I remember William Hague from back in the day, when he was the British Foreign Secretary, a member of David Cameron’s government, and he was very friendly with Angelina Jolie. Jolie and Hague did good work together, and they organized the London summit on sexual violence in war and conflict. In 2015, Hague even stepped down from his parliamentary seat because he wanted to do more work in that area, preventing rape and violence against women in conflict. He was eventually given a title – Lord Hague of Richmond – and he was then a member of the House of Lords. Except he’s giving up that position now, because he wants to spend more time working on The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s Royal Foundation. Interesting. This whole Eden Confidential column is fascinating:
Let no one be in doubt over the scale of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s charitable ambitions. I can reveal that one of Westminster’s most experienced figures has been inspired to quit politics to concentrate on his work for their Royal Foundation.
William Hague, who was Foreign Secretary and de facto deputy prime minister for four years, as well as being an ex-leader of the Conservative Party, has vacated his seat in Parliament.
‘I’m taking a leave of absence from the House of Lords,’ he tells me, confirming that he will be ‘working on charitable things including with the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’.
Prince William and Catherine appointed Lord Hague of Richmond as chair of their foundation’s board of trustees a year ago. But at the time, it was assumed by many that he would simply be a heavyweight name to add to their charity. In fact, he’s determined to play an active role in helping our future king and queen achieve their ambitions for the foundation, which enjoyed a surge in income last year, to a staggering £11.78 million.
That’s almost double the £6.68 million raised in 2019, when the Duke and Duchess of Sussex were still involved. Some royal watchers had predicted that the foundation would struggle after Prince Harry and Meghan quit in 2019 to create their own charitable organisation. They called their new foundation Sussex Royal but were ordered to drop the name by the Queen after they quit royal duties last year. They have created a new body, Archewell, which has been seen as a rival.
Lord Hague, 60, doesn’t appear to be in a hurry to don his ermine robes again, telling me: ‘I do not feel sorry at all that I’m not involved in politics.’
He formed a warm relationship with Prince William and Kate while he was Foreign Secretary, working with them to combat the illegal wildlife trade. As chair of the foundation, Hague replaced Prince George’s godfather, Jamie Lowther-Pinkerton, who was William’s right-hand man for 15 years.
Going into full-time work for the royals is something people tend to do at either the start or the end of their careers. They’ll start their careers working for the royals and then use those connections to leave royal work for better pay and better jobs. Either that or people – like Hague – will go into royal work at the tailend of a successful career so that they can be a professional “wise man” and consigliere in a position with a fancy title. That’s what this sounds like: Hague wants to influence the future future king, become a trusted advisor and help beef up William and Kate’s charitable bonafides. Plus, it’s always interesting to see the revolving door between Kensington Palace and the Conservative Party. I don’t think anyone working for the Cambridges has ever come from Labour or left to work with Labour. Fascinating, isn’t it?
Now, as for the money stuff… William and Kate have gotten more donations because of the National Emergencies Trust. The NET was launched in 2019, but William didn’t become patron of NET until 2020. Which is when he and Kate got access to the private NET donor list. They’ve been using the donor list to fundraise for their foundation, promising donors that they would parcel out money to worthy causes. I will keep saying this: something very shady is going on with their foundation’s finances. I’ve also felt like the Duchess of Sussex saw some sh-t at the foundation and she realized how scammy it was/is, and that’s one of the big reasons why she and Harry wanted to set up their own foundation.
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.
So they’ve allegedly doubled the income for the Royal Foundation and yet several charities still closed under its watch. Where is the money going because it isn’t being spent on those charities. They’ve done no fundraising and they’ve barely donated anything. Someone needs to investigate what’s going on instead of tracking H&M’s plane usage.
Like kaiser said; there’s something shady going on with their foundation. Personally i think that THAT is what the press is trying to hide. Because lets be honest, another cheating scandal wouldn’t rock the monarchy. People already don’t think william & kate still sleep together.
