Pollokshields Development Agency (PDA), a community charity that has received over £1 million in public funding, is the subject of an ongoing inquiry by the Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator (OSCR). The probe, which began in May 2023, followed concerns over the sudden removal and replacement of trustees and surrounding the safeguarding of the charity’s assets.

While OSCR confirmed that the decision to appoint a provisional liquidator was not a direct result of its investigation, the timing has drawn attention to the organisation’s rapid financial decline. Companies House filings reveal the charity’s cash reserves plummeted from £66,651 in March 2023 to just £672 by March 2024, in just seven months after new trustees assumed control.

The organisation is also in breach of charity law, having failed to submit its annual accounts to OSCR, which are now nearly seven months overdue.

In a statement, a spokesperson for the liquidators said their investigation is ongoing and expressed concern about the lack of accountability from those involved: “None of the trustees appear willing to take responsibility for the operation of the charity or its finances. They seem to want to abdicate responsibility and say it was somebody else.”

OSCR previously issued a formal notice to the charity’s bank in 2023 to prevent the sale or disposal of property amid fears over asset security. That restriction was lifted in August 2023, but questions remain over how the charity’s funds were subsequently managed.

Over the past decade, PDA has received close to £1m in public funding from Glasgow City Council, the Bank of Scotland Foundation, the Robertson Trust, and the National Lottery Communities Fund.

A source familiar with the matter told Scottish Housing News: “When public funds diminish without transparency, it raises wider questions. Not only about this charity’s governance, but about the robustness of oversight mechanisms across the sector.”

OSCR said the liquidation process is independent of its inquiry.

“As stated on the Companies Register, a provisional liquidator has been appointed to Pollokshields Development Agency,” an OSCR spokesperson said. “This was not as a result of OSCR’s inquiry, which remains ongoing.