happiness

BBC Breakfast is running a series of segments about happiness and the efforts of a new charity to promote a happier way of life. The charity, Action for Happiness, has produced a downloadable document[.pdf] for you to try at home.

I had to know more about this brand new charity so I had a look. They say they are "currently part of the Young Foundation" who are an established charity with plenty of accounts lodged with the Charity Commission. So I took a peek at their latest accounts[.pdf] and laughed. The Young Foundation gets a huge chunk of its funding from the public purse including contributions from the Cabinet Office, DCSF, NHS Institute, Office of the Third Sector, Audit Commission, Dept of Health, DEFRA, Haringey Council, Lewisham Borough Council, Local Government Association, Manchester City Council, Newcastle City Council, Suffolk County Council, Equality and Human Rights Commission to name but a few. The total income for accounting year 2009 was reported at £4,422,910 and well over 25% of that comes from these sources.

So a potential addition to the fakecharity pages sets up a new charity to encourage 'happiness' and is then promoted heavily by the BBC? One has to wonder why?