8th-9th June
The Guardian, London
Special report on Tvind

Alarm bells ring over education group set up in Denmark which has mushroomed into empire with companies in Cayman Islands

Ian Katz and Tom Sharratt report on the mysterious finances of a multi-million-pound organisation which runs charitable foundations, controversial aid projects, and owns offshore companies and plantations.

A BRITISH third world aid charity which sells more than £1 million of used clothes a year was last night being Investigated by the Charity Commission amid allegations that It has been donating thousands to a bogus organisation.  

THE distinctive pine collection boxes began appearing in west London In 1987. The message stencilled on most seemed straightforward. "Clothes for people in the third world".  

PEARSE Cooke saw the advert In the Guardian in March last year. "Are you Interested in a year’s challenging experience in educating young people in an unusual residential school in England or Denmark?"   At 29, having just spent two years working as a care assistant with disabled children, the idea sounded appealing. In July he attended a weekend introductory course at the Red House School in Norwich and liked what he saw.   

Councils continue sending pupils

LOCAL councils in Britain are continuing to send children with severe emotional and behavioural problems to a school in Norfolk despite warnings issued by the then Department of Education and Science three years ago.

DES officials wrote to social services departments to express concern about safety, health, hygiene and pupil supervision. Red House, at Buxton, near Norwich, and Winestead Hall, near Hull, are both owned by Tvind.   

Former Tvind pupil tells of falling foul of 'the programme' after a party time of television and sweets

NAOMI Edwards was 17 in the summer of 1992 when her mother returned to their Salford home with a poster from the Humana shop in Manchester.    It shows photographs of teenagers participating in sporting and educational activities, and the text explained that Tvind started more than 21 years ago with travelling courses, especially to Third World countries.