No More Failures: The League Must Choose a Chair of Integrity
The League’s new Chair must do more than warm the seat — they must raise standards, hold management to account, and restore credibility. Anything less will betray members, donors, and the animals the charity exists to protect.
The League’s Future Depends on Choosing the Right Chair
The arrest of the League’s former Chair was the greatest scandal in the charity’s 100-year history. Members and donors were promised a “reset”. Yet resets are only meaningful if they come with substance, accountability, and moral courage. This time, there can be no excuses.
What the League Needs Now
The League requires an independent Chair — someone who will support management while holding them to account. Independence means more than avoiding conflicts of interest: it means having the strength to say “no” when standards slip, and the integrity to ensure decisions are made in the best interests of animals, members, and donors.
The next Chair must also raise the standards of behaviour expected of both trustees and staff. Too often in recent years, members and donors have been treated as inconveniences, when they are the lifeblood of the organisation. Respect, transparency and accountability are not optional extras — they are the foundations of any credible charity.
Above all, the League’s next Chair must restore credibility. For a century, the organisation stood as a campaigning force for animals, built on outrage and conviction. Today, it risks becoming a hollow vessel, weakened by complacency and careerism. The new Chair must help the CEO, Emma Slawinski, deliver results and demand the highest standards of governance. Support must never become deference.
If the League fails to get this appointment right, it risks not just its reputation but its very future as a serious campaigning charity.
What the League Must Avoid
The danger is obvious: appointing a Chair who seeks prestige, rather than responsibility. The charity cannot afford to recycle failed figures with long records of personal ambition but little evidence of principle or competence.
One such candidate, who has hovered on the edges of the League for years, offers a cautionary example. He failed at least twice to secure the CEO role. He has been quietly on the League’s payroll — £1,100 per month as a consultant, though his LinkedIn page makes no mention of such employment. He stood as a Liberal Democrat candidate in the last General Election, presenting himself as the most “caring and compassionate” choice, yet opposing candidates who actually pledged to end the badger cull and strengthen the Hunting Act — positions his party did not support. The hypocrisy deepens: in July 2014, he attacked Labour, declaring “Never in the history of wildlife protection has there been such a betrayal of trust,” whilst seeking office under the Lib Dem banner.
His track record is littered with failures. He was removed as CEO of the Badger Trust. He failed as a parliamentary candidate. His close ties to certain League staff have contributed to the organisation’s decline, not its renewal. This is not the calibre of leadership the League requires.
A Real Reset — or a Betrayal
“Reset” must not be another empty slogan, joining the pile of broken phrases like “Enough is Enough” and “Time for Change.” The League needs leadership that demands integrity, commands respect, and restores confidence.
The choice is stark. The trustees can either appoint a Chair who embodies independence, accountability and credibility, or they can continue the downward spiral by recycling familiar failures.
For the sake of animals, members, and donors, only one option is acceptable.
