Kids Company
| Founded | 1996 30 September 1997 (incorporated) 25 February 1998 (registered as a charity) |
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| Founder | Camila Batmanghelidjh |
| Dissolved | 5 August 2015 (Closed) 12 August 2015 (Winding-up petition made) 20 August 2015 (Winding-up order made) |
| Focus | "Inner-city children and young people." (claimed) |
| Location | |
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Area served
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Mainly Greater London; also some limited services in Bristol and also in Liverpool. |
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Key people
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Employees
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495 (Reported, 2013) 650 (Reportedly, at closure in 2015) |
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Volunteers
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9,296 (Reported, 2013) |
| Company number (E.W.) 03442083 Charity number (E.W.) 1068298 |
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Keeping Kids Company (in liquidation), formerly Kids Company, is an incorporated and registered charity, founded by Camila Batmanghelidjh in 1996 to provide support to deprived inner city children. From its original "drop-in" centre in south London it expanded over the following two decades to be a prominent children's charity operating 11 centres, mostly within Greater London, but also in Bristol and Liverpool.
The charity reported that from 2011 it was supporting 36,000 children per year. Funding was provided by businesses and through government grants.
In 2015, it was first reported that Kids Company was in significant financial difficulty. A £3 million grant from the government was temporarily withheld until Batmanghelidjh agreed to resign as chief executive. However, after the grant was made, the government withdrew it and sought to reclaim the amount after alleged breaches of the grant's terms. A police investigation into allegations of sexual abuse at the charity was also announced.
On 5 August 2015 the charity ceased operations and announced it would begin the process of placing itself into compulsory liquidation.
On 20 August 2015, a winding-up order against Kids Company was made at the High Court of Justice of England and Wales, on the petition of Kids Company presented on 12 August 2015. On the making of the winding-up order, the Official Receiver was appointed, and one of the Official Receivers - Matthew Stone - was assigned as the liquidator of the company.
The organisation was founded in December 1996 by Camila Batmanghelidjh. The philosophy of the charity was based on her belief that children’s behaviour is biologically determined and environmentally influenced. According to Batmanghelidjh, environmental factors can, ultimately, influence how children develop into adulthood through a type of re-wiring of the brain (neuroplasticity), for more positive outcomes in encouraging and caring environments. Writing in the The Guardian, Peter Beresford, professor of social policy at Brunel University, suggested that Batmanghelidjh’s belief that "parenting at an early age hard-wires children’s brains for success or failure, deviance or conformity" was "pseudoscience". Batmanghelidjh was interviewed for an academic study on the relationship between brain development and social deprivation, and according to the authors of the study, Batmanghelidjh was "clear that neuroscience is good for fundraising in the business sector".
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