| AdminHistory | The Paul S. Cadbury Trust was established in 1931 to allow Paul and Rachel Cadbury to pursue their personal charitable interests separately from the trust set up by Barrow and Geraldine. Paul endowed the new trust with five thousand £1 fully paid ordinary shares in the British Cocoa and Chocolate Company Ltd. The original deed of trust, dated 30 November 1931, names Paul and Rachel as Trustees. In 1935 a third trustee, Meaburn Tatham was appointed. He had served as Secretary at Cadbury Brothers and was a friend of Paul. Tatham was the only non-family member to serve as a trustee of the Paul S. Cadbury Trust. Viney, Price, Goodyear and Littleboy (later Littleboy, Gillett and Co.) were employed as the new trust's auditors. The Trust became a registered charity on 04 March 1964.
Meetings of the Trust occurred sporadically throughout the 1930s with only two meetings taking place between 1931 and 1938. Though the governance of the Trust was relatively informal during this period, financial accounts with lists of grantees were recorded from the year ending 30 November 1932 onward. This earliest financial report classifies donations and subscriptions by subject, a system later adopted by the Barrow and Geraldine S. Cadbury Trust and the Barrow Cadbury Fund. Early giving was listed under the headings, 1) Society of Friends, 2) other religious bodies, 3) hospitals, 4) hospitals: sundries, 5) homes institutions etc., 6) relief funds, 7) temperance, 8) clubs, hostels etc., 9) education, and, 10) sundries. Major recipients included Watford Road Congregational Church (£50), Middlemore Emigration Homes (£136 2s 6p) and the Leighton Park School and Bursaries Fund (£50). Entries under the 'sundries' category include Boys Brigade 14th Birmingham Company, the Birmingham Discharged Prisoners Aid Society, British Social Hygiene Council and the Birmingham Society for the Care of Invalid Children. Total grant payments for the year ending 05 October 1932 amounted to £491 1s.
In common with his parents' trust, the Paul S. Cadbury Trust did not begin its existence as a grant making charity. Between 1931 and the late 1960s most trust giving was reflected through subscriptions and donations to established institutions or in response to special appeals. Subscriptions were usually made on an annual basis to an organisation without any stipulation as to how the funds were to be used. In contrast to grants (and loans), subscriptions required little supervision and could be readily managed by Paul and his private secretary. Similarly, donations to appeals and ad hoc relief funds required no exceptional oversight. The decision to move away from this traditional pattern of giving to more innovative and unproven grants based activities led to the recruitment of the Cadbury Trusts' first professional administrative staff in 1968.
The scope of Paul's responsibilities increased considerably in 1958 when Barrow died and he assumed the leadership of the Barrow and Geraldine S. Cadbury Trust and the Barrow Cadbury Fund Ltd. In addition to running the Cadbury Trusts Paul was also Chairman at Cadbury Brothers and a trustee of Middlemore Homes and the Bournville Village Trust. In 1965 Paul retired from Cadburys to devote more time to pursuing his wide-ranging charitable interests and to building up the Cadbury Trusts.
The growing success of the Cadbury chocolate brand greatly increased the personal wealth of Paul and Rachel through the increased value of their company shares. Most of these dividends were reinvested in the Cadbury Trusts, increasing their endowment and allowing for increased charitable giving. By the financial year ending 05 April 1958 Paul S. Cadbury Trust grants had increased to £3,977 1s 10p. That same year Meaburn Tatham resigned and two new trustees were appointed, Catherine R. Hickinbotham and Philippa H. Southall. The decision to offer trusteeships to the next generation of the family became a defining feature of the Paul S. Cadbury Trust as well as the allied Barrow and Geraldine S. Cadbury Trust and the Barrow Cadbury Fund Ltd. In addition to maintaining close ties between each generation, family trustees also brought new interests and concerns to the attention of the trusts.
