their pockets and DONATE their own funds, not set up a foundation or add their name to, it’s like getting credit when they’ve done actually nothing. If I ws to donate right now, I would have to take from my personal income, so money that would be spent on my family, or groceries, or clothing or gas or small savings is going towards that, i don’t just attach my name on a donation bucket and say whatever OTHER people place in here will be donated, and give myself a pat on the back. THere are tons of legit chairties already why can’t they just give money!???
Give money?? As in their own money? That would be asking for too much, yinyang. Another poster said yesterday that Prince Charles is the only royal who makes financial donations. Not sure how they would know that, but W&K don’t strike me as the types to dig deep into their own pockets. Asking others to, yes.
Well I won’t hold my breath, I could tell you that much, haha!
How keen.
The covid crisis is a semi-plausible excuse for abandoning her Struggle Survey, but there are is also so much relevant Early Years stuff she could be doing. Do what Sophie did and highlight useful educational resources for kids. Or just do an Instagram post being like “reading to your kids is important!” There would be so many easy wins for them here if they had even an ounce of imagination.