Section 8 Inquiry into Fair Play for Children Charitable Trust

Dear Sir or Madam,

ref: 292134/C-266150-RO0W dated 2 October 2009

1. The Commission is asked to disclose which other charities which
have a commercial participation agreement with Premier Publications
Ltd (of Croydon) have been subject to a Section 8 Inquiry, and at
what dates.

2. Also, of these charities, which if any, have been approached by
or approached the Commission concerning agreements with Premier
Publications?

3. Given the concerns raised by the Commission re the CP agreement
between Fair Play and Premier, why has the Commission not taken
similar action re all the other charities given the concerns re the
Fair Play agreement and the likelihood that other identical
agreements may have been made with those charities? Is the
Commission considering doing this? If not, why not?

4. If a charity finds it has problems with a commercial
participation agreement's operation should it not at first attempt
to discuss the problems with the CP organisation and try to remedy
the problems so the agreement runs as intended?

5. Now the Section 8 Inquiry is closed, will the Commission now
release the correspondence between itself and the DTI/BERR
concerning Premier which appears to have led to 2 DTI inquiries
into Premier neither of which appears to have led to any action by
DTI? In the interests of natural justice, will the Commission waive
any exemption about disclosure so that Fair Play's trustees may
judge for themselves the concerns raised by the Commission to the
DTI? Why were 2 such references made by the Commission, one after
the closure of the previous S8 Inquiry re Fair Play and Premier?

6. The Commission's agent appears to believe that the relationship
between Fair Play and Premier may not be that of commercial
participation. Will the Commission either confirm its view, as held
in the previous inquiries, that this is a commercial participation
situation, or give full grounds as to why it is not, and why Fair
Play should seek legal opinion on the matter - this has never been
stated?

7. At a meeting between Commission officials and Fair Play
representatives, a Commission officials alluded to Mr Jones of
Premier being a criminal - will the Commission confirm or deny that
it possesses any information which would lead them to believe that
this is true?

8. In the correspondence dated 2 October, the Commission has
stipulated that "the amount the Charity receives and the amount PPL
receives are proportionate in relation to the overall turnover" -
will the Commission provide the statutory basis for this
requirement - Act of Parliament or SI - and explain why this is to
be preferred to ensuring that the charity and the CP benefit
proportionately from any surplus produced after meeting by the CP
of all costs incurred in its CP operation for the charity?

9. By way of explanation - if the CP undertakes to promote and sell
a product entirely at its own expense, recovering allowable costs
such as staff engaged in the promotion, print, telephone, rent etc,
and shares the surplus with the charity, why is that not a suitable
basis for a CP agreement? Turnover may be e.g. £70,000, the costs
may be e.g. £52,000, and the CP may then give half of the surplus
of £18,000 to the charity under the agreement. What is the law on
this matter? That the value to the charity is measured solely
against turnover i.e. 12.9% or it is proper to take into account
the share of surplus = 50%?

10. The issue has been raised of a CP between Pampers and Unicef,
through a pack promotion in recent months. If the arrangement
between FP and Premier is alleged to be disproportionately in
favour of the latter, will the Commission explain its apparent
indifference to the Unicef/Pampers deal? In this, 3.5p was
promised, towards providing a single vaccination for a child in
each case, when a Pampers Pack was sold bearing the Unicef
promotion logo.

11. In that case, will the Commission justify why it has not
investigated this CP arrangement? Pampers packs will typically
retail at £4 or more. A Press Statement for Unicef/Pampers stated
that 7 million vaccinations were provided. This would have meant a
Pampers turnover of £28 million, and at 3.5p a pack, some £245,000
to Unicef. Why has the Fair Play arrangement been deemed to have
benefitted Premier disproportionately given the scale of benefit to
Pampers and the small amount to Unicef for the use of its name,
reputation and logo? That represents some 0.875% of the Pampers
turnover on those packs.

12. The Commission is asked whether it now expects every charity
which is in a CP arrangement to obtain from every CP organisation
the full financial records such as bank statements, receipts,
invoices relating to its agreement and why it is reasonable to
expect the Fair Play trustees to have to do so when it seems clear
that not one other charity in a CP relationships with Premier has
been told that it should do this given the great probability that
all have an identical agreement with Premier? Has the Commission
bothered to look into whether other charities may be in FPs
position with Premier? If not, given the 'history' with Premier,
why not?

Yours faithfully,

Jan Cosgrove <mr>

Dear Web Enquiries,

I should point out that the Commission is now overdue in its
response, which is in breach of the law. I want to know when I can
expect your response.

Yours sincerely,

Jan Cosgrove