Alternative Housing stripped of charity status after multiple rule breaches

A Bristol housing provider has been stripped of its charitable status after a three-year inquiry.

The Charity Commission said it had struck off Alternative Housing, which in 2017 topped a list compiled by a national newspaper of the most-prosecuted landlords in the UK.

The provider was found to have breached property regulations.

One senior staff member was also found to have paid companies they were linked to huge amounts of money.

That transaction involved more than £230,000, the inquiry was told.

The Charity Commission started investigating Alternative Housing in 2017.

On Thursday, it said it had found the trustees responsible for misconduct and/or mismanagement.

Amy Spiller, head of the investigations team at the commission, said: "Charities exist to do good and ensuring [their] beneficiaries are safe should be an absolute governance priority for all trustees.

"The trustees of Alternative Housing failed in this responsibility."

Links between Alternative Housing's trustees and companies that the charity made significant payments to were also discovered.

In one case, a signatory on the charity's bank account was also the sole director of a company that was given £232,000 but no conflict of interest was declared.

The Charity Commission said: "There are indications the trustees may have exploited their charitable status for financial gain... whilst exposing beneficiaries to harm, and by failing to ensure the accommodation the charity managed was maintained."

Financial irregularities included Alternative Housing reporting its income as below the £25,000 threshold when accounts must be filed.

The commission said the charity's income had actually "substantially exceeded this" over many years.

Alternative Housing had also failed to maintain fire equipment and alarms and left drains in one property in a poor condition, the inquiry was told.

None of the trustees of Alternative Housing gave information to the inquiry and the Charity Commission said it appeared the charity had ceased to operate.

The only person recorded as a trustee on the register at the time told the inquiry he had never been a trustee.