The Prince's Trust

infobox Organization
name = The Prince's Trust


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formation = 1976|extinction =
type = Charity
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purpose = Helping young people
headquarters =
location = 18 Park Square East, London
region_served = UK
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website = [http://www.princes-trust.org.uk www.princes-trust.org.uk]
remarks = Key people:Martina Milburn Chief ExecutiveSir Fred Goodwin Chairman

The Prince's Trust is a charity in the United Kingdom founded by the Prince of Wales to help young people.

Target groups

The young people helped by The Prince's Trust are the long-term unemployed, people who have been in trouble with the law, people who are in difficulty at school, and people who have been in care. These young people are considered by the Prince's Trust to have a "disadvantaged background" and are generally referred to by The Prince's Trust as being "disadvantaged". [ cite web|url=http://www.crimereduction.homeoffice.gov.uk/youth/youth46.htm/|accessdate=2008-08-15|title=Crime Reduction ] Some young people who are employed also go on Prince’s Trust courses as a training and development opportunity funded by their employer, but they can only attend if their employer pays course fees to The Prince’s Trust. [ cite web|url=http://www.notts-fire.gov.uk/|accessdate=2008-08-04|title=Nottinghamshire Fire & Rescue Service Charity Partnerships ]

Prince's Trust people

HRH The Prince of Wales founded The Prince's Trust and is now its president, a figurehead position with no legal responsibility. The Prince's Trust Council are the trustees of the charity and are legally responsible for management, administration and deciding policy.

The Chairman of The Prince's Trust Council is Sir Fred Goodwin. Other members of the council include Charles Dunstone, Simon Fuller and Michael Marks CBE. Sir Fred Goodwin is the current chief executive of the Royal Bank of Scotland Group (RBS), one of the major corporate supporters of The Prince's Trust. In 2007 RBS donated £1.1 million to The Prince's Trust and there was also commercial income of £0.4 million.

The Prince's Trust employs 688 people, including 615 people who work in charitable purposes and support, 72 in fundraising and publicity, and 1 in governance. Two members of staff earn more than £100,000 with a further two earning between £80,000 and £90,000.

The Chief Executive of the Prince's Trust is Martina Milburn who joined the organisation in 2004.

Finances

In 2006–7 The Prince’s Trust charity, and its trading subsidiary, Prince’s Trust Trading Ltd, had a total income of nearly £51 million, and expenditure of £46.6 million, giving a surplus for the year of more than £4 million, of which £1.2m was unrestricted and £3m restricted. The Prince’s Trust Group currently has reserves of more than £18 million and plans to increase this to more than £19 million. The Prince's Trust is one of the 100 largest charities in the UK ranked by expenditure. [ [http://www.charitiesdirect.com/CharitiesSearchTop500.asp?sortby=E Charities Direct] ]

Income

Public Sector Income

The largest source of income was the near £20 million received from the public sector. Of this nearly £8 million was from the European Union (EU), £3 million was from local and national government, nearly £600,000 came from the community fund and over £8 million came from a variety of other public sector sources. Most of this money was payment by these organisations for courses, training, mentoring and other services for unemployed young people, provided under contract by the Prince’s Trust.

Most of the EU money for the Prince's Trust came from the European Social Fund (ESF) and could only be spent to help young people who are Not in Education, Employment or Training (NEET). [ cite web|url=http://www.esf.gov.uk/ |accessdate=2008-04-15|title=European Social Fund in England 2007 – 2013 ] Some of the ESF money went directly to the Prince’s Trust (£816,000 2006/7), but mostly it went to the Learning and Skills Council (LSC) who “doubled it up” with government money that then had the same restrictions placed on it. Some LSC money was given directly to the Prince’s Trust (£1.3 million 2006/7) but the majority went to the regional LSC offices who took out contracts with the regional Prince’s Trust offices to provide services for unemployed young people. The ESF money was channeled through so many routes it is difficult to determine how much it amounted to, but in 2006 the funding provided by the LSC to the Prince’s Trust in total came to approximately £11 million. [ cite news |url=http://www.publications.parliament.uk |accessdate=2008-04-15|title=House of Commons Hansard Written Answers 11 Jan 2006 ]

Voluntary income

The voluntary income raised in 2007 was £19.2 million, consisting of £4.8 million from charitable trusts, a £1.2 million donation from the Queen’s Silver Jubilee Trust, £3.7 million in corporate donations, £6.6 in individual donations and £2.9 million donations in kind. £147,000 was received from The Prince's Charities Foundation.

The cost of raising this voluntary income was £5.1 million, which means that for every £1 donated, 73p was spent on charitable activities with the rest going on fundraising costs. The amount raised for every £1 spent on fundraising costs was £3.73.

