Anger at donkey sanctuary wages

CHARITY BOSSES ‘EARNING UP TO £130,000 A YEAR'

- WILLIAM TELFORD

CAMPAIGNERS battling to save Ivybridge’s under-threat Donkey Sanctuary say they are “disgusted” to learn charity bosses have been earning up to £130,000 a year. A group of eight volunteers at the Devon sanctuary have written to Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and started a petition in a bid to protect the facility from closure by the charity which runs it.

And Dawn Blatchford, one of the campaigners, said she was horrified when she read accounts for The Donkey Sanctuary which revealed 14 workers were paid more than £60,000 in 2022. She said: “It’s disgusting. The animals should come first. They are a charity for animals.”

Miss Blatchford, from Plymouth, and seven other unpaid volunteers who work at the Ivybridge sanctuary have written a strongly-worded letter to Marianne Steele, chief executive of the Sidmouth-headquartered The Donkey Sanctuary, pleading for the sanctuary to remain open.