Street Talk
Registered charity no. 1117588
Trustee’s Annual Report April 1st 2024 - March 31st 2025
Objectives and Activities
Street Talk’s mission is to provide professional, specialised mental health care of the highest quality to women trapped in street prostitution, women who have been the victims of trafficking, or any vulnerable woman. To listen to each woman’s personal story, to enable each woman to overcome those obstacles which keep her trapped in a life of exploitation and to enable her to live in safety and with dignity. To share the learnings accrued over Street Talk’s two decades of operation with other organisations within the sector and to promote Therapy of Presence, the clinical model pioneered by Street Talk that has already enabled hundreds of vulnerable women to engage successfully with psychotherapy. To campaign and influence policy in areas relevant to Street Talk beneficiaries and to give a voice to marginalised women.
This year Street Talk has provided the following services
One-to-one psychotherapy for women who come to the service without a referral
Taking place in our therapy space at Resource for London and over the phone.
One to one psychotherapy taking referrals from others organisations
Over the period Street Talk worked with women referred by Solace Women’s Aid Westminster, WiSER Project Islington, SHP Kali Project Barking and Dagenham, Safer Beds Camden, Hibiscus Women’s Centre, Hammersmith Women’s Hostel, Medaille Trust Hostel, Chrysalis Project, Hestia, as well as individual referrals from Islington Social Services, Camden Social Services, Nia, the NHS, Ella’s House, and others.
Art therapy groups and one-to-one art therapy
Over the period Street Talk ran four art therapy groups in Hibiscus Women’s Centre, Medaille Trust hostel, Safer Beds Endsleigh Gardens, Hammersmith Women’s Hostel and the Chrysalis hostel.
Advocacy for individual women’s rights
The women who came to us over the course of the year had many complex needs and had almost all been failed by services in different ways. Advocacy alongside the therapy seems to provide all round support.
Accompaniment throughout immigration proceedings
We provide reports to the court evidencing that mental health symptoms are consistent with PTSD caused by extreme fear and that the woman has told a consistent story over the years which we have worked with her. When requested by the women or by their legal team we attend court with the woman and have been called as a witness.
There is almost no mental health support for people going through the asylum system. The process takes a catastrophic toll on the mental health of those put through it and our main
role is to bear witness and work with women to manage the despair, terror, uncertainty and dehumanisation the system incurs.
Accompanying women through family proceedings
We provide reports for the court and psychological assessments as well as accompanying women to social services case conferences as well as court.
Where we believe a woman has parental capacity, we will support a woman in her fight to be allowed a parenting assessment and to evidence her parenting capacity in other ways.
Accompanying women to criminal court hearings
Reports were provided to explain circumstances and to draw attention to mental health issues and we accompanied women although the cases were still heard online this year.
Legal support
Street Talk beneficiaries continue to receive legal support from Martin Stewart, a solicitor who works pro bono up to one day each week, on housing, benefits, crime and family matters. The therapist working with the woman will work together with their lawyer to make as strong a case as possible and where that will help to include relevant information on women's mental health which otherwise would not be taken into consideration.
Mentoring
One-to-one mentoring, supporting women by accompanying them to appointments, which many find very hard, accompanying them to go out from where they are living and do simple things like go to a café or for a walk in a park to improve their well being and to give them some social contact. Mentoring provides a good volunteering opportunity for women who have come through the service.
Referral to specialist services
Women who have made sufficient progress may be referred on to addiction services, mental health specialists, parenting classes, and other services when that would provide additional support. The vast majority of Street Talk’s women are excluded from these services at the time of their first engagement with Street Talk.
Practical Support
Provision of essential items for women including food or supermarket vouchers, medication, nappies and other supplies for babies, clothing, telephones, laptops, travel cards, funded partly through partnership with Family Action who provide the grants for individual women.
Campaigning activity
Street Talk continued campaigning as part of Together With Refugees, an alliance of organisations in the sector, advocating the rights of refugees.