Expenditure

The Prince’s Trust expenditure of £46.5 million was made up of £36 million spent on charitable activities with the rest being spent on administration and other costs.

The £36 million spent on charitable activities was divided between the different programme areas such as the Team program, and the business program, but not all of the money was spent on helping young people. £2.7 million went on grants, loans & other awards to young people, whilst £18.3 million was spent on direct staff and other direct costs, and nearly £15 million was spent on support costs such as managerial and marketing staff, office rents etc. But not even all the “direct costs” were spent on helping young people, because with much of the money for these programmes coming from the public sector, these direct costs also include the cost of arranging and monitoring all the contracts etc.

So from a total income of nearly £51 million, significantly less than £21 million was spent on directly helping young people.

Charitable activities

The Prince's Trust has six main types of charitable activity.

*The Business Programme helps young people start a business.

*The Team Programme is a 12-week personal development course, offering work experience, practical skills, community projects and a residential week.
*Get Intos are short courses offering training and experience in a specific sector to help young people get a job.

*Development Awards are small grants to enable people to access education, training or work.

*Community Cash Awards are grants to help young people set up a project that will benefit their community.

*xl clubs are held in schools.

The Prince's Trust is sometimes referred to as being part of The Prince's Charities group.

Business programme

The Business Programme is the programme for which the Prince’s Trust is best known and it helps young people start a business. A young person can benefit from the program if they are aged 18 to 30, are unemployed or working less than 16 hours a week. If they are in an unsatisfying low paid job they will need to become long term unemployed before they can be helped.

The help provided usually consists of a loan of up to £4,000, which needs to be repaid by the young person togther with 3% interest. [ cite web|url=http://www.services4notts.org.uk/ |accessdate=2008-07-5|title=Services in Nottinghamshire ] Each year young people pay the Prince's Trust around £360,000 in interest payments on their loans. Ongoing advice is also provided for three years by a business mentor who is a Prince's Trust volunteer.

On repayment of their loan, Business Programme participants have the opportunity to join The Prince's Trust Business Club. This is a free-to-join business networking group exclusively for those who have been supported by The Trust's Business Programme.

In 2007 the Prince's Trust spent a total of nearly £13 million on the business programme. Of this £616,000 was spent on grants to young people. Of the remaining money £3.6 million was spent on Prince’s Trust staff costs, £3.4 million on other direct costs, and £5 million on support costs. In addition to this expenditure, £5.6m of loans were awarded in 2007, with the average value of a loan being £2,200. A substantial amount of the money for the business programme comes from the public sector. For example, in 2007, the Wigan Economic Partnership provided the Prince's Trust with £85,000 for 20 business startups.

The provision of public funds for the business program continues to be an issue. In May 2008 Prince Charles pleaded for more funds for the Prince’s Trust business program. [cite web|url=http://www.telegraph.co.uk/ |accessdate=2008-04-15|title=Prince Charles pleads for more Trust funds ] In response the chancellor announced that the government would provide an additional £1 million. [cite web|url=http://www.theyworkforyou.com/ |accessdate=2008-04-15|title=House of Lords debates 22 May 2008 ] But not everyone agreed that more money should be provided with responses to the news including comments such as “Prince Charles should dig into his own coffers … before asking anyone for help” and “does it [the Trust] look to control its spending or is it more interested in building a bureaucratic structure at some considerable cost? . [ cite web|url=http://www.telegraph.co.uk/ |accessdate=2008-04-15|title=Prince Charles pleads for more Trust funds ]

In 2007/8,089,300 young people were supported by the Business Programme - 2,402 new businesses were set up and ongoing volunteer business mentor support was provided for 6,913 young people. [ cite web|url=http://www.princes-trust.org.uk/Main%20Site%20v2/About%20us.asp|accessdate=2008-08-11|title=Prince's Trust factsheet ]

The Prince’s Trust takes only a very small financial risk with the loans, as in the event of a young person failing to repay the loan, the Prince’s Trust can be repaid up to 75% of the loan by the European Investment Fund. [ cite web|url=http://www.eif.org/news/index.htm |accessdate=2008-07-7|title=Guarantee for micro-credit to the Prince's Trust (UK) ]

The Technology Leadership Group is essentially a fundraising group for the Business Programme. It is unclear whether the business start ups helped by this money are technology enterprises.

