Glasgow Jewish Community Trust

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Grant-making charitable trust for the Jewish community of Glasgow, Scotland (OSCR SC013684)

Glasgow Jewish Community Trust

Type Charitable trust (founding document is a deed of trust)
Founded June 1963 (formed);[1] registered 27 February 1964[2]
Founder(s) Ephraim Goldberg, Michael (Melach) Goldberg, Sir Maurice Bloch, Samuel Ross Campbell, Isidore Walton[1]
Registration ID SC013684
Status Active
Headquarters Caledonia House, 89 Seaward Street, Glasgow, G41 1HJ[2]
Area served Glasgow and surrounding districts
Services Grants to organisations
Registration Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator
Website gjct.org
Remarks Income £1,592,088; expenditure £263,670 (year ending 31 December 2025)[2]

Glasgow Jewish Community Trust (GJCT) is a grant-making charitable trust that manages funds on behalf of the Jewish community of Glasgow and the surrounding areas, and says it has funded more than 50 organisations since it was formed in 1963.[3] It has been on the Scottish Charity Register as charity SC013684 since 27 February 1964. Its constitutional form is "Trust (founding document is a deed of trust) (other than educational endowment)", and its main operating location is Glasgow City.[2]

Its registered purposes are "the prevention or relief of poverty", "the advancement of education", "the advancement of religion" and "any other purpose that may reasonably be regarded as analogous to any of the preceding purposes". Its stated object is:

"To hold and to use the Funds of the Trust on behalf of the Jewish Community of the City of Glasgow and the surrounding districts for the charitable, religious and educational purposes of the said Jewish Community."[2]

In the year ending 31 December 2025 the trust reported income of £1,592,088 and expenditure of £263,670. It has no staff and no volunteers.[2]

The Trust gives the following description of itself:

The Trust was formed in June 1963 by Ephraim Goldberg, Michael (Melach) Goldberg, Sir Maurice Bloch, Samuel Ross Campbell, and Isidore Walton. It has however grown over the years. In 2010 the Bloch and Winocour Trusts merged with the Community Trust. In 2011 the reserves of the original Glasgow Talmud Torah and Board of Jewish Education (later known as Calderwood Jewish Education) also found a home in the Community Trust. In 2012 surplus funds held by the Glasgow Rabbinical College were transferred to the Community Trust and most recently in 2016, Habonim funds were also deposited with the Community Trust and a Habonim and Youth restricted fund was created.
There are seventeen Trustees of the Glasgow Jewish Community Trust, and they meet three times a year to consider all applications that have been submitted.[4]