Street Talk continued its partnership with the Human Trafficking Foundation for joint campaigning.
Promoting the Street Talk model
We work hard to share our learning, specifically about how to work therapeutically with people who are usually excluded from therapy and to promote the Therapy of Presence model. Our most important goal is to evidence that people with complex needs who have come from a background of trauma can use therapy to recover. Street Talk’s strategy is to remain small to ensure high standards of work, but we know that there are very many people we can’t reach. Encouraging others to practise the model is a way to extend the reach of the work, to scale up effectively.
We continue to share the book Not Angry But Hurting with colleagues in the sector, we have provided consultations on the model to other organisations in the sector and take up invitations to give talks on the model.
Some of the organisations receiving consultation / training from Street Talk over the period are listed below.
Oxlease NHS Foundation Solace Women’s Aid Westminster Solace Women’s Aid Islington Medaille Trust Hibiscus Women’s Centre
Public Benefit Guidance
In setting Street Talk’s objectives and planning its activities our Trustees have given due regard to the Charity Commission’s public benefit guidance.
Outputs
Quantification of Street Talk’s services is complex due to the nature of the women’s engagement which, according to the needs of each individual, may be chaotic in the early stages and later, sporadic. Street Talk’s model emphasises quality, long-term work over raw quantity of beneficiaries and this informs a strategy of sustainable growth.
Over the course of the year, 119 women engaged with Street Talk’s services.
The charity generated over 1700 discrete charitable outputs which are summarized in the table below.
| Output | Occurences |
|---|---|
| One-to-one therapy sessions provided | 1026 |
| Group therapy contacts | 142 |
| Inter-agency meetings facilitated / attended | 268 |
| Practical support provided | 42 |
| Reports to the courts / witness testimony / legal letters of support | 50 |
| Onward referrals to other support services e.g. addiction services | 65 |
| Training and consultation to other professionals | 5 |
| Mentoring sessions | 108 |
Outcomes
Each of the 119 women who had contact with Street Talk over the period has reported some positive outcome. These may include ‘hard’ such as managing addiction, exiting abusive relationships, exiting street prostitution, getting off the street and into accommodation, moving from supported accommodation to independent living, etc.
However, for many of the women, these outcomes are distant goals. Street Talk has learnt that, ‘soft’ outcomes which may seem insignificant (e.g. simply engaging with service or attending an appointment with a therapist), will, given time, eventually lead to hard outcomes.
The overall aim of Street Talk’s work is to enable women who have been brutalised to encounter their own humanity. When women feel entitled to live in safety and with dignity the hard outcomes follow. It is constantly challenging to quantify outcomes. Small acts of kindness go a long way in recovery from trauma, but they are almost impossible to measure.
None of the women who took part in one-to-one therapy or art therapy would have been able to access therapy through any conventional practitioners. All would be excluded for reasons such as addiction, homelessness, learning-difficulties, chaotic lifestyle or poor self-advocacy. The fact these vulnerable women with complex needs saw a therapist is, in and of itself, arguably Street Talk’s most significant outcome
Street Talk lacks the resources to record every outcome resulting from its work. The soft outcomes which are central to Street Talk’s process may be practically unmeasurable. Below, a sample of the hard outcomes achieved by the women over the period is presented as an illustrative example of the changes that women working with a Street Talk therapist are able to make.
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8 women entered education, from college to Masters Degree level.
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13 women resolved their immigration status
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12 women accessed specialist healthcare services (for example, eating disorder clinics, pain clinics, referrals under a psychiatric consultant, etc.)
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6 women engaged with addiction services
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A further 6 women accessed or engaged with other services such as GP practices, sexual violence support services and adult social care
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10 women with specific health problems were able to recover from, manage, or alleviate symptoms of their specific conditions.
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13 women who were previously isolated found community at women’s centres, church groups, by participating in free courses, or by joining a gym.
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12 women were successful in keeping children out of state care, were granted access to children in state care, or rebuilt relationships with estranged family.
