Jane Tewson

Jane Tewson CBE (born 9 January 1958) is a British charity worker and the originator of several innovative charitable (non-profit) organisations and ideas for community strengthening, notably in the UK and Australia. She believes in making charity "active, emotional, involving and fun", by building connections between people of different backgrounds, cultures, wealth, and social positions. Her approach argues for "people getting directly involved and giving themselves.....", rather than giving money for charitable works. This "embraces human connection as a vital part of social change".

She is the daughter of Edward Tewson and Jocelyn (née Johnston), a doctor in rural South East England. With serious dyslexia she left Lord Williams's Grammar School in Thame without qualifications, but later attended lectures at Oxford while working as a cleaner in the city.

In 1981, aged 23, she founded Charity Projects in London, with funding from Lord (Tim) Bell and numerous other donations. Its initial focus was tackling homelessness in Soho.

The highly successful Comic Relief concept emerged in 1985, combining 'Red Nose Day' with a BBC TV telethon featuring Britain's top entertainers and comedians. Tewson had worked in a refugee camp in Sudan in 1985, where she was pronounced clinically dead after contracting cerebral malaria. She recounts the sensation of looking down on her own body and but then returning to it and surviving – there were no drugs left in the camp. Her response to the African famine, Comic Relief was launched on Christmas Day 1985 from the refugee camp in Safawa, Sudan. By 2005 Comic Relief it had raised £337 million for famine relief and community development, notably for Africa and disadvantaged areas of the UK. Comic Relief distributes much of its aid through partner organisations.

In 2000, she relocated from South-East England to Melbourne, Australia, when her husband Charles Lane was appointed director of project funding at the Myer Foundation and then the Dept. of Victorian Communities. At the time she was suffering from ovarian cancer but survived after operations in Melbourne.

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