Sick Kids fundraiser had secret second job for Rosslyn – and was axed there too

THE head of a controversial children's charity campaign had a secret job on another major fundraising drive – which failed to raise a penny. Elaine McGonigle, who was suspended by the Sick Kids Friends Foundation in Edinburgh this month, was also axed as fundraising director for an appeal to restore Rosslyn Chapel, in Midlothian.

She is thought to have started work for the Rosslyn Chapel Trust in September 2008, the same month she started as campaign director for the New Pyjamas campaign to raise 15 million for extra facilities for the capital's new children's hospital.

Trust officials confirmed yesterday that Ms McGonigle's contract was terminated in March after she failed to bring in any money.

They are still trying to raise 9m so the restoration of the chapel – famed for its mysterious carvings and reputed links to the Knights Templar and the Holy Grail – can be completed this year.

Grants from the Heritage Lottery Fund and Historic Scotland were secured in March 2007, but the trust did not begin work on the project until the autumn of last year as it did not have enough money.

Trustees of the Sick Kids charity are understood to have ordered her suspension after discovering that more than 500,000 had been spent on a campaign that generated just 60,000 in the space of ten months.

The foundation yesterday insisted its trustees had been under the impression that Ms McGonigle had been working exclusively for its campaign. She was hired after a recruitment process led by Fletcher Jones, an agency headed by Graeme Millar, the campaign's long-serving chairman, who resigned last month after concerns emerged over the running of New Pyjamas.

Sources close to the charity said it was not known if Mr Millar had been aware of Ms McGonigle's second job.

The Scotsman revealed this month how Ms McGonigle was thought to have been ousted from the post of UK director of marketing and external affairs with the Princess Royal Trust for Carers.

She was appointed by the carers' trust just over three years after dropping allegations of bullying and sexual harassment against the principal of St Andrews University. She had made a number of serious claims about then principal Dr Brian Lang after resigning in the wake of being suspended for alleged gross misconduct.

A spokesman for the Rosslyn Chapel Trust said yesterday: "We entered into a consultancy contract with Elaine McGonigle on 10 September, 2008, for the provision of fundraising services and personnel. Ms McGonigle's title was director of fundraising.

"The contract was terminated on 10 March, 2009 at the six-month review and break period.

"During this period, no funds were raised by Ms McGonigle for the trust and there was no apparent prospect of any funds being forthcoming."

A spokesman for the Sick Kids Friends Foundation said: "Elaine McGonigle was appointed as director of the New Pyjamas campaign in September 2008.

"As far as the board of trustees of the SKFF was concerned, she was working wholly and exclusively for the New Pyjamas campaign."

Scotland's charity regulator has begun an investigation into the affairs of the Sick Kids charity and the New Pyjamas campaign.

NHS Lothian, which is building the new Royal Hospital for Sick Children, due to open in 2013, has stripped the charity of its independence after officials decided they needed to take a "central role" in the running of the campaign.