Bringing Schools Together
www.twins.org.uk
REPORT AND FINANCIAL STATEMENTS
FOR THE PERIOD
1 JANUARY TO 31 DECEMBER 2025
CONTENTS
TWINS
| Page | |
|---|---|
| Charity Information | 3 |
| Charity Overview | 4 |
| Report of the Trustees | 5 |
| Statement of Responsibilities | 7 |
CHARITY INFORMATION
TWINS
| Trustees Managing Trustee Registered Office Bankers Accountants UK Registered Charity Number Further Information |
William Oswald Ashley Gray Bryony Croft William Oswald Newstead House Bitteswell Lutterworth Leicestershire LE17 4SG National Westminster Bank plc 15 Bull Ring Ludlow Shropshire SY8 1AG Ashmole & Company Manchester House Grosvenor Hill Cardigan SA43 1HY 1160469 www.twins.org.uk |
|---|---|
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CHARITY OVERVIEW
TWINS
Introduction
Twins links schools between the UK and areas of natural disaster/general need for practical support, educational interaction and cultural understanding. It was initially established in reaction to the effects of the Asian tsunami on schools in Southern Sri Lanka and about 200 schools were twinned. More recently, pilot projects have been established in Pakistan, Somalia, Somaliland and Yemen, with one new project in Sri Lanka.
Activities
The fundamental aim of Twins is to establish mutual understanding and friendship between children of different cultures and religions, through educational and social interaction. This is achieved through various collaborative programmes, some of which are compatible with inclusion in UK national curricula, in recognition of how little spare time schools have available. Details of the programmes are provided to schools through an online schools resources area on the Charity’s website. There is also a fundraising and expenditure element, but much effort is made to avoid dependency and co-dependency mindsets through overly focusing on this element.
An underlying principle of the Twins fundraising model is that every penny raised by a UK school is spent directly on its own ‘twin’ school. Nothing is taken by Twins for administration and funds are not spread between schools. This means that everything raised by UK school communities is spent on those with whom they are building direct relationships overseas. The purchase of items such as IT and sports equipment, generators and water-coolers, even classroom construction, is carried out by project management according to strict controls (Twins never gives cash to schools).
A coincidental result of Twins’ more recent activities is that it has become a conduit for friendship and understanding between children of Christian and Muslim cultures. While the fostering of intercultural/faith relationships was always an aim of Twins, it was perhaps a less urgent mission in relation to Twins’ operations in primarily Buddhist and Hindu Sri Lanka. The more recent projects in Pakistan, Somalia, Somaliland and Yemen come at a particularly important time for understanding and cooperation between moderate majorities. Positive interaction between children at such a formative age can be invaluable.
Twins also contributes to efforts to ensure that girls have access to education and that the education received by boys is balanced and progressive. Twins’ local partner for Pakistan, DIL Trust UK, has established 120 schools there, educating thousands of boys and girls who might otherwise receive only narrow religious educations or be denied education completely. Education is key to building happy, prosperous and peaceful communities, with positive global relationships and citizens who are less likely to take terrible risks to try to start lives in other countries.
Governance & Management
Twins has three trustees; Ashley Gray, Bryony Croft and William Oswald, the last of whom manages the charity on a daily basis. Twins has three patrons; Edward Gould, Rageh Omaar and Shehan Ratnavale. Twins has a Constitution drawn up by William Oswald and legal advisors A&O Shearman. Twins was founded in 2005 as a community project and registered as a charity in 2015.
Twins works with local partners in each overseas country, using a comprehensive set of Standard Operating Procedures. These ‘SOPs’ detail all of the processes involved, along with providing templates to be used and other relevant information, notes and references. They have been designed to be sufficiently generic, such that they could be used in relation to any overseas country for which a partner is available. The SOPs and other related items are posted in an online management resources area, accessible through the Twins website.
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REPORT OF THE TRUSTEES
TWINS
The Trustees present their Report together with the Financial Statements for the period 1[st] January 2025 to 31[st] December 2025.
Activities
The Charity continued to link schools between the UK and areas of natural disaster/general need for practical support, educational interaction and cultural understanding. During the period, the Charity continued to operate the four pilot projects (Twins Pakistan, Twins Somalia, Twins Somaliland, Twins Yemen and the most recent Twins Sri Lanka), enabling the schools concerned to continue both with fundraising activities and with educational and social interaction. The Charity retained its account with charity donations website ‘JustGiving’ (https://www.justgiving.com).
School Donations and funding of administrative costs
The core focus of Twins is educational and social interaction between the children involved. However, there is also the facility for UK children to raise funds to help improve the lives of the children at the schools with which they are twinned. Twins maintains a policy of ring-fencing funds received from each UK school’s donations for expenditure on the specific overseas school with which that UK school is twinned. There is no ‘pooling’ between schools and neither Twins nor its country project partners use any such funds for their own administrative costs. All funds received by Twins from UK schools’ donations are remitted to the relevant country project partners for expenditure on items to benefit the appropriate overseas schools.