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13 women improved their accommodation situation by moving into independent or supported housing, or into shelters from the street.
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6 women found paid employment and 1 started a small business.
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6 women began volunteering
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7 women accessed specialist legal services
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4 women involved with the criminal justice system were diverted from pathways that could have led to prison
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5 women exited exploitative relationships
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2 women reported abusers to police, 1 securing a conviction
It was a successful year for growth of the Street Talk model, Therapy of Presence . Training and consultation was provided to 5 organisations interested in adopting or incorporating practices developed by Street Talk into their own services for vulnerable people.
Case Study
Blessing referred herself to Street Talk after hearing of the service from another woman who was seeing one of the therapists. She was 55 and presented with her terror of being sent back to her country of origin, Nigeria.
Blessing had fled from Nigeria in fear of her life over 20 years ago, after her husband murdered her father. In her faith, she knew that she would be punished by death by her family for the actions of her husband. She fled to London, arriving legally but becoming an illegal immigrant by overstaying her visa. She disappeared into a life of exploitation, working in return for a room and a little cash for a gang who held her captive by threatening to report her to the police were she ever to try to escape.
Blessing was eventually arrested when the accommodation where she lives with other migrant workers was raided. She came to Street Talk a month or so after her release. She had no understanding of therapy and was reluctant to talk, only coming because another woman persuaded her.
She presented with suicidal feelings, terrified of being repatriated, certain that she would be killed were she to be sent back even after so many years. She lived in fear of family finding her in London and having her killed, in fear of spells and magic that her family used against her, believing this to be the cause of her ill health.
On leaving prison she had fallen victim to sexual exploitation with no means to support herself and no entitlement to benefits or social housing. In spite of acute, disabling shame she felt trapped.
Our first response was to refer Blessing to solicitors Duncan Lewis who very quickly got her into the asylum system. That freed her from sexual exploitation (rent for sex) and she was accommodated in an asylum hostel. This presented different challenges but she was free from the overwhelming shame.
We referred her to our partner Hibiscus who put in place a support worker and a peer group of other women in similar circumstances. Blessing continued to see her Street Talk therapist over a period of four years. She got used to the relationship, formed a very strong therapeutic alliance and was able to work on what turned out to have been a lifetime of trauma which started when she was forced into an arranged marriage with a violent man when she was a teenager.
As so often happens the healing took place in the relationship. Blessing had only known exploitative relationships since adolescence and when she came to Street Talk she saw herself as someone who deserved abuse and punishment. She grew in self confidence, has a great sense of humour and took part in Street Talk’s photography project, showing her work in an exhibition at the end of the course. Perhaps more significantly the course was made up of eight women all of whom had been in prison on immigration offences, and Blessing made a good friend from that group.
Street Talk provided a report for her final appeal for asylum in this country as well as appearing as a witness for her in court. It was a harrowing day. Blessing collapsed in court which was clearly from extreme fear. The hearing went ahead followed by a six month wait for a decision after which she was awarded asylum. She has now started college courses, hoping to qualify for care work.
She has now ended the work with Street Talk but knows that if she needs help in the future she could come back to us.
Financial Review
| Income £152,900 |
Income £152,900 |
|---|---|
| Trusts and Foundations £110,400 |
|
| Donations and Fundraising £15,200 |
|
| Major Donors £15,000 |
|
| From Solace Women’s Aid/WiSER Project | £12,100 |
| Refunds £200 |
|
| Expenditure £130,500 |
|
| Salaries, Pensions and Tax £95,100 |
|
| Sessional Staff £25,700 |
|
| Admin and Overheads £3,600 |
|
| Staff and Volunteer Expenses £3,500 |
|
| Beneficiary Expenses & Practical Support | £2,700 |
| Unrestricted reserves 31/3/24 £152,500 |
|
| Restricted reserves 31/3/24 £87,600 |
|
| Trusts, Foundations & Grants Breakdown | |
| Segelman Trust £33,000 |
|
| Tudor Trust £30,000 |
|
| Aurum Trust £15,000 |
|
| Cripplegate Foundation £12,812 |
|
| London Community Foundation £10,000 |
|
| London Quaker Services Trust £5,000 |
|
| WE Heal Fund Islington Council £4,540 |
The Trustees are satisfied that there are no uncertainties about the charity’s abilities to continue as a going concern over the next reporting period.
