Captain Tom charity closes to donations amid daughter’s pool row

The Captain Tom Foundation is no longer accepting donations after the daughter of the late NHS fundraiser was ordered to demolish an unauthorised home spa allegedly built “using the hero’s name”.

Hannah Ingram-Moore and her husband, Colin, applied in 2021 for permission to build an office in the grounds of their £1.2 million home in Marston Moretaine, Bedfordshire, that was to be used partly “in connection with the Captain Tom Foundation and its charitable objectives”. The annex “was given the all-clear”, said The Sun, but they then added a building containing a 50ft by 20ft pool and applied for retrospective permission.

After refusing the application, Bedforshire Council has ordered that the “now-unauthorised building” be demolished. A council spokesperson said the decision was being appealed by the Ingram-Moores.

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A local resident told The Sun that “it feels like they thought their goodwill gave them cover to do whatever they wanted”.

The charity trustees were reportedly “left in the dark” about the spa complex. The foundation told the paper that “had they been aware of any applications, the independent trustees would not have authorised them”.

The foundation “was already in crisis”, said the Daily Mail, after the Charity Commission launched an investigation last year into decisions that “may have generated significant profit” for a private company run by the Ingram-Moores. The probe began with “a series of discussions with the foundation amid concerns about the way it was governed”, said The Guardian, and “escalated into a full inquiry after fresh evidence emerged of potentially serious misconduct”.

The charity said yesterday that it had “taken the decision to close all payment channels while the statutory inquiry remains open”.

The Captain Tom Foundation was set up in June 2020 after its namesake raised £38.9m for the NHS by walking laps of his Bedfordshire garden during the UK first Covid-19 lockdown. He died at the age of 100 in February 2021.