You scratch my back...

The British Council is keen, as we have seen in Libya, to use its resources (i.e. ours) to look after those who are well placed to provide “mutually beneficial relationships”. One possible vehicle for this dubious pragmatism is BC Trading International Ltd, a (£100) company which operates out of 10 Spring Gardens and which is 100% owned by the British Council. (Charities sometimes set up companies when they want to make money at, let us say, arm’s length from their charitable purpose). We note that two of the (5) company directors of BC Trading International Ltd are British Council trustee Gerard Lemos and the British Council director of Finance Margaret Mayne. We find that these two directors have more than one interest in common.

Following the recent publication of an article by Nick Cohen in the Observer raising the issue of political pressure on sponsored artists, and the subsequent debate, we looked a fraction closer at what the BC was doing by way of supporting the arts. A dance company that we noted as having significant British Council support was the Akram Khan Dance Company. Here you can see a poster in Armenia , here a BC supported appearance in the USA, here an extended tour “Stage-managed” by the British Council, here an appearance in Germany - here a forthcoming tour in Mexico - you get the picture; and if you don’t, just Google "Akram Khan" "British Council" where you will find plenty more.

We don’t know of any connection between BC Trading International Ltd and the Akram Khan Dance Company Ltd. But we note that two of the (6) directors of the Akram Khan Dance Company are the British Council trustee Gerard Lemos and the British Council director of Finance Margaret Mayne. So when the Akram Khan Dance Company happens to get the backing of the British Council (paid for by the organisation’s “grant-in-aid”, a.k.a. taxpayers’ money) - and it seems to be a regular beneficiary - the organisation builds on a “mutually beneficial relationship” for its own people. What a stroke of luck. 

Comments

[alison reguson]

Both British Council workers should be sacked if they are in some way favouring committees or groups that they belong to or associate with - no matter how good the groups are at what they do - it is a duty of anyone with a say in taxpayers' money distribution to be totally seen to be clean - this article - if true sickens me !!! What are finance people in the British Council doing Chairing some of the organisations which they fund ?? And what are the government doing if they continue to ignore this cavalier attitude to "let's fund our mates" .... it's another example of Goverment funding used for the buddy network ......

[David]

Hello Alison Fortunately these things are still verifiable, so you may be sure that it's true. As to whether the government will do anything about it, it's difficult to be optimistic. The record shows that they do nothing about the British Council, and the British Council does nothing about itself. Given that we are talking about taxpayers' money as you say, it's a failure of democracy.

The Akram Khan dance company are now amongst "The 50 largest grants to institutions" as disclosed in British Council's 2006-07 Accounts. These people have no shame.

[APC]

Very interesting. I am a former British Council colleague of Ms Mayne's. I had wondered for some time why her application for her own job was unsuccessful last year. Now, without very much effort I seem to have found one of the reasons.

Finally she was discovered going too far. It took time but karma wins in the end.