It must be some Ponzi scheme or maybe the Keens are living off of the charity’s funds because this makes no sense. They spent the past year barely zooming and clapping to “highlight” charity work while they were allegedly sitting on millions, the BM is too chickenshit to say anything but had the time to investigate a perfectly legal transaction that occurred when H&M left the Royal Foundation.
This is the same Foundation that wanted to steal the Grenfell Cookbook funds. The same Foundation that won’t fund the very patronages they cover. So yes, where IS all the money going?
There is definitely something shady going on, and I think its worse than what was happening with Charles’ foundation. It makes me wonder if William and Kate are just straight up pocketing some of the cash or something.
Remember we have heard that there is something that cannot be discussed for legal reasons and it would explain a lot about why the Sussexes left. Could charity financial mismanagement be that thing?
i’m not sure if that’s “THE” thing about William the press is trying to hide, unless its something really really bad.
Yeah I have absolutely no idea how creative they’re being with their accounting, but I saw “That’s almost double the £6.68 million raised in 2019, when the Duke and Duchess of Sussex were still involved.” and my first thought was “Oh absolutely the fck not!”
Yeah I’m curious as to what’s happening with the money if they’re raising so much of it? Does Administration gobble it? Are they bad at handling it? I know the RF does reports but I’m going to need someone more financially savvy to decode it and explain it like I’m 5 for me.
The foundation raised a lot of money for covid relief which is why they raised so much more in 2020 than 2019.
Maybe they spent it all on a solid gold, bejeweled “Early Years Center” nameplate that some random staffer is forced to carry around in her purse and put in front of her on whatever desk, conference room table, coffee table she’s currently sitting at, just in case anyone comes in and asks to see Kate’s “Center for Childhood Research and Early Years Studies.”
“Oh, the research center? Yeah, it’s right there at cafeteria table 3. You can see the nameplate and everything in front of Karen, there.”
Oooooo, maybe Kate even brought it to that pub lunch and had it sat in front of her on the picnic table! (They photographed from the other way though, so we couldn’t see it. Boo.)
@becks1 I think the comment that Kevin Maguire made about legal reasons to keep related more to evidence of KP being directly involved with the media and Tom Markle to smear Meghan.
Not that I don’t think something shady is happening with the foundation. Where is all the money they raised going?
I’ve called out this foundation from the start. The set up is a scam.
They can use the funds legally to fund themselves. For galas. For foundation overhead which could be Kate’s wardrobe or appearances.
What seems to be happening is they’re fundraising and not distributing. Which happened with one of Kate’s patronages. They closed doors instead of getting funds raised by the foundation for them.
Exactly. Where has all the money gone and why are their charities suffering and shuttering?
Yes! This is the question that needs to be asked.
Could the ‘income’ be the 5 million USD Gates donated for EarthShot? If those funds are run through this central Foundation, I could see an unethical accountant calling these passthrough funds a ‘donation’ to the Foundation proper.
So Gates and Bezos both donated that amount for the ES prize money? So essentially the first two years of prize money was covered in money donated by Americans? Why can’t they fund there own schemes and keep them over there ?
It makes me laugh all day to think that Harry and Meghan’s philanthropic work has stirred a competitive philanthropic effort in the remaining royals. If the royals actually make a tangible difference, does it matter that it happened out of spite?
No it doesnt matter in the grand scheme of things. But its truely sad and rather pathetic that it took someone with some work ethic and genuine interest in using their position to help others,get them to crawl out of their entitled hole.
Absolutely.
“ I will keep saying this: something very shady is going on with their foundation’s finances. I’ve also felt like the Duchess of Sussex saw some sh-t at the foundation and she realized how scammy it was/is, and that’s one of the big reasons why she and Harry wanted to set up their own foundation.”
To quote Harry “I’ve seen the business model and I want no part of it.”
+1
If this guy is clean, how much you want to bet he blows the lid off of the scam? I don’t think they realize how many ppl hate the monarchy and brexit.
