Action on Sugar - the revenge of CASH

I've been vaguely following the UK War On Sugar, but not paying much attention. However, Simon Clark at Taking Liberties spotted that Action on Sugar have more than a passing connection to our Marcela Trust funded friends at CASH:

The [actiononsugar.org] link takes you to the website for Consensus Action on Salt and Health (CASH) so when Action on Sugar say "staff share other research projects" I imagine that's what they mean.

And indeed, here's the relevant "whois actionsugar.org" information:

Domain Name:ACTIONONSUGAR.ORG
Created On:02-Oct-2013 15:03:20 UTC
Last Updated On:02-Dec-2013 03:45:39 UTC
Expiration Date:02-Oct-2015 15:03:20 UTC
Sponsoring Registrar:eNom, Inc. (R39-LROR)
Status:CLIENT TRANSFER PROHIBITED
Registrant ID:8259a6739c6b982d
Registrant Name:Katharine Jenner
Registrant Organization:Consensus Action on Salt and Health
Registrant Street1:Wolfson Institute; Charterhouse square; Queen Mary Universit
Registrant Street2:London
Registrant Street3:
Registrant City:Queen Mary University of London
Registrant State/Province:London
Registrant Postal Code:ec1m 6bq
Registrant Country:GB
Registrant Phone:+44.2078826018
Registrant Phone Ext.:
Registrant FAX:
Registrant FAX Ext.:
Registrant Email:cash@qmul.ac.uk

Back in 2012 I probed into CASH which turned up the Marcela Trust as a funding source. What's happened in the past year?

CASH's 2012-2013 report drops hints that their interests are broadening out from salt to include sugar (sugar-sweetened beverages in particular) and saturated fats. Their registered charity number is 1098818 which let me find their end of 2013 accounts:

• CASH doesn't seem to be very popular in terms of public donations, and their finances aren't looking that good: total income for the year was £141,335 (2012: £261,590) and expenditure was £140,490 (2012: £169,750)
• OMC Investments Ltd (proxy for the Marcela Trust) gave them £200K in 2012, but only £100K in 2013. Perhaps they didn't like the publicity that they got last year... Note that they're still 70% of CASH's funding.
• The rest of their income is made up of donations (4k), interest (17K), fund generating activities (17K) and "other" (2K). Their interest is basically 2% on £880K of funds.
• The British Heart foundation gave them 30K in 2012 but nothing in 2013.
• CASH shifted 300K of cash into long-term investments during the year.

Looks like CASH can run for a few years on their reserves, but without continuing OMC (Marcela Trust) investments, they're screwed.

actiononsugar.org domain registrant and nutritionist Katharine Jenner is quite the campaigner:

Katharine is a Registered Public Health Nutritionist and the Campaign Director of the award winning salt reduction charity CASH (Consensus Action on Salt and Health) and its international arm WASH (World Action on Salt and Health) [...] Katharine worked as a media strategist for several years and as such is very interested in developing innovative approaches to communicating public health.

Specifically, banning salt, sugar, and who knows what else...

I wondered how CASH got their 880K in funds so I dug back a few years.

• In 2009 they went from 200K to 370K via 240K in "voluntary income" which include 200K from OMC.
• In 2010 OMC pitched in another 200K, and the British Heart Foundation 90K
• In 2011 OMC pitched in 200K and the BHF 60K.

One is left with the inescapable conclusion that CASH (and hence actiononsugar.org) is principally a lobbying arm of the Marcela Trust, funded through OMC Investments. Don't put sugar in the tea you offer Dawn Pamela Rose from the Marcela Trust, she'll tell you that she's sweet enough.