Annual Report 2024- 2025 Brighter Path Foundation ## Introduction ## OUR MISSION To advance in life and relieve the needs of young people in Sri Lanka, who for any reason, are living in or have lived in residential care or in the care of others who are not their parents, by providing support and monetary grants with a view to ensuring they are equipped with the necessary skills and capabilities to enable them to participate in society as mature, responsible and happy adults. ## OUR VISION A Sri Lanka where every child grows up loved, safe and empowered to reach their full potential. Brighter Path was registered as a charity in England and Wales in May 2019 and this is our sixth annual report, covering the period 1 May 2024 to 30 April 2025. In the past 12 months we have continued making grants to individual care leavers, provided emergency food aid to struggling families as part of our family strengthening programme, we provided support for a nurse for a very ill child in care, funded teachers for children in care, and provided financial support both for renovation and running costs to a number of institutions supporting the disabled and children in care. We have continued to work with organisations on the ground in Sri Lanka which work with care leavers and have continued to fund transition homes for male and female care leavers in Colombo. ## **Tustees** The trustees remain Caroline de Bono, John de Bono, Patrick Marshall, Henrietta Woolf and Alice Pilcher. ## **Banking** In accordance with our banking policy Brighter Path banking remains with CAF Bank who specialise in supporting the charitable sector. Our bank and platform fees (Stripe/ Paypal) were £698.88. ## **Funds received** In the period of 12 months to 30 April 2025 we received cash donations of £53,023.58. Many of these donations were Gift Aided enabling us to claim an additional 25% (the claim for Gift Aid was submitted after the end of this reporting period so is not shown on the financial report). ## **Financial report** This report is accompanied by our financial report which has been examined in accordance with the requirement of the Charities Act 2011 by an independent examiner. ## **Website** Our website and its running costs remain entirely funded by private donation from the trustees. ## **Funds distribution** We made charitable grants of £48,341.76 which was a significant increase on the previous year (£27,160.28). At all times we have followed our own banking policy and have been aware of the importance of complying with best practice to avoid money laundering. ## **Ethical image policy** Images play an important role in helping us to raise awareness of the challenges faced by young people in care and care leavers. However the gathering and use of images can also cause harm or offence if they are intrusive, manipulative or used inappropriately. Our images must show a true and accurate account of the ways in which people live. We have introduced an ethical image policy to manage and guide our use of photos in fundraising which is in line with leading NGOs including Unicef and Save the Children. ## **Safeguarding** We have a safeguarding policy and a code of conduct for Brighter Path staff and volunteers working in Sri Lanka. Brighter Path is committed to working in accordance with the laws of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka and to working with the Department of Probation and Child Care Services. Brighter Path is committed to a practice which protects children and young people from harm. The best interests of the child or young person and are paramount and are the primary consideration in our decisionmaking. Brighter Path accepts and recognises our responsibility to develop awareness of issues relating to child protection. ## Activities ## **Working with other organisations** Brighter Path is keen to work with any reputable organisation in Sri Lanka which offers support to care leavers or children in care. There are very few organisations in Sri Lanka working with care leavers. In the past we have partnered with SOS Villages and Generation Never Give Up. In this reporting period we have collaborated with and provided grants to Emerge, an organisation which works with the victims of sexual abuse. Most of our grants have been made through Brighter Path Sri Lanka which has enabled us to ensure that more of the money received in donations goes directly to children in need and care leavers. Sri Lanka is a national jurisdiction which operates to high child protection standards and has ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. See the website of the Department of Probation and Child Services, http://www.probation.gov.lk/index_e.php ## **EMERGE** Emerge Lanka is a not for profit organisation in Sri Lanka which is registered also as non-profit in the US. This organisation focusses on providing support for young girls who have suffered sexual violence. We have funded ‘reintegration packs’. These packs are intended to provide those items which are essential for starting out in independent life. They include toiletries, sanitary pads, basic first aid supplies, bed sheets and a towel, groceries, cooking utensils, a backpack or handbag for work, office shoes and much more. When girls leave Emerge’s home they are helped to find work. However, without support in the transitional period before they receive their first pay packet, they would otherwise have nothing to live on. These packs make a huge difference to the prospects of an individual girl successfully transitioning to independent living. Brighter Path has also funded the printing of an Emerge Lanka legal toolkit. Designed by lawyers at iProbono, working with Emerge, this toolkit is written in three language – Sinhala, Tamil and English. It sets out basic rights and legal options for young women. The toolkit is intended to be user friendly for vulnerable girls who may not know the law and their rights. Designed for participants in the Emerge Lanka programme we are delighted to support this initiative and we will also be giving them to our own Brighter Path care leavers. Brighter Path also funded emergency accommodation through Emerge for a care leaver who had completed one of Emerge’s courses but was unable to start work or move into her employer’s accommodation for a period of 5 days over a public holiday. ## **BRIGHTER PATH SRI LANKA** Brighter Path Sri Lanka is a not for profit company registered in Sri Lanka and founded by Caroline de Bono. John de Bono is a director. Brighter Path Sri Lanka operates the two transition homes which we fund but it also provides through its local staff an operation through which we can provide support to care leavers in the community, to children’s homes and disabled people’s homes and which works closely with local Departments of Probation and Children’s Services. In practice the most cost efficient and reliable way of providing support to the children and young people we support in Sri Lanka is often through Brighter Path Sri Lanka. Where grants were made to Brighter Path Sri Lanka a potential conflict of interest was declared, these grants were approved by the other trustees and John and Caroline did not vote. ## **Brighter Path Sri Lanka transition homes** In this period we have supported a total of 19 boys and girls in two Brighter Path Sri Lanka transition homes in Colombo which are fully funded by Brighter Path. In March 2024 the boys’ transition home moved to new, bigger premises and can accommodate up to nine care leavers. The girls’ home, which opened in 2023, has capacity for six girls. Care leavers come to these homes from orphanages and have the opportunity to attend vocational training or university. Care leavers benefit from a mentoring programme in which they learn essential life skills and are supported to stay in training or work whilst also learning to manage money and to save for when they leave the programme. We fund the three Brighter Path Sri Lanka staff who work with the care leavers in the transition homes. As well as running the mentoring programmes these staff work closely with future employers to help care leavers into well-paid, secure employment. We have also continued to fund weekly English classes which are compulsory for those living in the transition homes because improving English is a good way to increase employment prospects. Recent graduates from the transition homes include an A/C engineer, an IT specialist, nurses and bakers. In the transition homes in this reporting period we had nurses, bakers, motor mechanics, hairdressers, and hotel and hospitality students, and two university students including one girl who is being supported to study law at the University of Colombo. "rry Brighter Foundati ## **Vishaka Training Centre** We have continued our support for the Vishaka Training Centre in Bandarawella. This is home to up to 40 young girls, most of whom have had children and often as a result of sexual abuse in remote communities which makes it impossible for them to return home. In the last reporting period we began to provide course materials and to fund the salary of a sewing and dressmaking teacher. ## **Suraksha Boys Remand Home and Certified School** Following an approach from Commissioner Nadeesha Chathurangani of the Uva Province Department of Probation we agreed to fund a masonry teacher, and materials, for boys in this remand home/ certified school. The boys in this institution are all either awaiting criminal trials or have been sentenced to detention. Their prospects are limited and we hope that by helping them to acquire practical skills they will be in a better position to provide for themselves as adults. Caroline and John visited the home to see the masonry workshop and we made a further donation of sports equipment. ## **Support for care leavers in the community** Although our primary focus