Carrie may soon be on the job hunt

If Damian Aspinall’s lawyers don’t manage to dissuade the Charity Commission from making him step down as the boss of his eponymous wildlife foundation, Carrie Johnson – its strangely silent spokeswoman – may well find herself looking for another job.

Happily, the prime minister’s wife could not be closer to the Goldsmith family and it looks as if Ben Goldsmith – the youngest son of the late billionaire tycoon Sir James Goldsmith – could offer her another job in the same charity sector.

Updated accounts for the Conservative Environment Network, which he chairs, show its income almost doubled last year, with £352,000 sitting in the bank, and he has already taken on five new employees to take its headcount up to nine. The outfit, set up in 2013, describes itself as “an independent forum for conservatives in the UK and around the world who support net zero, nature restoration, and resource security”.

On top of his role at the think tank, Ben is also a non-executive board member of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, where, cosily, his brother Zac Goldsmith – controversially ennobled by Boris Johnson – serves as a junior minister.

Ben remains a trustee of Carrie’s employer, the Aspinall Foundation – a role he assumed in October 2013 – where fellow trustees include his half-brother, Robin Birley. Whether they will wish to continue to be associated with the outfit if Aspinall goes – it’s alleged that there has been financial misappropriation – remains to be seen.