The King’s former most trusted aide Michael Fawcett exposed Charles’s charity to “substantial risk”, but his actions did not amount to misconduct, an inquiry has found. The Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator (OSCR) examined dealings at the King’s Foundation, formerly known as the Prince’s Foundation.
Mr Fawcett, Charles’s ex-valet, resigned as the foundation’s chief executive in 2021 amid claims he promised to help secure a knighthood and British citizenship for Saudi billionaire Mahfouz Marei Mubarak bin Mahfouz – a donor to the charity. The OSCR’s report, published on Tuesday, criticised Mr Fawcett’s “unacceptable” conduct over his failure to make sure a collection of artwork, reportedly worth more than £100 million and loaned to the charity by businessman James Stunt, was insured.
Mr Fawcett was not named directly in the publication and was only referred to as the “charity’s former CEO”. The inquiry revealed the foundation had expressed previous concerns about Mr Fawcett over his involvement in the loan of high-value paintings from an individual referred to in the reports as Donor B.
Some of the art was later feared to be fake and the collection was found not to have been insured by the charity. In 2019, it was reported Mr Stunt, the now-bankrupt British socialite and ex-husband of heiress Petra Ecclestone, lent 17 masterpieces by Monet, Picasso, Dali and others to the then-Prince’s Foundation to display at its headquarters, Dumfries House in Ayrshire, Scotland.
