Ever since Tony Blair set up his Faith Foundation in 2008, it has been dogged by controversy. Now he can’t even close it down without causing a stir.
Companies House has just received an objection to the closure of the former Prime Minister’s charity.
The Foundation applied to be struck-off the register of companies in December, and a strike-off notice was duly published in the London Gazette in January. However, its dissolution has now been temporarily halted.
‘The striking-off and dissolution of the above company has been suspended as an objection has been received by the registrar,’ says a Companies House notice.
The notice does not identify the objector, Companies House will not elaborate, nor will Blair’s office. But it is not unusual for HMRC to object to companies being wound up due to tax issues.
Blair’s Faith Foundation is one of three charities he founded after leaving Downing Street, the others being the Tony Blair Governance Initiative and the Tony Blair Sports Foundation.
Companies House has just received an objection to the closure of the charity run by former Prime Minister Tony Blair (pictured in a stock photo)
While the Sports Foundation is closing completely, the other two are being folded into a new venture — the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change — along with his commercial projects, the Windrush and Firerush companies.
In 2016, Blair announced he was focusing on his ‘not-for-profit’ work, after squirrelling away millions from secretive deals with despots around the world.
The globe-trotting moneybags has been criticised in the past for mixing his charity work with his commercial activities.
In 2014, the Charity Commission met with representatives from the Tony Blair Faith Foundation after a former employee claimed the ex-Prime Minister used it as a ‘think-tank’ for his private office.
Latest accounts for the Foundation report the transfer of its assets to the new institute — comprising £2.1 million in funds and a lease to premises in Canary Wharf.
A post-balance sheet event note in the accounts reports: ‘With effect from March 1, 2017, the activities, assets, liabilities and undertakings carried out by the Tony Blair Faith Foundation were transferred to the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change, a not-for-profit company.’
Titchmarsh knows his place
TV gardener Alan Titchmarsh insists he will never develop delusions of grandeur, despite being on intimate terms with the Royal Family.
He is chums with Prince Charles, and interviewed the Duke of Edinburgh when he announced he was retiring from royal duties at the age of 95.
‘I remember [film director] Martin Scorsese being asked what a top Hollywood actor was really like, and his reply was, “What would you be like if no one had said no to you for 40 years?” I don’t want to get like that. You can be professional without being arsey.’
Titchmarsh, 68, has other delusions, of course. He claims that when he collected his MBE at Buckingham Palace, the Queen told him: ‘You give a lot of ladies a lot of pleasure.’
Allen Leech, pictured, 36, received a flurry of marriage proposals after his appearance in Downton
In Downton Abbey, Allen Leech played the dashing chauffeur Tom Branson, who married the Earl of Grantham’s daughter Lady Sybil, played by Jessica Brown Findlay.
But in real life the Irishman is to tie the knot with another Jessica — American actress Jessica Blair Herman.
Leech, 36, received a flurry of marriage proposals after his appearance in Downton, and previously dated Sky Sports presenter Charlie Webster.
In 2011, he was forced to deny having an affair with his Downton co-star Brown Findlay, after Leech’s brother, Simon, claimed there had been a hush-hush romance between the two young actors.
‘First [Valentine’s Day] as a fiance!’ Tom wrote on social media yesterday. ‘Thank you for saying yes and making me the happiest. And no I didn’t do it today. It’s been a while.’