remains supporting care leavers in education through the Colombo transition homes we continue to support some individual care leavers in their own communities. A total of four care leavers in the North Central and Uva Provinces have been supported financially in this period whilst living at home. For example we are funding a boy in Bandarawela who was placed in a children’s home because his family did not have the financial resources to support him. He has now returned to live with his grandfather but without our support would not be able to attend the local state Vocational State Training Authority (VTA) where he is training to become an electrician. In addition to his course fees we are funding his course materials, uniform, travel and paying him a small amount towards his daily living expenses. For him, and the others to whom we are providing support, this makes all the difference and is what enables him to obtain a qualification which would otherwise have been beyond his financial means. We have provided funds for the construction of a ramp for a disabled care leaver who is a wheelchair user so that he iss able to live independently. We continue to provide monthly grants to care leavers, both in the transition homes and those we support in the community, to enable them to continue in training and education. ## **Nursing care** A young baby being cared for in a children’s home needed life-saving heart surgery. The Provincial Children’s Commissioner approached Brighter Path to explain that a leading surgeon at the Lady Ridgeway Hospital for Children in Colombo was willing to perform the operation if funding was in place for a specialist nurse to care for the child afterwards. In November 2024 Brighter Path started providing the necessary funding for 24 hour care from a specialist nurse. ## **Support for baby homes and teenage mothers and disabled homes** We have continued to support a number of residential homes. The Sujatha Sewana centre in Bandarawela provides accommodation for young babies up to the age of two who are in state care. It also looks after teenage mothers who are then permitted to stay with their babies for up to six months after birth. We had previously provided a grant for soft play flooring and in this reporting period we were asked to fund curtain material for the centre. This is a mountainous area of Sri Lanka and at night it can be cold and draughty. The new curtains which we funded make a huge difference to the comfort of the babies, young mothers and staff at Sujatha. We have provided support to a number of homes for the disabled. We provided Methsewa with donations of milk formula and dried food and cleaning products. We paid for the renovation of 40 iron bed frames. We also funded the centre’s water and electricity for six months. At the Polonaruwa Parakum Disabled Child Development Centre the sanitary facilities were in very poor condition but there was no funding available for the renovations as a result of which all the residents were sharing a single shower and only two toilet. We funded the renovation of two washrooms and the centre now has proper washing and toilet facilities for its children. At the Marc Sri Saranaseva Nivanha Disabled Child Centre in Kalutara we funded the Christmas party (food, drink and entertainment) for this organisation’s three homes and over 100 children. At the Minihiri Girls & Women’s Protection Centre in Higurakgoda, Polonnaruwa we provided dried foods and cleaning materials. ## **Food distribution / Family Strengthening** As part of our family strengthening’ programme we returned to the Dimbulagala area in the North Central Province where we distributed food, dry rations and other essential supplies to vulnerable families. These are primarily single grandmothers caring for grandchildren who would otherwise be taken into state care. We are also supporting a number of single parents in great need, often managing chronic illnesses themselves (typically kidney disease) or caring for children with significant disabilities. By providing this ongoing support we are helping keep families together and reducing the risk of children ending up in orphanages. A key feature of our work is regularly visiting every single family in their own home. Most do not have access to transport or childcare and live in remote areas. Visiting enables our staff to assess and assist every family individually and to build long term relationships. ## Conclusion In our sixth year we have moved to a different level in terms both of our fundraising efforts and the level of support we are able to provide to children in need and care leavers in Sri Lanka. Our assistance remains targeted but there is no doubt that for those we are able to help we make a considerable difference. In particular those young people we have helped with accommodation and training over this reporting period have transformed their own life chances. I believe that we are