Team Course

The Team course is a 12 week personal development course which is operated as a franchise by the Prince’s Trust. The course involves team building activities, a residential week, a community project and a work placement, and it aims to raise self-esteem, build confidence and develop personal skills. There are clearly some issues though about how effective a 12 week course can be, because as Martina Milburn the chief executive of the trust said in 2008 "on the Prince's Trust Team programme, you took them through the 12 weeks, you built up their expectation and [then] they fell off the cliff face". [ cite web|url=http://www.parliament.the-stationery-office.co.uk/ |title=House of Commons Education & Skills Bill ] The course is usually run by a local organisation who is known as the delivery partner and many of the delivery partners are local fire and rescue service organisations. The delivery partner, a local college and the Prince’s Trust, all get paid, usually by the local Learning and Skills Council (LSC). Payment is made according to “results” in respect of young people completing certain parts of the course. Sometimes so much money is paid that there is actually a surplus. [ cite web|url=http://www.cheshirefire.gov.uk/ |accessdate=2008-04-18|title=Cheshire Fire & Rescue Service ]

Typical structure of a Team course:

The people going on the Team course are usually unemployed, and if they are receiving JobSeekers Allowance and other benefits they are still able to receive these whilst on the course. People going on the course also get their travel expenses and other costs paid. Some people in employment also go on part of a course but their employer has to pay a course fee of £1,250 [ cite web|url=http://www.notts-fire.gov.uk/|accessdate=2008-06-30|title=Nottinghamshire Fire & Rescue Service ] to the Prince’s Trust. The Prince's Trust employs fundraisers with "proven sales experience" to persuade employers to pay for their employees to go on the Prince's Trust Team Course. [ cite web|url=http://www.princes-trust.org.uk/ |accessdate=2008-06-21|title=Prince's Trust Current Vacancies ] In 2006/7 the Prince’s Trust received nearly £687,000 from employer’s fees for Team courses.

Get Into

Get Into are short courses for unemployed young people that are related to a specific sector, usually one where there are many jobs available. The courses aim to help young people get a job in the sector, and they provide training and in many instances work experience.

Example of sectors where Get Into is provided, are retail, sports coaching, customer services and construction.

xl Clubs

xl Clubs operate mainly in schools and are for young people at risk of exclusion from school and/or at risk of underachievment. The informal clubs take place during the last two years of compulsory schooling and meet for at least three hours each week. The clubs are described to young people as being where “you choose what you learn. You have a lot of fun. And you do it all in school”.

In 2006/7 the Prince’s Trust spent £4 million on the xl program and of this £298,000 consisted of grants to clubs, £1.26 million was spent on Prince’s Trust staff costs and £2.3 million on other direct costs and support costs.

The Jason Kanabus Fund

The Jason Kanabus Fund was created from the £2.5 million left to the Prince’s Trust by Jason Kanabus, a young farmer in Sussex who died from cancer in July 2006.

He left his money to the Prince’s Trust, in order that the income could be used to help young people become established in farming. The Prince’s Trust is working with the National Farmers Union (England and Wales) (NFU) and the National Federation of Young Farmers' Clubs, to organise the provision of awards to young people from the fund. Any young person wishing to apply for a grant should contact either a regional office of the Prince’s Trust, or the NFU.

Prince's Trust Timeline

Simple timeline
1976|The Prince of Wales launches the charity
1982|First fund-raising concert
1986|The Prince's Trust All-Star Rock Concert in Wembley Arena to celebrate first 10 years of the Trust
1988|£40 million appeal is launched for The Prince's 40th birthday year
1990|The Prince's Trust Volunteers programme launched
1996|First rock concert in Hyde Park
1999|Trust charities are brought together as The Prince's Trust. This is recognised by HM The Queen at a ceremony in Buckingham Palace, when she grants it a Royal Charter
2000|The Trust is devolved. Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland and each of the English regions now has it own Director and Council but overall control remains in London
2003|The 10,000th Development Award
2003|"Volunteers" programme renamed "Team" programme
2003|Prince's Trust Council restrict help to four "core groups" of young people [ cite web|url=http://www.charity-commission.gov.uk/ |accessdate=2008-06-27|title=Prince’s Trust Accounts 2004 |publisher=UK Charity Commission]
2006|The Prince's Trust turns 30 with a 30th Birthday concert at the Tower of London, an ITV documentary, 'The Prince of Wales: Up Close', a live televised event on ITV and featuring the first interview with all three princes - Prince Charles, Prince William and Prince Harry.
2008|Controversy over Sainsbury family legacy [ cite web|url=http://www.guardian.co.uk/ |title= The Guardian February 14th 2008 ] and Bill Gates donation [ cite web|url=http://www.mailonsunday.co.uk/ |title= The Mail on Sunday March 23rd 2008 ]
2008|25th anniversary of the Business Programme.

ee also

* Party in the Park

References

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