So they are finally serious after a decade. Scrambling to appear to be making big moves.
William looks happier to be with this man than with his wife. He is actually smiling and relax. Yikes Katie keen.
I give Hague a year, then he will resign in frustration.
Yup. I think many go in there with high hopes of being able to make a difference (like Meghan) and are met with an intractable wall. Then they realize they are only there to make the Cambridge’s look good and help them launder money. If they don’t go with the flow, they make their polite excuses and leave quietly.
Considering he’s very much part of the establishment and has worked with them for a while, I’m going to go with Kaiser’s opinion and say he’ll stay on because he wants to be advisor and influencer to William. So he won’t quit.
He’s had enormous power to move things before so I think it will be difficult to come into this role where getting stuff done will be challenging because Will and Kate are lazy dunderheads and the culture of the foundation is toxic. I definitely think choosing to work under those conditions could be a lot for anyone.
I think Hague is not going to have to report to Billy directly so he will stay on as long as it is not inconvenient for him. He’s in a different position than Kate’s former chief of staff, who had to drag Kate out to work which got tiresome after two years. Here Hague can just organize things the way he wants and Billy can choose to attend or not.
Ex-leader of the Conservative Party & charities under their financial umbrella STILL closing despite record fund raising tells me ALL I need to know about this sludge
Good point…why couldn’t she give some of those billions to the Art Room? (I think that’s one that closed last year?) These two are disgusting.
They are always competing with H&M. Never being proactive or innovative. Anyhoo…glad they doubled their cash reserves, sorry 2 of Kate’s charities have folded in the meantime.
It doesn’t make sense to even consider them a rival to Archewell, which is a small startup with a few focused projects and partnerships just getting off the ground. They should compare themselves to much bigger philanthropic organizations,especially since they have the full backing of the Firm andUK government.
So this part – ‘working on charitable things including with the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’.
Doesn’t make it sound like he’s quitting JUST to work for the Cambridges, it sounds like he’ll continue with his role on the board of trustees and also do other things in the charity/philanthropy sector.
At any rate – the money raised by the foundation is interesting, where is it going?
I agree that Meghan saw what was going on with the finances and was like, NOPE.
To Carole, Pippa, and James as ‘consultants’? To fund the struggle awards paid PR articles? To fund the struggle documentary because no one wanted to make it?
Adding, Carole’s experience in unethically selling her clients info without their permission? Could come in handy when raiding other Foundation’s donor lists as Kaiser mentioned. Not the first time W&K have pulled a stunt like that.
Why mention Meghan and Harry ??? It really seems that all of their ideas and decision making is based on them. In the next five years we’re gonna have 100 books written about how Meghan and Harry brought the Monarchy to its knees.
It gets so tiring that every piece of news about the royals have to mention them and this so- called one sided rivalry. It’s probably the only way most people pay attention to royal news now.
I suspect Hague is going to be named the new CEO of the Royal Foundation replacing Jason Knauf in December. Nobody talks about the high turnover of staff at the Royal Foundation. And when most , if not all, charities suffered a decline in revenue last year, the Royal Foundation doubled theirs. Something fishy is going on with those numbers. I think Charles is pouring alot of his money into the Foundation but where is the rest of the money coming from?
Could it be a cover for a Tax evasion/ Money Laundering scheme?
“I suspect Hague is going to be named the new CEO of the Royal Foundation replacing Jason Knauf in December. Nobody talks about the high turnover of staff at the Royal Foundation.”
William does not care to be advised, let alone told what to do. I think Hague, do to his age and background, will have a much greater chance of making a success of the Cambridges.
The Cambridges were only a stepping-stone to a bigger pond with bigger fish for that Jason Knauf person.
Maybe he coming in to clean up the mess. But whatever, if he can pry money out of that Foundation and get it people who need it, it’s a good thing. And if this guy has a respected track record, it’s not so bad for Will to have a counselor.
