Action on Sugar is back in the black. After receiving just £74 in voluntary donations in 2022/23, the pressure group - formally known as Consensus Action on Salt, Sugar and Health - raised £201,225 last year.
£200,000 of that came from
the Marcela Trust. The Marcela Trust was set up by the late businessman
Octav Botnar and is named after his (now also late) wife. Mr Botnar founded Datsun UK, which later became Nissan UK, and was a bit of a character.
In June 1991, the Inland Revenue
raided Nissan UK's headquarters, as well as Mr Botnar's home and the
homes of other company officials. The tax authority accused Botnar of
evading more than £200
million in taxes. The scam involved using a third party shipping agent
to deliberately overcharge Nissan UK for the shipment of vehicles from
Japan so as to artificially depress its own profits thus reducing the
company's exposure to corporation tax. Botnar left for Switzerland and lived for the rest of his life there in Villars-sur-Ollon.
I have long been intrigued by the Marcela Trust because I have never been able to work out what it is. It has a vast amount of money but it doesn't seem to give much of it away and its charitable objectives are hilariously vague...
THE CHARITY PROVIDES SUPPORT TO SELECTED CAUSES IN LINE WITH THE CHARITY'S OBJECTS.
In 2022/23 it had an income of £8.2 million but it spent £5.8 million on running costs, including £2.6 million on wages. It only handed out £353,000 in grants (which, as I understand it, is supposed to be the purpose of the trust) and most of that went to a fanatical anti-sugar lobby group.
Action on Sugar is not a grassroots organisation, to put it mildly. The £74 it raised in donations in 2022/23 was a big improvement on the £7 it raised the year before. It was rapidly running down its bank reserves when the Marcela Trust stepped up with 200 grand. And those reserves only existed because the Marcela Trust had given it fat wads of money back when it was plain old Consensus Action on Salt and Health, the last of which was a £140,000 grant in 2017/18.
Back in 2012, the blogger
Hemiposterical tried to find out what this is all about, but despite
following it up for years was never really able to. I don't particularly care where Action on Sugar gets its money from, but out of sheer curiosity I'm asking the question again in case anyone can help. What does the Marcela Trust do and what has it got against sugar and salt?
No comments:
Post a Comment