Meghan Markle & Prince Harry's Former Charity Didn't Mismanage Funds, Anti-Monarchy Group Apologizes
In the clear. Meghan Markle and Prince Harry were accused of mismanaging charity funds, but it has been revealed that the couple did not break any laws.
“We are pleased that the Charity Commission has confirmed what we knew from the start: that MWX Foundation, formerly Sussex Royal, complied fully with UK charity law in its handling and transferring of funds and grants,” the spokesperson told royal reporter Omid Scobie. “Today’s update provides complete closure to this review and ultimately underscores both the legitimacy of the former charity and the baselessness of the claims against it.”
The Charity Commission launched a review after an anti-monarchy group called Republic claimed that a transfer of money from Prince William and Kate Middleton's Royal Foundation to Harry and Meghan's new charity — formerly called Sussex Royal but is now named MWX Foundation — was a conflict of interest.
However, a spokesperson for the Royal Foundation said they had done nothing wrong. “They were fully in line with governance requirements and were reported transparently,” they said.
Still, the Charity Commission opened a "regulatory compliance case" to look into the claim.
Following the investigation, Helen Earner, the commission’s director of regulatory services, noted that in the future, if someone wants to set up an organization, they should keep it open longer than a year after it launched.
“A substantial proportion of funds went into setting up and then winding up a charity that was active for a relatively short period of time,” she said. “Trustees cannot predict future events when establishing a new charity — circumstances can change after a charity has been set up. But all trustees, before setting up a charity, should think about the longer term, and consider carefully whether a new charity is the best way of achieving the intended aims.”
Meanwhile, Republic issued a statement of their own. “We apologise unreservedly to the charities and personally to the Duke of Sussex for our actions and the public damage that has been caused as a result of widely publicized untrue claims,” the group said. “If we had contacted the organizations directly, we accept we would have realized quickly that there was nothing improper in their operations.”
