David Cameron: Right to give Kids Company ‘last chance’ £3m

Prime Minister David Cameron has defended the government’s decision to give charity Kids Company £3m one week before its closure, saying it had been right to give it “one last chance”.

Kids Company workers and supporters marched to the gates of Downing Street today protesting at the closure, carrying banners and chanting “Save Kids Company see the child” as they gathered at the gates.

For Alan Yentob, the creative director of the BBC and chair of trustees for the charity Kids Company for 18 years – a man who in a long career at the corporation has always seemed unruffled by anything – it has been a long seven days.

The Kids Company founder said: “I do remember hearing about that incident”. He has not addressed why the advice of the charity’s own financial directors to build up some financial reserves was not heeded, or why civil servants latterly felt giving more millions of pounds of public funds to the charity was not value for money.

She said: “Because I don’t wear a suit and I don’t carry a briefcase, I haven’t sort of bought into the corporate packaging”.

Pressed, he apologised for becoming emotional and said: “I have had to watch what has happened to hundreds of thousands of children, I will answer your question in due course”.

Karl Wilding, from the National Council for Voluntary Organisations, told the BBC were coming together to try to “provide cover” for Kids Company. That said, she did stipulate that this wasn’t a problem with the Government, but Britain as a whole: ‘We’ve become a nation that demonises children and perceives them to be the adversaries, negatively impacting our quality of life.

Ms Batmanghelidjh did accept it was “irresponsible” not to have reserves at the charity to make up for any shortfall in donations.

But Ms Batmanghelidjh said police had brought the allegation to the charity’s attention recently and it would have “absolutely dealt with it very robustly” if it had emerged before then. She blamed the sexual abuse allegations for the loss of a donation which could have helped secure its future and said it had been police had been “very irresponsible” in releasing the information to the media.

Or, according to Batmanghelidjh’s account on Newsnight: ‘We had a fantastic deal on the table, with the Government getting money in, with the philanthropists putting money in…

He insisted he not “abused my position at the BBC” and had not called for the story to be pulled, although he had suggested it could be postponed to give the organisation time to respond. The perpetrator is serving a prison sentence for murder. Our policy is if staff wish to press charges they can do that.

She said: “I draw the line at sexual abuse”.

She also denied allegations that skunk – the strong form of marijuana – was openly smoked by staff and clients at the Urban Academy.

“So, consequently, what’s happened is when these children come to the premises, nobody pays for them”.

Kids Company, which provided educational support to deprived young people in London, Liverpool and Bristol, was forced to close down this week. She told the Huffington Post: “Kids Company is helping me and my children”. In a statement it said: “Kids Company has sustained its services for 19 years growing from one centre under railway arches to a service which reached 36,000 children, young people and families”.

In the interview with Frei on Thursday, his first since the charity closed on Wednesday night, Yentob said he saw no reason to resign from the BBC.

Protestor Tom Ngoye said: “We didn’t even get a chance for our voice to be heard”.

“Local authorities will also be reviewing the most high-risk cases on an individual basis to determine what support is required”.