£3m in bonuses for C&G bosses? It doesn’t add up

Conflicting accounts continue to emerge about whether City & Guilds Foundation trustees knew large bonuses were paid to senior executives after the sale of their awarding business.

Bosses at new owner PeopleCert this week alleged former awarding body chief executive Kirstie Donnelly and chief financial officer Abid Ismail paid themselves bonuses worth almost £3 million without PeopleCert’s or City & Guilds charity trustees’ knowledge.

But Donnelly and Ismail said they “categorically reject” PeopleCert’s allegations and claim to have evidence showing both the charity and PeopleCert were “fully involved” in structuring and approving their payouts.

The pair are accused of independently making the payments on November 3 last year, the first working day after control of the awarding business – City & Guilds Ltd (CGL) – passed to PeopleCert.

City & Guilds Foundation has also repeatedly denied any involvement in discussions about post-sale bonuses.

In a joint statement, legal representatives for Donnelly and Ismail, who were dismissed for gross misconduct in April following an internal investigation, said: “Our clients will present all their evidence to the courts in due course.

“That evidence overwhelmingly demonstrates that all bonus payments referenced in PeopleCert’s statement were approved, documented and implemented as part of the wider transaction process.

“It further shows that both the seller and the buyer, along with their advisers, were fully involved in the structuring and approval of the bonuses paid.”

Charity ‘not involved’?

The former CEO and CFO’s claims contradict the account offered by the charity.

Its account of how much it knew about bonuses linked to the sale has changed since details of the cash first emerged.

When news first hit in December, the charity and PeopleCert issued a joint statement claiming “no payments” were made outside of its existing bonus scheme.

The charity later claimed, on January 3, that trustees were “not involved in any pre or post-deal conversations” about post-sale pay.

However, in response to media reports that trustees did discuss bonuses, and a formal investigation launched by the Charity Commission, the City & Guilds Foundation updated its statement on January 13, admitting that trustees did have “a discussion” about post-sale bonuses in May last year, but scrapped the proposal shortly before the sale was completed in October.

It claimed trustees decided bonuses were no longer necessary “principally because a higher sale price had been agreed”.

But according to former trustees who spoke to The Telegraph, during the May board meeting trustees approved bonuses of four times the CEO and CFO’s gross salary, similar to the amounts they were eventually paid on November 3.

The statement from the charity, which was led at the time by chair Ann Limb – also a friend of Donnelly – claimed that “trustees were not involved in the widely reported bonus payments to CGL executives”, adding that “these post-sale payments are solely a matter for the new CGL owners”.

The claim from Donnelly and Ismail that the charity and PeopleCert were fully involved, and City & Guilds Foundation’s claim that it was “not involved”, cannot both be true.

City & Guilds Foundation declined to comment on the contradictory claims.

Bonus mystery

PeopleCert said it did not learn about the bonuses until December, but refused to explain how its former executives managed to pay themselves and more than 60 other staff members such a large amount of money without authorisation.

The payouts, worth about £5 million in total, were given to Donnelly, Ismail, several other senior executives, as well as 60 more junior members of staff. They also received significant salary increases.

Donnelly and Ismail claim to have already shared their evidence that proves the transactions were approved with “other appropriate agencies”, including the Charity Commission, which launched a formal inquiry in January when news of the bonuses was first leaked to the media by insiders.

However, the pair have declined to share their evidence with FE Week and PeopleCert has not published the full findings of its investigation.

The former CEO and CFO are now understood to be preparing legal action over their dismissal, while PeopleCert has said it will seek to recover the £3 million paid to them.

A PeopleCert spokesperson said: “As stated, the investigation found that bonus payments totalling approximately £5 million were authorised and paid from CGL funds without authorisation, approval from, or knowledge of, City & Guilds London Institute, the CGL Board or PeopleCert.

“The investigation further found that these payments were not brought to the attention of PeopleCert until December 2025, after they had been paid, and that there was no provision, board resolution or other binding document from either City & Guilds London Institute, the CGL Board or PeopleCert that authorised them.

“Concerns came to light through a number of channels, including internal processes and media reporting, following which the matter was investigated.”

PeopleCert’s findings came from an investigation carried out by a committee of non-executive directors, led by Michael Milanovic, chair of PeopleCert subsidiary LanguageCert, with support from legal advisers at Balfour+Manson.

PeopleCert said a subsequent appeal process, led by CGL non-executive director Richard McCarthy CBE, did not uphold appeals against the dismissal decisions.

Donnelly and Ismail claimed that the process leading to their dismissal was “fundamentally flawed and lacked the necessary independence”.

IBIS Capital, which advised City & Guilds Foundation on the sale, declined to comment, citing “confidentiality obligations that prevent us from commenting on any aspect of the matter”.