What you may not know…

At a recent Committee meeting, a discussion occurred about how well our members understand the governance and finance structure of the Coachmakers’ Company and our separate charitable activities. We concluded that a short description was in order.

All Livery Companies, Companies without Livery and Guilds enjoy three fundamental pillars of activity to merit their existence:

Fellowship within the Company
Philanthropic endeavour towards a specific public benefit
Support for the craft, trade or profession represented

It was not always like this. In the early beginnings, Guilds grew out of parish fraternal organisations where numerous members of the same trade lived in close proximity. This allowed a particular craft or trade to form a union of common interest. The early Guilds were more about business; control of prices and quality, keeping out competition beyond the City, providing training for apprentices and welfare for needy members such as the sick and widowed families. This last aspect eventually grew into philanthropy beyond the company.

As the Companies enjoyed a monopoly of trade they grew in stature and wealth until eventually in 1880, they became the subject of external criticism of their wealth, influence and perceived misuse of funds. In that year the government created a Royal Commission on Livery Companies, to investigate their finances, charitable work and their role in the modern society of the time. The findings largely exonerated the companies by finding that they met legal requirements and provided a useful public function.

The outcome did however prompt companies to significantly boost their public utility (largely education), increase support for crafts with apprenticeships and deliver professional training. Charitable endeavour was also greatly and visibly increased. This continues today with the Livery movement justifying its purpose and relevance through the charitable endeavours of Livery Companies. Last year, these totalled more than £81 million in charitable donations across all 113 Companies, and tens of thousands of hours of voluntary work by Liverymen.

Moving now to the specifics of the governance and finances of our Livery, there are two distinct elements to our being: The Coachmakers’ Company and the Coachmaker’s Charitable Trust.

The Coachmakers’ Company is mostly funded by the whole of the members’ subscriptions and admission fines. The Company has around £225,000 invested which also provides some income to the Company. Any surplus arising from social and dining events also provides income, but the burden of increasing costs in recent years has resulted in no significant surplus. Indeed, during the past year, the impact of the increased costs faced in the hospitality industry has meant our operating budget has seen a deficit. This has not allowed the Court to covenant a Company surplus to the Charitable Trust as has occurred in past years.

The Company is governed by the elected Court consisting of the Master, Past Masters, Wardens and Assistants. The Clerk and Assistant Clerk are employed to manage the Company, and the annual accounts are independently examined.

The Coachmakers’ Charitable Trust is an entirely separate and independent body governed by three Liverymen Trustees, who report their deliberations to the Court. The Trust is registered with and overseen by the Charities Commission. The Charities Commission requires that the Trustees must be independent and free from any interference by any connected body such as the Company. The Charity must also adhere to the declared philanthropic objectives set out in the memoranda and articles approved by the Charity Commission. Put simply, there must be separate governance, separate bank accounts, and a separate management committee that determines policy and grants.

Where does the money in the Trust come from? The Charitable Trust receives income from several sources:

Member donations, some regular, some sporadic. Regrettably less than 15% of our members (460) make donations.
Corporate sponsorship. Fortunately, we have the opportunity through the work of the Coachmakers’ Company, to be closely involved with modern industries (the successors to our horse-drawn carriage origins) of aerospace, automotive and associated businesses. This association means a few of these companies have been encouraged to generously contribute to the Trust which allows the Trustees to sponsor some of our bursaries, grants and awards.
Investment income – the Trustees manage our investments to achieve dividend income which is added to our reserves to provide increasing income. The Fund currently has approximately £2,000,000 invested which delivers an annual income of around £120,000.
Miscellaneous fundraising activities such as the John Pearl 100 Club (£6k+ last year), church collections and fundraising events such as the Annual Banquet.
One-off donations from members of the Livery such as legacy gifts.

The Charity does not support the Company in any way although it does pay for its own accounting costs and a proportion of the Clerk’s salary as he also serves as Secretary to the Trust.

So, what of the future?

The company faces a substantial challenge in controlling costs, and particularly for our formal dinners where the cost of living crisis has had a significant impact on food, wines and venue hire costs. The Court and its Committees are thoroughly examining the cost base and developing ideas to minimise the effect on dinner charges and on the subscription increases that members pay.

Attendance at events, which had fallen significantly post COVID, has now recovered somewhat but has not regained former numbers. Lack of attendance numbers drives up event costs due to the fixed cost element. Please see this explanation as an overt appeal to you all, recently reinforced by the Master, to make best endeavours to attend some, or all, of our dinners.

The Charity Trustees, supported by the Fundraising Committee, faces the challenge of persuading members to make modest donations, preferably on a regular basis thus providing predictable income. The amount is largely immaterial and could be likened to forgoing a cappuccino and pastry once a week.

Please consider making a modest regular donation to the Trust in addition to your membership fees to the Company. Please also consider making a bequest in your will for the benefit of the Trust. We will be providing an appeal on this separately.

If you would like to support the Trust with just £10 per month via direct debit, this can be set up in seconds. Just scan the QR code below with your camera to authorise a mandate with the GoCardless Charitable Trust account, or just click the image to go to the link.

Our strapline is ‘An active livery investing in young people’ and the aim for our 350th anniversary year 2026-27 is to fund up to 35 awards to young people in our industries as well as expanding further our engagement with young people to stimulate interest in careers in these sectors.

Please contact the Fundraising Committee at donations@coachmakers.co.uk if you would like to donate other amounts/frequencies or help with our fundraising activities. Many thanks for reading this message.

This ‘demystifying’ message has been agreed and supported by:

The Coachmakers’ Charitable Trustees & The Fundraising Committee

Use this code to authorise a bank mandate and commence a regular donation, or just click below.