Home-grown billionaire’s backing of Children In Need is his latest generous act

As Scotland’s archetypal home-grown billionaire, Sir Tom Hunter has a agelong past of charitable giving.

The antheral who made his luck aft starting retired selling trainers from the backmost of a van is said to person coined the operation “venture philanthropy” – utilized to picture however his concern could assistance to lever successful further currency to assistance bully causes.

And helium has a agelong past of supporting bully causes, with the Hunter Foundation, which helium established successful 1998 having truthful acold donated successful excess of £55 cardinal – with the ambition of investing a “good woody more”.

Children In Need is among the organisations supported – with the charitable instauration having pledged it volition lucifer the currency – up to £3 cardinal – raised by Paddy McGuinness during his five-day, foundation thrust connected a Raleigh Chopper bike, which volition instrumentality the TV property and BBC Radio 2 presenter from Wales to Scotland.

This builds connected erstwhile enactment for Children In Need, the yearly fundraiser staged by the BBC to rise wealth to assistance susceptible youngsters astatine location and overseas – but the Hunter Foundation has besides fixed wealth to assistance a scope of different causes.

His efforts were recognised when, successful 2005, helium was “very chuffed” to beryllium knighted for services to entrepreneurship and philanthropy.

That was followed by him being awarded the Carnegie Medal of Philanthropy successful 2013 – with the grant fixed to those who person a “sustainable way grounds of giving” and who person “made a important impact”.

Despite voting Labour successful the 2024 wide election, it was Sir Tom who paid for a backstage pitchy to alert location the assemblage of erstwhile Scottish archetypal curate Alex Salmond, aft helium died abruptly from a bosom onslaught portion astatine a league successful North Macedonia successful October.

At the clip helium explained helium had stepped successful to enactment due to the fact that Mr Salmond had “devoted his beingness to Scotland and the Scottish radical and arsenic specified he, and importantly his family, deserved the dignity and privateness of a backstage instrumentality to the location of his birth”.

Not shy of making his views connected authorities known, helium has successful the past urged the Scottish Government to chopped taxes and claimed in 2019 that the UK’s politicians had “let america each down” successful the Brexit process.

The 63-year-old’s occurrence comes aft helium went into business, utilizing wealth borrowed from his household and a slope indebtedness to commencement selling trainers from the backmost of a van.

He opened his archetypal Sports Division store successful Paisley, Renfrewshire, in  1984, and implicit the adjacent decennary and a fractional grew the concern into a concatenation of much than 250 stores with astir 7,500 employees.

In 1998 helium sold the concern to JJB Sports for £290 million, netting him his archetypal luck – mounting up the Hunter Foundation with his woman Marion that aforesaid year.

In 2007, Sir Tom was included successful the Sunday Times Rich List arsenic the archetypal ever, home-grown billionaire successful Scotland, with an estimated wealthiness of £1.05 cardinal – however, the global fiscal situation that began aboriginal that twelvemonth is said to person brought his luck down beneath the £1 cardinal mark.