IRC v McMullen
A trust to promote the playing of football and other sports by pupils at schools and universities was charitable, because it was for the advancement of education.
Facts
The Football Association set up the FA Youth Trust, to organise or provide facilities which would enable pupils of schools and universities in the United Kingdom to play association football or other games or sports, and thereby to ensure that due attention was given to the physical education and development of such pupils as well as to the development and occupation of their minds. The Inland Revenue argued that the trust was not charitable.
Legal principle
The House of Lords held that the trust was charitable, as being for the advancement of education. Lord Hailsham LC said that education is not limited to formal instruction in the classroom, but includes the development of the whole person, including physical education. Sport played as part of education, by pupils at schools and universities, was therefore within the concept of education. The House did not need to decide whether the trust was also charitable under the Recreational Charities Act 1958.
Related cases on charitable trusts
- Chichester Diocesan Fund and Board of Finance Inc v Simpson [1944] AC 341
- Re Compton [1945] Ch 123
- Dingle v Turner [1972] AC 601
- Re Finger's Will Trusts [1972] Ch 286
- Gilmour v Coats [1949] AC 426
- Re Harwood [1936] Ch 285
- Re Hetherington [1990] Ch 1
- Income Tax Special Purposes Commissioners v Pemsel [1891] AC 531
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