beginning to make a real difference to some of those for whom there is no alternative to institutional care within the realities of the Sri Lankan system, in particular with our support for the Vishaka Training Centre and the Suraksha Boys Home. We are particularly proud of our family strengthening programme and its efforts to keep families together and children out of institutional care in the first place and our emergency food aid programme has been an important part of that work. Caroline de Bono, Oxford, January 2026 ## **Brighter Path Financial Report for Year Ending 30[th] April 2025** ||**Total 2025**|**Total 2024**| |---|---|---| |**Incoming resources**||| |Donations|53,023.58|17,825| |Other income|-|22.36| |Gift Aid1|-|4,861.32| |Bank Interest|25.45|24.13| |**Resources Expended**||| |Bank/ fundraising charges|689.88|559.83| |Grants|48,341.76|27,160.28| |**Net resources**||| |Total incoming/ outgoing|4,017.39|-4,987.30| |Total funds carried forward|16,885.96|12,844.07| The notes on pages 2 to 3 form part of this financial report > 1 A request to HMRC for Gift Aid was not submitted in the relevant period, but a claim at a later date will include Gift Aid on donations made in this period 1 ## **Balance sheet as at 30[th] April 2025** ||**2025**|**2024**| |---|---|---| |Cash in CAF Bank|16,858.23|12,728.45| |Paypal balance|28.23|115.62| |Stripe balance|-0.50|0| |Total assets|16,885.96|12,844.07| 2 ## **Notes to Financial Report** Brighter Path is a CIO which previously had an income of less than £25,000 and therefore our accounts used only to require approval from trustees and were not subject to independent examination. The accounts had to show receipts and payments with a statement of assets and liabilities. Now that our income has increased above the £25,000 threshold we are required to submit our accounts for independent examination. Brighter Path remains in good financial health with a steady flow of donations, large and small, from very generous donors who believe in what we are doing. We are grateful for their support. Our income from donations for the year to 30.4.25 increased significantly to £53,023.58. This compares to £22,728.76 in 2024 and £22,778.25 in 2025. The reason for the increase is an increase in the amount of annual giving from some donors, the continued generosity of existing donors and a very significant one off grant of £15,000 from a single donor in March 2025 for which we are most grateful. Our expenditure for 12 months to 30.4.25 was £48,341.76 which was a significant increase on the £27,720.11 for the previous 12 months. The increased expenditure reflected the increase in our donations. Website: two trustees continue to donate the value of hosting the website and plug-ins to allow the website to operate[2] . Trustee remuneration: No remuneration was paid or was payable for the year directly or indirectly out of the funds of the charity to any trustee. Attention is drawn to the heading ‘conflicts of interest’ below. Conflicts of interest: Caroline and John de Bono who are trustees of Brighter Path are also directors of Brighter Path (Sri Lanka) a not for profit company in Sri Lanka which provides support for care leavers and those in care in Sri Lanka. In accordance with the Charity Commission’s guidance on conflicts of interest neither trustee voted on any grants to Brighter Path in Sri Lanka. > 2 Hosting cost £50.99 per month 3 ## **Brighter Path** ## **Independent Examiner's Report to the Trustees of Brighter Path** ## **Year ended 30 April 2025** I report to the trustees on my examination of the financial statements of Brighter Path ('the charity') for the year ended 30 April 2025 ## **Responsibilities and basis of report** As the trustees of the charity you are responsible for the preparation of the financial statements in accordance with the requirements of the Charities Act 2011 (‘the Act’). I report in respect of my examination of the charity's financial statements 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 examiner's statement** I have completed my examination. I confirm that no material matters have come to my attention in connection with the examination giving me cause to believe that in any material respect: 1. accounting records were not kept in respect of the charity as required by section 130 of the Act; or 2. the financial statements do not accord with those records; or 3. the financial statements do not comply with the applicable requirements concerning the form and content of accounts set out in the Charities (Accounts and Reports) Regulations 2008 other than any requirement that the accounts give a ‘true and fair' view which is not a matter considered as part of an independent examination. 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. ## **Richard Williams** ## R L Williams ACMA Retired ## **Independent Examiner** 9 Hillside Hardwick Rd Whitchurch on Thames Oxfordshire RG8 7HL 6[th] January 2026