Reserves Policy
Street Talk’s policy is that reserves should be held equal to at least six months operating costs in order to guarantee safe cessation of therapeutic services in the event that the charity were to close. Reserves held at the end of the reporting period were in line with the policy.
Structure, Governance and Management
Street Talk is a registered charity. The governing document is the Constitution. Trustees are selected by the Board.
Trustees
Aoife Ritchie
Works in NHS mental health services and completed her psychotherapy training placement with Street Talk.
Charlotte Littlewood
Works in NHS mental health services and completed her psychotherapy training placement with Street Talk.
Colleen Rhodes
Former service user.
Fatima Ba
Former service user.
Keran Burris
Former service user.
Rebecca Hammond
Business owner/operator.
Sophie Jones
PR professional.
Consultants
Simon Dodds (lawyer)
Advises on strategy and development.
Dr Jan Birtle (psychiatrist)
Advises on the clinical model and sharing the learning.
Jane Cook (former government advisor on homelessness)
Advises on strategy and funding.
Martin Stewart (solicitor)
Advises on legal matters.
Staff
Director, clinical supervisor, psychotherapist
Pippa Hockton
Operations, fundraising and reporting, communications & compliance Oliver Hockton
Art Therapists
Catriona Alderton Vera Howard
Psychotherapists
Alison Caldow Amanda Chapman Karl Svars Laura Guy (training placement) Louise Turner (training placement) Nikki Adams (training placement) Poppy Martin (training placement) Rose Campbell Sandi Baiju Shirley Sutton
Partnerships
Aside from external and independent referrals, Street Talk also works in partnership with the following organisations.
Chrysalis Project (St. Mungo’s Broadway)
Two hostels exclusively for women involved in street prostitution in the London Borough of Lambeth.
St Mungo’s Safer Space
Enhanced support for women involved in street prostitution across three hostels and one drop-in centre in the London Borough of Camden.
St Mungo’s Hammersmith Women’s Hostel
Hostel for so-called difficult to reach women in Hammersmith.
Human Trafficking Foundation
Street Talk has taken part in joint campaigning with HTF in previous years but we are working more closely with HTF providing clinical supervision to the LEAP group and training in trauma to their team.
Medaille
Hostel for women who have escaped from traffickers in East London. Street Talk takes referrals from the hostel for psychotherapy and remote one-to-one art therapy.
Hibiscus Women’s Centre
Day centre for vulnerable women, including women involved in street prostitution, women in the criminal justice system, women who have been trafficked, asylum seekers and those who have no recourse to public funds in the London Borough of Islington.
Solace Women’s Aid / The WiSER Project
Service for hard-to-reach women who are extremely vulnerable but not able to access other women’s services, sometimes because they are from a culture where asking for help is not permitted.
Solace Women’s Aid / Westminster Housing First
Offering intensive support to women who are “hard to reach” very much modelled on the WiSER Project with Islington Solace.
999 Club
Homelessness charity in Deptford
Resource for London
Resource centre for charities in the London Borough of Islington.
Women’s Resource Centre
Organises an alliance of activist women’s organisations to campaign for women’s rights.
Family Action
Provide small grants and supermarket vouchers to 20 partner charities of which Street Talk is one.
The Centre for Social Justice Alliance
Sharing lived experience and learning from small charities to influence government policy .
Together with Refugees
An umbrella campaigning organisation.
St Beuno’s Retreat Centre
Welcomes Street Talk women of all faiths or no faith for periods of respite from the street.
Debevoise & Plimpton LLP
Law firm offering pro bono advice and legal services to Street Talk.
