The Charities (Royal Medical Foundation of Epsom College) Order 2000

Explanatory Note

(This note is not part of the Order)

This Order gives effect to a Scheme of the Charity Commissioners for the Charity known as Epsom College, formerly the Royal Medical Benevolent College, to be known in future as the Royal Medical Foundation of Epsom College (the name under which it already has Royal patronage).

The Charity has found it difficult to administer within one organisation two disparate primary functions, one for benevolent medical purposes and the other for educational purposes. Two wholly-owned subsidiary charity companies have therefore been established to carry out these two primary purposes, one to be called the Royal Medical Foundation, which will be a grant-making body providing pensions to former registered medical practitioners and their widows and widowers, and the other Epsom College, which will administer the School of that name.

The continuing “parent” charity will continue to hold the real property and other assets representing permanent endowment of the Charity, and appoint directors for the two companies, as well as carrying out the third, subsidiary, purpose of providing occasional financial assistance to registered medical practitioners (including former practitioners) and their families when this does not detract from the primary purposes.

It is anticipated that these arrangements will enable the Charity to carry out its purposes more efficiently, providing more focused management, a modern administrative structure, clarity in fund-raising, simpler accounting, the removal of some outdated provisions, and limited liability for those managing the School.