Animal charity in accounting probe

MANAGEMENT at animal welfare charity SPA could face criminal charges after a damning report from auditors found a number of problems with the group’s accounts.

The 150-year-old charity – which has 58,000 members – was first investigated in 2002 over its handling of donations.

The SPA promised at the time to get its finances back in order, but in a damning report published on Monday, the French National Audit Office (the cour des comptes) said the problems were still there.

“We have been critical of the management of the SPA for the past eight years and we have not seen any improvement,” the report said.

It said there was “a complete lack of control” of what happened to donations and 43% of the money given to the charity was spent on general administrative and management costs.

This means that only 57 cents in every euro donated to the charity is spent on animal welfare.

The report also said it appeared the charity had “wasted” money on a number of refuge construction projects that were then aborted halfway through.

The charity was also criticised for building up what the report said was an “abnormal” amount of cash reserves – with €13m tucked away in savings while a number of refuges were in urgent need of that money to improve their conditions.

Some SPA donors leave their house to the charity in their will, which the organisation then sells to raise cash.

But the auditors said there were irregularities in this system and a number of the houses appeared to have been sold to the same person.

The Interior Ministry is considering the case for bringing criminal action against the directors of the organisation.

SPA president Virginie Pocq Saint-Jean said in a statement that there were “dysfunctional” parts to the association that needed attention.