We actively encourage and accept donations from a wider number of sources, including individuals and companies. The £6,000 with which Action for M.E. is funding this study was contributed by a private corporate donor with a specific interest in seeing the alleviation of childhood suffering. This sum has been match-funded by University of Bristol
I have long held the view that AFME are operating as a front group for various vested interest who seek to keep ME under-researched and maintain the status quo as a (bio)psychosocial illness. I have long held the view they are a charity front and give a veneer of respectability as a registered charity to the vested interests.
Some might point out some of the good work that AFME do regarding very generalist issues etc (fake lobbying, welfare benefits, fundraising) which they cannot as a small charity have any impact and gives the impression and illusion to naive people that they are helping people with ME and doing something. However they are not on our side on important ME issues like PACE (who AFME made possible), SMILE, and have given the licence for the BPS school to do what they have done.
Thankfully AFME are now proving this very fact by laundering money from "an anonomyous donor" to give to Bristol uni.
1. Why would AFME allow itself to be used as money laundering operation for the donor?
2. Why can the anonymous donation not be given direct to Bristol uni?
3. Why is this being hidden and why are AFME not being transparent?
4. How can we be sure the anonymous donor is not the DWP, insurance companies such as Unum, psychological practitioners such as Trudy Chalder's The British Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapies (BABCP)?
5. Are charities allowed by Charity Commission to pass money through their accounts from the anonomyous donor to Bristol Uni?
This should be of concern to all members of AFME and ME community and society in general.
If anyone is in doubt about vested interests using charitable type organisations to improve their image and work against society see three very recent examples.
BP and museums
Coca-Cola and European Hydration Institute (EHI)
Chemical Co's and "Citizens for fire safety"
British Petroleum funding various museums to "greenwash" themselves
"BP’s actions around the world, from displacing frontline communities and colluding with regimes with horrendous human rights records, to investment in tar sands and mass pollution, mark them out as a key player in human rights abuses and environmental destruction.
Yet BP is able to rely on the good reputations of our cultural institutions to curry favour and present an acceptable face to the public, while at the same time continuing to lobby against environmental protections and action on climate change. This greenwash must not continue."
https://www.opendemocracy.net/uk/alys-mumford/why-bp-has-no-place-in-our-arts
Coca-cola setting up charitable body to counter claim that sugary fizzy drinks make you fat
"Coca-Cola has spent millions of pounds on healthy-eating initiatives and research to counter claims that its fizzy drinks can cause obesity, it has been claimed.
The drinks company, a major sponsor of the Olympics, the Fifa World Cup and the Rugby World Cup, is said to have financial links to more than a dozen British scientists, including government health advisers, who cast doubt on link between sugary drinks and obesity.
It spent £4.86 million setting up the European Hydration Institute (EHI) — a research foundation promoting hydration - which has recommended that people consume sports and soft drinks, according to The Times.
The newspaper claimed that Ron Maughan, chairman of the EHI's scientific advisory board, was an emeritus professor of sport science at Loughborough University, which received almost £1 million from Coca-Cola while he provided nutritional advice to leading sports bodies."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/...rove-that-fizzy-drinks-dont-make-you-fat.html
https://www.rt.com/uk/318126-coca-cola-obesity-sugar/
Chemical companies producing dangerous and toxic fire retardant exposed in Chicago Tribune expose of their Front group "Citizens for Fire Safety
http://www.prwatch.org/news/2012/09/11749/citizens-fire-safety-smoked-out-front-group-folds-after-exposé
http://media.apps.chicagotribune.com/flames/index.html
"In 2007, the three biggest flame retardant chemical manufacturers, Albemarle, Chemtura, and ICL Industrial Products, founded the Citizens for Fire Safety (CFFS).
The three companies, which control 40 percent of the world's market for flame retardant chemicals, were the group's only members and funders. But it didn't call itself a trade group. It misleadingly labeled itself "a coalition of fire professionals, educators, community activists, burn centers, doctors, fire departments and industry leaders, united to ensure that our country is protected by the highest standards of fire safety."
The group claimed it "had joined with the international firefighters' association, the American Burn Association and a key federal agency 'to conduct ongoing studies to ensure safe and effective fire prevention.' Both of those organizations and the federal agency, however, said that simply is not true. 'They are lying,' Jeff Zack, a spokesman for the International Association of Fire Fighters (IAFF), told the Tribune. 'They aren't working with us on anything.'" Other deceptive techniques include hiring expert witnesses to mislead lawmakers.
