Parish Council is ruining a charity. Who is right/ next steps

Question

Hi, lets starts with background:

WI builds and runs a hall as a local charity for them and the benefit of the community.

WI starts to go down hill and leases hall the PC on fll repairing lease for 99yrs.

PC set up charity where they are Custodian Trustee. Charity starts and does everything. Original committee are PC, but hand over to locals.

Then WI closes and gives building and land to PC provided it stays for the community. Charity is NOT notified of any changes.

All muddles along for 20+ years until just before covid. New(after the above) clerk and PC are told of severe building issues and Charity starts looking for builders and grants. Suddenly Charity gets banned from hall so PC can pay and fix building.

Present day: PC (5/6) have made it clear that they don’t want to run the hall. PC have sought legal advice (without the knowledge of at least 2 PC members or a minuted agreement on appointment or wording) and the solicitors have told the Charity that the PC was never Custodian Trustee due to the lease, everything has been wring for 30years, and everything is done by ‘management agreement’.ie the PC are in complete control. ( which explains the invoice the charity got for some of the building works - again PC members were unaware if this happening).

Charity has come to me as ward rep completely destroyed. There are no agreements, there was no notice of this action and they have no idea what to do. Charity has been attending PC meetings. They have single handedly run, manage, hired and done financials for the hall for years.
They could stop and close the Charity, but that is the current chairmans goal, so plays into his hands AND the village loses a superb asset. Remit of charity is to ‘raise funds to maintain and assist in the maintenance of the hall’. Raising funds has been done through events and hires using the hall, all managed by the charity.

What can I do?

Answer 1

I don't have the answer but I think a starting point is to go right to the beginning of the process and establish a) the charity number of the charity (from the Charity Commission website), b) who are the trustees registered with the Charity Commission, and c) whether a copy of the governing document is logged on the Charity Commission website.

My guess (and that is what it is) is that the original trustees are STILL the trustees.  Buts lets see.

Comments

a) charity number is ok and registered with Char Com years ago
b) not the PC, the current trustees are the folk running the charity and doing all the work - this was confirmed by the CC.
c) yes it is.
FYI the original trustees of the charity were not listed as PC members. The PC could only those dictate who the first committee/trustees were. New ones are voted on by the public/existing members at agm as per governing docs it also states that all the committee/trustees resign annually for reappointment. PC do have right to appoint someone, but have never - even now - exercised that right.
When original folk asked (alive and remember), and the minutes from the time read, the PC wanted nothing to do with the charity and didn’t until 3/4 yrs ago. Now the PC (some) want full and complete control.

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You will appreciate that is not something that can be managed/unpicked from a distance.

But let me put it this way.  If was faced with this situation I would be suggesting that the registered trustees should seek their own legal advice and work from there.

Answer 2

The situation sounds similar to many village hall set-ups - the PC owns the land/building and this is leased to a charity who operate it.  The key to unlocking this will be to locate the agreement between the PC and the charity.  The previous situation with the WI is a red herring if the PC now own the building - what matters is the nature of the agreement between the PC and the charity.  You said there are no agreements but that seems very unlikely.

In the event that there is no agreement then I'd suggest that the charity seek to put an agreement in place with the PC.  If the PC don't want to run the hall then it would be in their interest to have an agreement with a body that does want to.

Comments

There is no lease in place as far as I know as a councillor or from the halls POV. I suspect it was a ‘we don’t need that, we all get along’ kind of thing.
The only info is in the docs lodged with the Char Com. :)
If the PC had a (in my view) rational clerk and chairman then that would absolutely be the right thing to do, but both refuse to put things in writing.

I am just glad to know I haven’t lost my mind over it, as someone else thinks as I do.

Answer 3

Have you discussed this with your local ACRE branch? They are the experts in community building management and provide free advice.

Comments

ACRE in the area went straight to the PC who said there was no issue, the Charity has misunderstood the documents. So that was the message the Charity got told. The charity then asked a less local ACRE.
Diff county ACRE felt the Charity should seek Official Custodianship.
It is the process of seeking OC the charity asked for the PC’s official position on the hall which is why the solicitors letter that has just make the Charities life harder.
I will suggest they ask ACRE again as the solicitors letter makes no sense to me and refers to documents that I don’t think exist.

Both parties are small and really it is out of control. I just don’t know how to fix things.