Duncan Lewis Solicitors
National Law firm offering legal support to Street Talk clients on immigration cases.
Declarations
The trustees declare that they have approved the above report.
Signed on behalf of the Board of Trustees
Alison Caldow, Chair of Trustees 19/12/2025
Charity Name No (if any) Street Talk 1117588
Receipts and payments accounts
CC16a
For the period Period start date Period end date To from 4/1/2024 3/31/2025
Section A Receipts and payments
| Unrestricted funds |
Unrestricted | Restricted funds |
Endowment funds |
Total funds | Last year | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| to the nearest £ | to the nearest £ | to the nearest £ | to the nearest £ | to the nearest £ | to the nearest £ | ||||||||
| A1 Receipts | |||||||||||||
| Tudor Trust | 33,000 | - | - | 33,000 | 30,000 | ||||||||
| Segelman | 30,000 | - | - | 30,000 | 25,000 | ||||||||
| Fundraising& Small Donations | 15,204 | - | - | 15,204 | 12,168 | ||||||||
| Aurum Trust | 15,000 | - | - | 15,000 | 15,000 | ||||||||
| Major Donors | 15,000 | - | - | 15,000 | 15,000 | ||||||||
| Cripplegate | - | - | 12,812 | - | 12,812 | 12,812 | |||||||
| Solace Women's Aid | - | - | 12,120 | - | 12,120 | 7,240 | |||||||
| London CommunityFoundation | - | - | 10,000 | - | 10,000 | 10,000 | |||||||
| London Quaker Services Trust | 5,000 | - | - | 5,000 | 5,000 | ||||||||
| WE Heal Fund Islington Council | - | - | 4,540 | - | 4,540 | - | |||||||
| Refunds | - | - | 200 | - | 200 | 36 | |||||||
| National LotteryCommunityFund | - | - | - | - | - | 19,750 | |||||||
| Madhav Mugal Foundation | - | - | - | - | - | 10,345 | |||||||
| FamilyAction | - | - | - | - | - | 300 | |||||||
| - | - | - | - | - | - | ||||||||
| - | - | - | - | - | - | ||||||||
| - | - | - | - | - | - | ||||||||
| - | - | - | - | - | - | ||||||||
| - | - | - | - | - | - | ||||||||
| - | - | - | - | - | - | ||||||||
| - | - | - | - | - | - | ||||||||
| - | - | - | - | - | - | ||||||||
| Sub total(Gross income for AR) | 113,204 (Gross income for AR) |
39,672 | - | 152,876 | 162,651 | ||||||||
| - - - - - - - - - Sub total - - - - - Total receipts 113,204 39,672 - 152,876 162,651 A2 Asset and investment sales, (see table). ~~—————~~ |
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| A3 Payments | |||||||||||||
| Salaries | - | - | 59,665 | - | 59,665 | 57,840 | |||||||
| Sessional Staff | - | - | 25,667 | - | 25,667 | 33,815 | |||||||
| Pensions | 10,400 | 12,054 | - | 22,454 | 18,354 | ||||||||
| Tax & National Insurance | - | - | 12,981 | - | 12,981 | 26,007 | |||||||
| Staff & Volunteer Expenses | 3,463 | - | - | 3,463 | 3,866 | ||||||||
| BeneficiaryPractical Support | 2,457 | - | - | 2,457 | 2,284 | ||||||||
| IT | - | - | 808 | - | 808 | 3,875 | |||||||
| Fees & Membership | - | - | 749 | - | 749 | 764 | |||||||
| Postage & Printing | - | - | 556 | - | 556 | 577 | |||||||
| Events | 438 | - | - | 438 | 45 | ||||||||
| Staff Benefits | 441 | - | - | 441 | - | ||||||||
| Insurance | - | - | 324 | - | 324 | 324 | |||||||
| BeneficiaryTravel | 210 | - | - | 210 | 440 | ||||||||
| Meetings | 123 | - | - | 123 | 306 | ||||||||
| Training | - | - | 97 | - | 97 | 295 | |||||||
| Room Hire | - | - | 90 | - | 90 | - | |||||||
| Art Materials | - | - | - | - | - | 82 | |||||||
| RoundingError | - | - | 2 | - | 2 | 1 | |||||||
| Publicity& Marketing | - | - | - | - | - | 26 | |||||||
| - | - | - | - | - | - | ||||||||
| - | - | - | - | - | - | ||||||||
| - | - | - | - | - | - | ||||||||
| - | - | - | - | - | - | ||||||||
| - | - | - | - | - | - | ||||||||
| - | - | - | - | - | - |
| - | - | - | - | - | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| - | - | - | - | - | ||||||
| **Sub total ** | 17,532 | 112,993 | - | 130,525 | 148,901 | |||||