Accordingly, funds received by Twins from UK schools (or from non-school donors, but designated for specific overseas schools) are held and accounted for separately, in a similar manner to that of a ‘client account’. At the beginning of the period, the Charity was holding £98.47 in schools’ donations, pending remittance to the relevant country project partners. During the period, the Charity received an additional £4,448.75 in schools’ donations, being £4450.00 in schools’ donations (£4,400.00 of which was from Make Humanity Great Again, The Talent Fund), less £1.25 deducted in fees and disbursements by JustGiving before funds were remitted to the Charity. The Charity therefore had a total of £4,547.22 in donations for schools to remit to country project partners. £607.98 of this was remitted during the period, with the remaining £3,939.24 carried over into the next period (Funds are often retained by the Charity in GBP until shortly before they are needed for expenditure, in order to optimise exchange rates).
The Charity started the period with administrative funds (from general donations in earlier periods) of £4,551.74 and received no further general donations. During the period, the Charity spent £236 in subscriptions (£216 JustGiving and £20 British Yemeni Society). All other administrative costs were directly covered privately by the Managing Trustee. The Charity ended the period with administrative funds of £4,315.74.
Review of the Charity
The Charity will remain open to receiving general funding. If any such funding is sufficiently large and ongoing, the Charity may use it to increase administrative resources, in order to expand operations within current country projects and to extend operations to new country projects. Otherwise, the Charity will not subject itself to any substantial ongoing expenditure commitments and will limit one-off expenditure items to those that can be afforded with existing funds. Through this policy and with most administrative costs covered directly privately by the Managing Trustee, the Charity will remain sustainable and financially secure.
By Order of the Board of Trustees
William Oswald Trustee 10.01.25
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INCOME AND EXPENDITURE
TWINS
| GENERAL ACCOUNT(See notes on previous page) | 2025 | 2024 |
|---|---|---|
| Income | ||
| General Donations | - | £2,000.00 |
| Expenditure | ||
| Fees and charges related to website content | - | £190.00 |
| Subscriptions | £236.00 | £236.00 |
| __ | __ | |
| £236.00 | £426.00 | |
| Funds remaining at period end | £4,315.74 | £4,551.74 |
| SCHOOL DONATIONS(See notes on previous page) | ||
| Income | ||
| Donations, Grants & Gift Aid related to specific schools/projects | £4,450.00 | £3,720.75 |
| Expenditure | ||
| JustGiving card processing & transaction fees | £1.25 | £2.68 |
| (Amounts taken at source by Just Giving) | ||
| ______ | ______ | |
| Net Donations Received | £4,448.75 | £3,718.07 |
| Funds Disbursed Through Local Partners | ||
| Twins Yemen Project |
£607.98 | £4,437.96 |
| ______ | ______ | |
| £607.98 | £4,437.96 | |
| Funds remaining held for schools at period end | £3,939.24 | £98.47 |
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TWINS
BALANCE SHEET
| Fixed Assets | 2025 | 2024 |
|---|---|---|
| Tangible assets | - | - |
| Current Assets | ||
| Debtors | - | - |
| Cash at bank and in hand | £4,315.74 | £4,551.74 |
| Cash held for schools | £3,939.24 | £98.47 |
| Accounts receivable for schools | - | - |
| __ | __ | __ |
| £8,254.98 | £4,650.21 | |
| Creditors: due within one year | - | - |
| Cash due for schools | £3,939.24 | £98.47 |
| Accounts Payable | - | - |
| __ | __ | __ |
| £3,939.24 | £98.47 | |
| Net current assets | £4,315.74 | £4,551.74 |
| __ | __ | |
| Total assets less current liabilities | £4,315.74 | £4,551.74 |
| __ | __ | |
| Creditors: due after one year | - | - |
| £4,315.74 | £4,551.74 | |
| __ | __ |
In approving these Accounts as Trustees of the Charity we hereby confirm:
-
a. that, due to the amounts concerned, there was no requirement for either an independent examination or an audit to be conducted in relation to the Charity’s accounts during the period; and
-
b. that we acknowledge our responsibilities to comply with the requirements of the Charities Act 2011 with regard to the keeping of accounting records, to the preparation and scrutiny of statements of account, and to the preparation of annual reports and returns. The statements of account, reports and returns will be sent to the Charity Commission (regardless of the income of the Charity) within ten months from the financial year end.
Approved by the Board of Trustees on 10th January 2026.
William Oswald bu Moan. Dsalod Bryony Croft Bhael ~~y~~
) ) ) Trustees ) )
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