Why is everything a competition with those two! Why should Archewell be considered a rival? These two have no vision, no depth. Charles had a vision, an idea of what impact he wanted to make when he created the Prince’s Trust. Harry and Meghan have an idea of where they want to focus their charitable energy and what impact they want to make. William and Kate could not give a rat’s ass about anything or anybody and that’s why their charity is floundering.
Wow, this is huge.
Hmm. It doesn’t sound to me like he’s working with them exclusively – “he will be ‘working on charitable things including with the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge”. If he’s worked with Jolie, that does seem like a big “get”, but the Cambridges don’t exactly have a great track record of keeping professionals. Given his history with Jolie, I have to wonder if, having solved racism in football and Broken (read: poor) Britain, someone is eager to repeat her star turn at Sarah Everard’s memorial and make a pie chart about how white women should be more careful walking at night.
I have a hard time imagining anybody with a high level of expertise and competence would last long at the Cambridges foundation.
“Yes, David, right this way, welcome to the foundation. This is my office – no, that printer doesn’t actually connect to anything, it’s just for show. And that console over there with the classic novels display is where Catherine likes to pose. Aren’t they nice? Alright, well, I’m off, if you need anything, ask Jason over there, maybe I’ll see you at the meeting next month!
Willie looks goofy, to me in that one photo with the eyes thingy. Nothing diplomatic about him. Looks like a used car salesman, trying to sell a lemon.
Hague will likely be more involved with the arm of William’s charitable organization to fight the illegal wildlife trade. He’s been active in it so far, but I don’t know about any of the other charities the Cambridges “supposedly” support. He will definitely bring some gravitas to the Cambridge foundation but it may be that, like others, he will find dealing with William’s overbearing, petulant and stubborn work style impossible, and/or discover some of the financial shenanigans and leave to work with more compatible organizations.
The royal foundation received nearly 6 million from the Bezos climate fund for Earthshot. So much of that increase was that. And actually Jolie and Hague did not do good work with that sexual violence in war initiative. It was defunded at the start of 2020 because it was revealed that most of the 20 million dollars they had received from the government was spent on administrative cost. For example Jolie and Sophie Wessex who became attached to the project had all of their travel cost paid out of the funds. They could not document tangible benefit from the initiative.
William Hague was never achieved much as a politician and not really that well liked. He does have connections with other politicians around the world and being a former foreign secretary brings some political contacts for the Royals. He has been involved in Kate’s early years project too. He is getting lots of money by being involved in all these projects, but they never have much substance just doing the minimum possible. His party the UK Tories don’t care about poverty they are just about keeping the establishment and themselves enriched. It saddens me that Angelina Jolie has been involved with working with him closely and also two of his staff Chloe Dalton and Arminka Helic work with Angelina Jolie. They were responsible for her getting a damehood and an honorary professor title at LSE. I believe they have a joint charity together were they are paid very well. All part of the Tory Party and the establishment.
I didn’t know that King William of the British monarchy is corrupt. And the rota clowns are silent about this? They are in cahoots with William. They too are corrupt. The world has lost respect for the UK Royals and the UK media. They are hated and ridiculed.
Any time I read something from “Eden Confidential”, I hear it in my head as Lady Whistledown!
Since Burger King can’t get his hands on The Duchy, he will use this ‘foundation’ as his personal bank account.
“working on charitable things including with the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge….”
The word “including” is doing a lot of work here. It doesn’t say the Royal Foundation will be his primary job. And it’s only a leave of absence, so he may return to politics. Has anything actually changed?
They haven’t even survived the paedophilia and racism claims and now they want to add money laundering. I’m getting my wine and edibles now. It’s going to be a good show 😌
I think Hague also wants to get close to America and the Biden government and thinks he can do this via the royal family and try and make more money for himself by meeting lots of rich, famous and powerful people and making stronger links with the Tory party and Biden administration. They don’t have that special relationship.
Is he good at his work?
or is he a bad man doing bad things for money and power?
Or is he able to get these high job because of his breeding and connection?
Well good luck working for willie