| A4 Asset and investment | ||||||||||
| purchases, (see table) | ||||||||||
| - | - | - | - | |||||||
| - | - | - | - | |||||||
| **Sub total ** | - | - | - | - | - | |||||
| **Total payments ** | 17,532 | 112,993 | - | 130,525 | 148,901 | |||||
| **Net of receipts/(payments) ** | 95,672 | - 73,321 | - | 22,351 | 13,750 | |||||
| A5 Transfers between funds | - | - | - | - | - | |||||
| A6 Cash funds last year end | 56,811 | 160,912 | - | 217,723 | 203,973 | |||||
| **Cash funds this year end ** | 152,483 | 87,591 | - | 240,074 | 217,723 |
Section B Statement of assets and liabilities at the end of the period
| Categories B1 Cash funds B2 Other monetary assets B3 Investment assets B5 Liabilities B4 Assets retained for the charity’s own use Signed by one or two trustees on behalf of all the trustees |
Details Lloyds 02305716 Details Details Details Details Signature #VALUE! Total cash funds (agree balances with receipts and payments account(s)) |
to nearest £ to nearest £ 152,483 87,591 - - - - 152,483 87,591 OK OK to nearest £ to nearest £ - - - - - - - - - - - - Cost (optional) - - - - - Cost (optional) - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Print Name Alison Caldow Unrestricted funds Restricted funds Unrestricted funds Restricted funds Fund to which asset belongs Fund to which asset belongs Fund to which liability relates Amount due (optional) |
to nearest £ Endowment funds |
|---|---|---|---|
| - | |||
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| OK | |||
| to nearest £ Endowment funds |
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| Current value (optional) |
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| When due (optional) |
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| Date of approval |
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| #VALUE! | Alison Caldow | 12/19/2025 | |
Independent examiner's report on the accounts
Section A Independent Examiner’s Report
| Report to the | Street Talk | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| trustees | |||
| On accounts for | 31stMarch 2025 | Charity no | Charity no1117588 |
| the year ended |
Set out on pages Receipts and payments accounts CC16a pages
I report to the trustees on my examination of the accounts of the above charity (“the Trust”) for the year ended 31[st] March 2025.
Responsibilities As the charity's trustees, you are responsible for the preparation of the accounts in and basis of accordance with the requirements of the Charities Act 2011 (“the Act”). report
I report in respect of my examination of the Trust’s accounts carried out under section 145 of the 2011 Act and in carrying out my examination, I have followed all the applicable Directions given by the Charity Commission under section 145(5)(b) of the Act.
Independent I have completed my examination. I confirm that no material matters have come to examiner's my attention in connection with the examination which gives me cause to believe that statement in, any material respect:
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the accounting records were not kept in accordance with section 130 of the Charities Act; or
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the accounts did not accord with the accounting records.
I have no concerns and have come across no other matters in connection with the examination to which attention should be drawn in this report in order to enable a proper understanding of the accounts to be reached.
Signed:
Date: 08 DEC 2025
Name: René Albert van Velzen
Relevant I am familiar with charity R&P accounting through my role as treasurer for a charity. professional I am working within financial services. qualification(s):
Address: 5 Lupton Street NW5 2JA London