History of the trust

That's when Isaac, on behalf of the Trust, approached Matthew Dickie of house builders John Dickie and Son, which later became the John Dickie Group. Isaac already knew Matthew Dickie as when he and his brother Louis moved to Glasgow, they bought houses back-to-back to each other in Douglas Avenue and Otterburn Drive. As the street name suggests there was a burn at the bottom of their land with the surrounding area virtually a swamp. The brothers drained the ground with landfill topped off with soil which they then sold to house builders Dickie who put additional houses on it. That's how they became friends with Matthew Dickie.
So when the Trust members began to wonder about the land they now owned at Braidbar, Isaac Jesner arranged to meet Matthew Dickie at the Braidbar site. The builder liked what he saw and offered £10,000 for each acre that was able to obtain planning permission for housing. The company also undertook test borings to check what land was safe for buildings. It seemed that initial £5000 investment was going to pay off handsomely.
The road to profit though is not always straightforward. Many meetings took place with the local planning authority who initially seemed positive but then ruled after further investigation by experts that the drainage on the land was insufficient for a scheme of 100 houses.[5]
Then three years later house builders Wimpey expressed an interest and were talking about offering £240,000 for the whole site. It was a vast sum, but Isaac told his fellow trustees to hold their nerve as he still believed it was worth far more than that. But then Wimpey pulled out of the deal. As Isaac said: "Ephie was despondent and I was delighted."
The Trust had to be patient. Another four years passed and Wimpey returned to the table. Matthew Dickie were again approached and was told about Wimpey's interest. At that Dickie's offered £84,000 for each buildable acre. The science of land reclamation over old mines had moved forward in the ensuing decades and it was now likely that more of the land could be economically reinstated and built on. Improved drainage had been installed by the council nearby which would also help with house construction on the land.
Finally, in 1986, nearly 20 years later, the first phase of Braidbar was sold. At last, the Trust could see some profit from that initial £5000 purchase all those years ago. And the profit was vast, giving the Trust the additional funds to drive forward their plans for the community.
Initially they achieved a return of £647,000 from Braidbar with another £106,000 the following year. In total, before the millennium, it eventually raised over £900,000 for the Trust which happily put it to good use helping much-needed projects, particularly in social housing. It really took the Trust to another level.[6]
There were doubts too about what Giffnock members thought was the simplest solution - expanding the existing shul at May Terrace. Architects who looked at the site said a more costly demolition and rebuild was the only viable answer and therefore remaining was not the cheap option some had hoped for whenever they argued its case. Previously the ever-resourceful Isaac Jesner had circulated a further suggestion - building to the rear of a traditional villa, one of the oldest in Giffnock, further south on Fenwick Road named The Glen which had the attraction of having a large plot of land of over an acre to its rear, which would be a suitable site on which to build. He had told a few friends about his proposed solution which is why a phone call one morning changed everything. It was one of his friends who asked him if he had seen an advertisement that morning in the Glasgow Herald stating that The Glen on Fenwick Road was for sale at offers over £7000. Suddenly decision time was upon them if what might have been a whimsical idea was to come to fruition.[7]
With two other members of the shul, he went to see The Glen, and more importantly its land, the following day. A brief stroll around convinced him that his initial idea that the spare ground behind the house was large enough for a synagogue was a sound one. But convincing the members of the shul could be time-consuming, as the discussions were sure to be numerous and lengthy. The immediate problem of course was that houses in desirable areas can sell quickly - there would be no time to call meetings and debate in minute detail the pros and cons of the site. So Isaac swallowed hard, and said he himself would buy it. His mantra had always been, If you want something done, just do it".[8]
If the shul members eventually rejected the proposal, he hurriedly thought, he could always build flats or shops on the land and recoup his investment so it was not such a foolhardy endeavour that some people might assume. As he later recalled: "On my return to my office I phoned the solicitors and asked if they were in a position to accept an immediate offer of £7000. They thought the offer too low but promised to discuss it with their client.
"I had a sleepless night. At 10a.m. the next day they phoned to say the least they would take was £7250, and we finally closed the deal with our lawyer's offer in their hands the following morning. I don't think our solicitor had ever worked so fast in his life."
So, shul members, now accepting that the Tudor site was not to everyone's taste, and that remaining at May Terrace was more costly than envisaged, now looked more closely at Isaac's land behind The Glen. Of course, support was not unanimous as there were concerns that the ground would not be large enough and that there would be insufficient space for parking. Nevertheless, it was finally agreed that they would build the new shul behind the existing house at The Glen at an estimated cost of £140,000, and fund-raising began immediately. It was then the Trust was on hand to help it come to fruition, and in a way which helped not only Giffnock shul, but the Maccabi youth organisation.[9]
Since the Jewish community had spread south of the Gorbals, raising doubts about the future of the existing three major synagogues there, shuls had been established in first Queens Park just before the First World War, then Langside, Pollokshields, Crosshill, Newlands and Clarkston, and finally Newton Mearns. But by the sixties a number of them were seeing members move even further south to Giffnock and Newton Mearns and so they began to face the pressure of falling memberships that had dogged the congregations in Gorbals. There was also a fall in regular attendance by members of the Jewish community which was not immune to the growing secular trend in Scotland as a whole. And so, they turned to the Community Trust for help. [10]

Benefactors

The trust lists the following as benefactors since its creation.

Registration and finances

The Glasgow Jewish Community Trust is registered with the Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator (OSCR). Its register entry gives the following details:[2]

  • Charity number: SC013684
  • Registered: 27 February 1964
  • Constitutional form: Trust (founding document is a deed of trust) (other than educational endowment)
  • Principal office: Caledonia House, 89 Seaward Street, Glasgow, G41 1HJ
  • Geographical spread: more than one local authority area in Scotland. Main operating location: Glasgow City
  • Beneficiaries: "Other charities or voluntary bodies"
  • Activities: "It makes grants, donations or gifts to organisations"
  • Staff: 0. Volunteers: 0
Annual returns to OSCR[2]
Year ending Income (£) Expenditure (£) Annual return received
31 December 2021 131,250 161,313 29 September 2022
31 December 2022 127,415 172,135 12 September 2023
31 December 2023 1,865,490 263,202 10 July 2024
31 December 2024 160,995 200,549 25 September 2025
31 December 2025 1,592,088 263,670 17 September 2026