In 1968 Kenneth Nicholson was appointed as the Cadbury Trusts' first administrator. He was succeeded in 1969 by Anthony Wilson who was joined in 1972 by Eric Adams. The recruitment of professional staff was vital to fulfilling Paul's vision of transforming the Cadbury Trusts' into a grant making institution capable of supporting innovative projects and organisations. As a seed funder the Trust provided the opportunity for groups to demonstrate the feasibility of new ideas and alternate ways of problem solving to local government, national government, statutory agencies and community groups. Paul was keenly aware that official bodies were hesitant to fund experimental projects or to collaborate with untried groups.
Trust support served to validate or refute the value of a range of projects including rape crisis centres, housing associations, neighbourhood borstals, small business loans programmes and alcoholics' rehabilitation centres. To effectively evaluate and monitor such a diversity of projects required trained administrators who would carry out day to day grant administration and in turn report to trustees and directors.
Throughout his life, Paul remained directly involved in the management and running of his trust. While Anthony and Eric technically acted as administrative secretaries to the Paul S. Cadbury Trust their work was practically limited to the Barrow and Geraldine S. Cadbury Trust and the Fund. The operational business of the Paul S. Cadbury Trust continued to be conducted by Paul with the assistance of his secretary Carole Yates. This managerial distinction reflects the personal nature of grants and subscriptions made by the Paul S. Cadbury Trust.
The interests of Paul and Rachel tended towards grants and subscriptions relating to town and country planning, neighbourhood development, work for the handicapped and family welfare. Their commitment to medical research stemmed in part from the death of their daughter Margaret in 1950 from cerebral palsy. Her illness led Paul to co-found the Midland Spastics Association with Steven Qualye in 1947. Perennial recipients of Trust support include Middlemore Homes, the Midland Spastic Association (now Cerebral Palsy Midlands) and the Birmingham University Centre for Urban and Regional Studies. These areas of interest often overlapped with those of the Barrow and Geraldine S. Cadbury Trust and many grantees received support from both organisations at various times. Like the Barrow and Geraldine S. Cadbury Trust, the Paul S. Cadbury Trust was unable to make grants to individuals or organisations not formally classed as charities. Where charitable status was lacking or unclear the Paul S. Cadbury Trust could use the Fund, with its status as a benevolent company, as a channel for payments to grantees.
In 1966 Paul S. Cadbury Trustees established a new trust to purchase and own land for amenity purposes. This new entity, the Worgan Trust, formed a practical extension of Paul's longstanding interest in town and country planning, particularly his desire to protect green belt land around the city of Birmingham and to promote rural recreation and education. It was unclear if the deed establishing the Paul S. Cadbury Trust allowed for land ownership and Paul was advised that the creation of a new trust would be preferable to risking any potential legal entanglements. Paul wished to provide an opportunity for city children to experience rural life and established Chapmans Hill School Farm near Waseley Hills Country Park for this purpose in 1972. The Worgan Trust had no endowment and was reliant on the Paul S. Cadbury Trust and the Barrow and Geraldine S. Cadbury Trust for financial support.
Throughout the 1970s and 1980s the work of the Paul S. Cadbury Trust became more closely associated with neighbourhood development grants focusing on Birmingham and the West Midlands. The Trust advocated the formation of urban parish councils through its support for the Association of Neighbourhood Councils and provided seed money for many local residents associations. The Paul S. Cadbury Trust operated a series of small grant programmes including the Youth and Community Fund and the Technical Advisory Service. The Fund was designed to meet specific needs of youth groups operating in deprived urban areas while the advisory service provided specialist technical and administrative support to housing associations and other tenant groups. These small grant programmes proved highly flexible in quickly meeting the needs of applicants, from seeking the advice of an architect to assisting in the registration of community groups as companies or charities.
The shift towards neighbourhood development grants did not bring an end to subscriptions for traditional Friends causes. During the year ending 05 April 1979 the Paul S. Cadbury Trust approved subscriptions to 'The Friend', the Margery Fry Memorial Trust, Woodbrooke College, the temperance Council of Christian Churches (Educational) Ltd. and a variety of local Quaker meeting houses. Financial support was also maintained for the Midlands Spastic Association, Middlemore Homes, the Birmingham Royal Institute for the Blind, Birmingham Medical Mission (where Rachel served as president), Uffculme School and the National Trust.
