Captain Tom’s charity boss quits just months after ‘trying to remove war hero’s son-in-law from the board’

The boss of Captain Tom’s charity has quit, it emerged today – just months after he was said to have tried to remove the war hero’s son-in-law from the board.

Solicitor Simon DeMaid was one of three trustees of the Captain Tom Foundation, along with Colin Ingram-Moore, who is married to the Covid fundraiser’s daughter, Hannah, and chair, Stephen Jones.

Yet Companies House records now show that Mr DeMaid has ceased his directorship of the company attached to the not-for-profit, while he has also been removed as a trustee on the Charities Commission website.

The foundation, set up in memory of Captain Tom who won the nation’s hearts by doing laps of his garden in lockdown, has raised £39million for good causes.

However, it has been at the centre of a Charities Commission investigation into potential conflicts of interest, including claims the family has personally profited. 

Solicitor Simon DeMaid was one of three trustees of the Captain Tom Foundation but has now stepped down

The foundation, set up in memory of Captain Tom who won the nation’s hearts by doing laps of his garden in lockdown , has raised £39million for good causes

However, it has been at the centre of a Charities Commission investigation into potential conflicts of interest, including claims the family has personally profited (pictured, Captain Tom’s daughter, Hannah, and her husband Colin, another of the foundation’s trustees)

Earlier this year, Mrs Ingram-Moore was ordered to demolish an unauthorised spa pool complex in her garden. 

The war hero’s daughter applied in 2021 for permission for an L-shaped building, which was approved, but council officers later rejected a retrospective application in 2022 for the different shaped spa.

The Captain Tom Foundation building was given an enforcement notice in July by Central Bedfordshire Council that it should be demolished as it was a ‘non-unauthorised’ building.

Officials then dismissed an appeal against its demolition, with inspector Diane Fleming saying the ‘scale and massing’ of the new building – which has not been finished – ‘resulted in harm’ to The Old Rectory, the Grade II-listed family home.

There was also a row when Mr and Mrs Ingram-Moore insisted the family were right to keep £800,000 made from three books written by Captain Tom, and wouldn’t do anything differently because they were ‘his wishes’.

Mrs Ingram-Moore insisted the books were ‘never anything to do with’ the Captain Tom Foundation and said there was nothing in the contract that referred to the charity, nor was there ever any agreement that cash from her father’s book deals would go to charity.

Amid a raft of negative publicity, reports suggested a wedge was driven between Mr Ingram-Moore and the two other trustees of the charity, Mr DeMaid and Mr Jones.

The relationship was said to have broken down so badly that the pair started exploring how they could remove Captain Tom’s son-in-law from the board altogether.

The charity even looked at changing its name and rebranding around its aim of ‘championing the elderly’, such was the reputational damage caused.

Mr DeMaid resigned on November 27, official filings show.

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