The End of Charity

Third Sector’s podcast documentaries explore some of the big issues facing the charity sector and the people who work within it.

When Charity Goes Wrong

What happens when charities struggle to reckon with the regulatory and governance structures that charity law requires them to follow? And when the regulator’s decisions are called into question, what next?

Hosted by Lucinda Rouse, this three-part podcast documentary examines three charities where things went badly wrong. It questions whether their cases throw up any weaknesses in how the UK’s voluntary organisations are governed and regulated.

Featuring voices close to the action at Kids Company, the Captain Tom Foundation and Mermaids, along with legal experts and the head of the Charity Commission, the series asks what lessons the wider sector can take from each of these high-profile cases to ensure other charities avoid the same harmful pitfalls.

The End of Charity

In a world where need is spiralling out of control and new, radical forces are shaping the landscape for doing good, can charity be the answer to the world’s social and environmental problems?

Lucinda Rouse presents The End of Charity, a new podcast series from the makers of Third Sector.

Guided by some of the leading voices of the philanthropy world, as well as radicals who believe the current model is on the brink of implosion, Lucinda asks: what are the flaws and contradictions baked into the ways charities work?

How has the sector’s problematic past shaped its present?

And who are the disruptors – from MrBeast to Extinction Rebellion – who could shake it up for good?

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Last refreshed: July 22nd, 2025 at 7:27 PM ⓘ

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Episodes

When Charity Goes Wrong, Ep. 3: Mermaids

This episode contains a reference to suicide in the first two minutes. In November 2022, the transgender youth support charity Mermaids was in crisis. Caught up in a media storm over its chest binder service, compounded by internal governance and culture failings, a statutory inquiry was launched. In the third and final episode of When Charity Goes Wrong, Lucinda Rouse hears from Lauren Stoner, chief executive of Mermaids, about the impact of the 23-month inquiry into the charity. Mermaids servi...

Jun 17, 2025•29 min•Season 2Ep. 3

When Charity Goes Wrong, Ep. 2: The Captain Tom Foundation

In April 2020, 99-year-old war veteran Captain Tom Moore became an unexpected national hero after raising £38.9m in less than four weeks by walking 100 laps of his garden. But his legacy quickly turned sour, leading to a very public fall for his family and the charity created in his name. In episode two of When Charity Goes Wrong, Third Sector journalist Lucinda Rouse hears from Hannah Ingram-Moore, daughter of Captain Sir Tom Moore and former interim chief executive of the Captain Tom Foundatio...

Jun 10, 2025•33 min•Season 2Ep. 2

When Charity Goes Wrong, Ep. 1: Kids Company

In August 2015, one of the country’s most prominent children’s charities, Kids Company, was declared insolvent. Its collapse has been followed by almost a decade of legal wrangling as the charity’s trustees pushed back against regulatory findings of mismanagement. In episode one of When Charity Goes Wrong, Third Sector journalist Lucinda Rouse hears from Andy Gough, a former Kids Company centre manager, about the realities of working for the charity’s charismatic leader, the late Camila Batmangh...

Jun 03, 2025•28 min•Season 2Ep. 1

MrBeast, influencer philanthropy and reconfiguring power

In a session recorded at the Third Sector Conference, Lucinda and Emily are joined by Rhodri Davies, director of Why Philanthropy Matters, to reflect on some of the themes covered in Third Sector’s recent podcast documentary, The End of Charity . These include the rise of influencer philanthropists, such as the YouTube megastar MrBeast, and their potential role in attracting a new, younger support base for charities. They discuss the need for charities to sustain the momentum in tackling histori...

Jun 24, 2024•36 min•Season 1Ep. 7

What is a world without charity?

In November 2023, the finance officer of West Norfolk Carers came to a devastating realisation: after more than a year of rejected funding applications, the charity wouldn’t be able to stay afloat for longer than four months. Several months earlier, the Lankelly Chase Foundation, a grantmaker tackling severe social disadvantage and extreme marginalisation, had reached a similarly terminal conclusion. After finding that its very existence perpetuated past harms and injustices, the foundation’s le...

Apr 23, 2024•32 min•Season 1Ep. 6

Power in the wrong hands

When The Times newspaper’s chief reporter, Sean O’Neill, broke the story that senior Oxfam aid workers had been accused of sexual misconduct while working in the disaster zone of the 2010 Haiti earthquake, it sent shockwaves around the charity sector and wider society. O’Neill reflects on his memories of the scandal; and experts including Chilande Kuloba-Warria and Martha Awojobi discuss how the very foundations of charity can create imbalances of power – and environments in which abuse can thri...

Apr 16, 2024•28 min•Season 1Ep. 5

The political chokehold

In May 2018, three climate activists called time on lukewarm campaigning over the climate crisis. They wanted a different and radical approach. The plan: mass civil disobedience. The name: Extinction Rebellion. And the first major act of the movement? Stage an occupation – of the Greenpeace offices in London. Why is it that charities are so often perceived to be “the opposite of disruptive?” Experts including The Wildlife Trusts’ chief executive, Craig Bennett, and the domestic violence campaign...

Apr 09, 2024•29 min•Season 1Ep. 4

Who are charities missing?

Why donate to a charity if you can just help out a fellow human yourself – or buy a piece of premium fashion that promises to generate a similar result? In episode three of The End of Charity, Lucinda Rouse explores two very different alternatives to the charity model: mutual aid theory, and the rise of buzzy “for good” business. The activist and founder of Mutual Aid UK, Eshe Kiama Zuri, discusses mutual aid as an alternative to the “oppressive dynamics” of traditional charitable structures, su...

Apr 02, 2024•31 min•Season 1Ep. 3

Can MrBeast save humanity?

Meet Jimmy Donaldson, perhaps better known as MrBeast – the 25-year-old YouTuber who some say is on the verge of sparking a revolution in online philanthropy. With more than 236 million YouTube subscribers and an estimated net worth of $500m, MrBeast has turned his focus from filling houses with Lego bricks to curing blind people and building wells. Lucinda asks Darren Margolias, the executive director of Jimmy’s charitable venture Beast Philanthropy, why MrBeast’s storytelling may have the edge...

Mar 26, 2024•28 min•Season 1Ep. 2

The food bank era

Last year the UK food bank network the Trussell Trust distributed almost 3 million emergency food parcels, 1 million of which were for children, up from 50,000 a decade ago. How has the UK landed in such a severe hunger crisis – and can food banks ever be the solution? In episode one of The End of Charity, journalist Lucinda Rouse hears from the Trussell Trust’s chief executive, Emma Revie, about the need to reimagine our social contract at a time when demand for charities is greater than ever. ...

Mar 19, 2024•20 min•Season 1Ep. 1

The End of Charity – Trailer

In a world where need is spiralling out of control and new, radical forces are shaping the landscape for doing good, can charity be the answer to the world’s social and environmental problems? Lucinda Rouse presents The End of Charity, a new podcast series from the makers of Third Sector. Guided by some of the leading voices of the philanthropy world, as well as radicals who believe the current model is on the brink of implosion, Lucinda asks: what are the flaws and contradictions baked into the...

Mar 12, 2024•3 min

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