Following the formation of Cadbury Schweppes Paul and Anthony proposed to diversify the investment portfolio of the Cadbury Trusts. Prior to the merger this portfolio had been dominated by Cadbury shares. The move away from ties with the family business was made to 1) disentangle the interests of the Cadbury Trusts from those of the company, and, 2) protect its capital through a greater breadth of investments. The process of diversification occurred over three decades and resulted in the sale of all Cadbury shares by 2000. Accompanying diversification was an emphasis on ethical investment. In keeping with its Quaker ethos, the trusts and Fund instructed their financial advisors to avoid investments linked to arms production, alcohol, tobacco, gambling or major concerns in apartheid South Africa.
Formal meetings of the Paul S. Cadbury Trust were held on an annual basis and attended by all trustees and the trust's administrators. Informal meetings were held by Paul and Rachel at their home in Harborne to address any urgent business arising during the course of the year. Following Paul's death in 1984 Paul S. Cadbury Trust meetings were scheduled for the same weekends as Barrow and Geraldine S. Cadbury Trust and Barrow Cadbury Fund Ltd. quarterly meetings to ensure the most efficient use of trustee time. Periodic informal meetings continued and were usually attended by Rachel Cadbury and Catherine Hickinbotham.
After Paul's death the chairmanship of the Trust passed to Catherine Hickinbotham. Operational matters became the primary responsibility of Eric Adams. Under his leadership the activities of the trusts were rationalised to clearly demarcate organisational responsibilities. This was accomplished in part by transferring Paul S. Cadbury Trust grants outside of the neighbourhood development remit to the Barrow and Geraldine S. Cadbury Trust while transferring relevant Barrow and Geraldine S. Cadbury Trust neighbourhood development grants to the Paul S. Cadbury Trust. Trustees identified three principles on which to base future grant spending:
1) Increasing opportunities for individuals to develop their capacity to contribute to the life of their neighbourhoods;
2) Enabling individuals to play a greater part in society by support for organisations and programmes providing a democratic role in community and neighbourhood issues;
3) Encouraging the effective functioning of neighbourhood systems so that peoples' voices are informed, representative and effective.
During Eric's tenure the Trust expanded the scope of the neighbourhood development portfolio to include Northern Ireland, particularly projects in Belfast and rural County Fermanagh. Despite undertaking additional work in Northern Ireland the Paul S. Cadbury Trust was routinely underspending in relation to the value of its investments. The contrary held true for the Barrow and Geraldine S. Cadbury Trust which had a tendency to regularly overspend.
The integration of the Barrow and Geraldine S. Cadbury Trust and Paul S. Cadbury Trust eventually led Trustees to open discussions with the Charity Commission about the possibility of amalgamating the two charities. The future of Paul Cadbury's trust had been under periodic review since his death in 1984. While the operation of the trusts' had been rationalised to avoid overlapping areas of work it gradually became clear that there was little functional justification for running two allied charities administered by the same staff and governed by the same trustees. The duplication of meetings, financial reporting and record keeping further contributed to the case for merger.
Following a period of negotiation with the Charity Commission between 1993 and 1994 the merger scheme was approved and subsequently authorised by Barrow and Geraldine S. Cadbury Trust and Paul S. Cadbury Trust trustees. On 30 August 1994 the property and assets of the Paul S. Cadbury Trust were formally transferred to the Barrow and Geraldine S. Cadbury Trust. The newly amalgamated trust was referred to as the Barrow Cadbury Trust. In January 1995 the Paul S. Cadbury Trust was removed from the Charity Commission Register. The grant making functions of the defunct Paul S. Cadbury Trust were transferred primarily to the Community Organising Programme and Northern Ireland Programme of the Barrow Cadbury Trust. |