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07
Nov
Banned businessman still on board of trustees at Harrogate charity
A businessman is still working as a trustee for a Harrogate charity, a year after the Financial Conduct Authority declared he was not a “fit and proper” person to carry out regulated financial services and banned him from the industry.
Craig Buchan is vice chair of the board of trustees of Harrogate Town AFC Community Foundation, the football club’s charitable arm, whose website claims it acts “with honesty, transparency and fairness in everything we do".
But last November, Mr Buchan and his business partner, Martin Cooke, were partners in MedDen Financial Services LLP, a company whose clients had suffered financial losses due to the advice they had received.
As a result of this, in December 2020 the FCA imposed an asset requirement on the firm to safeguard its assets for the benefit of its customers.
But just a day after the FCA imposed the requirement, Mr Buchan withdrew more than £9,000 from the company's bank account.
This meant the account held no funds for clients who were owed redress.
Both men also failed to report the matter to the FCA and, during the subsequent investigation, failed to adequately cooperate and engage with the body.
As a result of “recklessly breaching” the asset requirement, Mr Buchan and his business partner, Martin Cooke, were deemed to no longer be "fit and proper" to perform any regulated duties in financial services, and on November 14 last year, they were banned from doing so.
In its decision, the FCA said "Mr Buchan acted with a lack of integrity".
The pair were also fined more than £6,000 each – sums slashed from around £110,000 each in financial and punitive penalties due to “financial hardship”.
In February 2021, MedDen entered voluntary liquidation.
The Financial Services Compensation Scheme has since paid out £2.2 million in relation to 35 claims made against the company.
Despite this sequence of events, Mr Buchan was appointed as a trustee of Harrogate Town AFC Community Foundation in February 2023.
The Stray Ferret was alerted to the situation by a source who said they were a "concerned local citizen and Harrogate Town supporter". They asked:
How is a charity overseeing income upwards of £200,000 annually to improve lives of people in the local community, allowing someone on the board of trustees who is banned by the FCA for reckless behaviour?
We contacted the Charity Commission to ask if someone banned by the FCA is entitled to be a charity trustee, and if not, what action it may take.
A spokesperson told us:
We are currently assessing information relating to a trustee of Harrogate Town AFC Community Foundation to determine what, if any, regulatory role there is for us.
That was three weeks ago. Asked again this week, they confirmed that the assessment is ongoing.
Joe Saxton, a charity trustee and voluntary sector consultant who is unconnected with the case, said that Harrogate Town AFC Community Foundation’s actions would be guided by the outcome of the Charity’s Commission’s assessment.
He told us:
Every board of trustees needs to be clear that all their trustees pass the Charity Commission’s ‘fit and proper person’ test. They should do that when they recruit new trustees, and if anything happens that might change the status of their existing trustees.
The commission takes this test very seriously, and any charity which decided that not all of their trustees were able to pass the test would need to think about filing a ‘serious incident report’ with the commission.
The Stray Ferret has approached Harrogate Town AFC Community Foundation and Mr Buchan for comment but has received no reply.
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