It is widely believed that the Celtic New Year began and ended with the Gaelic festival of Samhain (“Summer’s End”) which, in the modern Gregorian calendar, falls on 31st October/1st November. The association of this time of year with the spirits of the departed has its echoes in the Christian Feasts of All Hallows/All Saints Day on 1st November and All Souls Day on 2nd November as well as in the fancy dress parties and trick-or-treatery of modern Hallowe’en festivities. This therefore seems as good a time as any to look back and reflect on the events of the past few months, a period which has seen both endings and beginnings, as befits this time of year.

I was privileged to spend nearly seven years as Director of the Bradgate Park Trust, the longest I have stayed in any one job in my entire career and could, at one stage, see my being there until retirement. A remarkable location with some world-class heritage and a team of staff who were growing into the job and a group of volunteers whose passion and commitment was second to none and continually fired my enthusiasm: Bradgate was poised for great things and we had begun to achieve some real successes and terms of conservation, events, awards and funding received. And then politics got involved.

Charities depend on their Trustees, who are almost always unpaid volunteers. Finding good people to sit on Charity Boards is a constant struggle but there are thousands of them the length and breadth of the country doing incredible work, often in difficult circumstances and on a shoestring, to ensure that their charities deliver for their beneficiaries. It is a fundamental principle enshrined in charity law that Trustees must act only in the interests of their charity, independent of all other vested interests and personal considerations. Trustees who fail to do this not only breach charity law and fail in the moral and fiduciary duty they owe to the charity’s beneficiaries but they erode public trust and confidence in the charity sector as a whole and their conduct is an insult to all those volunteers working hard and doing the right thing. I would make “perverting the course of charity” a criminal offence like perverting the course of justice in order to really stress just how important that bond of trust is and how serious the breaking of it – they are called Trustees, for good reason, being the ones entrusted with the charity’s assets, including its people, and reputation.

I have been fortunate throughout my life not to fall victim to bullying. My physical build and robustness of character have always meant that I was never the one that the bullies picked on, which is why, when it happened, it was such a shock and why I was so utterly unprepared for it. I was also taken by surprise by the subtlety and insidiousness with which bullying can happen and the shame of having to admit that I had become a victim. I have been lucky: I had the strength, and the support, to continue fighting for three long years and then, when I had finally come to the realisation that there was nothing further to be gained by fighting, to have the opportunity to walk away, and into another job, with my health and sanity, if not exactly intact then not damaged beyond repair.

So, on 31st July 2019, I walked away…