For the year ending 31 December 2025, OSCR breaks income down as donations and legacies £1,316,624 and investments £275,464. It breaks expenditure down as raising funds £42,048, charitable activities £207,640 and other £13,982.[11]

From 9 March 2026 OSCR began publishing the names of charity trustees on the Scottish Charity Register; supplying them becomes mandatory only as part of future annual submissions. In October 2026 the register entry for the trust listed eight trustees: Delia Berkley (spelt "Berkely" on the register), Gillian Quigley, Samuel Kingsley, Howard Beach, Stanley Lovatt, Adrian Jesner, Malcolm Livingstone and Mark Tenby.[2] Gillian Quigley, the one name on the register not in the Trust's April 2024 list, sat on UJIA's Scottish Programmes Committee in 2016 alongside Adam Berkley, Paul Morron and Hazel Tenby.[12] A Gillian Kate Quigley of Giffnock has been company secretary of Doughball (Scotland) Ltd since 2004.[13]

Donations

1971

According to Fred Samuel Berkley Chairman circa 1971 of Hillel Foundation Glasgow, the Trust gave Hillel a grant of £2,500 and the Jewish Youth Fund in London gave a six year loan bearing 5 per cent interest for a 'similar amount'.[14]

2016-2023

Recipients - Annual grants 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 Total
Friends of Lubavitch Scotland 4,000 4,500 7,000 15,500
Glasgow Jewish Representative Council 18,000 18,000 17,500 18,000 18,000 20,000 20,000 20,000 149,500
Glasgow Maccabi 18,000 5,000 5,000 5,000 5,000 5,000 10,000 5,000 58,000
Jewish Care Scotland 12,000 12,000 24,000
Jewish Student Chaplaincy Scotland 20,000 22,500 17,000 59,500
Lubavitch Foundation 4,000 4,000 4,000 4,000 6,000 22,000
Newark Care 5,000 5,000
Northern Region Jewish Chaplaincy 11,000 11,000 11,000 12,500 45,500
Scottish Council of Jewish Communities 7,000 10,000 10,000 10,000 8,000 8,000 8,000 10,000 71,000
Scottish Jewish Archives Centre 2,500 2,500 3,000 2,500 2,500 2,500 15,500
UJIA 4,000 4,000 4,000 4,000 16,000
Total 69,500 54,500 51,500 56,500 37,000 59,500 79,500 73,500 481,500
Recipients - Special grants 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 Total
Aberdeen Synagogue 500 750 1,250
Beatson Cancer Charity 1,000 1,000
British Heart Foundation 500 500
Clarkston Chanukah Celebration 1,250 1,500 2,750
Cosgrove / Cosgrove Care 8,000 5,000 7,500 7,500 28,000
Glasgow Reform Synagogue 10,000 1,500 11,500
Garnethill Hebrew Congregation 2,000 2,000
Garnethill Synagogue 500 500
Garnethill Synagogue Preservation Trust 5,000 5,000
The Gathering the Voices Association 2,500 2,500 2,500 2,500 2,500 2,255 14,755
Giffnock & Newlands Hebrew Congregation 1,200 1,200
Glasgow Friends of Israel 5,000 5,000
Glasgow Hebrew Burial Society 500 20,000 20,000 20,000 10,500 20,000 10,000 4,000 105,000
Glasgow Jewish Representative Society 6,300 1,000 5,000 12,300
Glasgow Rabbinical College 5,250 1,814 3,500 10,564
Glasgow Rabbinical College and Mikveh (Education) 14,000 12,000 26,000
Glasgow Rabbinical College and Mikveh (Mikveh) 4,000 20,000 24,000
Jewish Care Scotland 10,000 12,000 12,000 12,000 15,000 12,000 73,000
Lubavitch Foundation 500 500
Magen David Adom UK 25,000 25,000
Northern Region Jewish Chaplaincy 5,000 5,000 10,625 20,625
Scottish Council of Jewish Communities 1,377 1,377
Scottish Jewish Heritage Centre 1,000 1,000 1,000 3,000
Miscellaneous 1,100 1,100
Total 26,500 57,050 62,016 46,250 26,500 50,000 34,250 73,355 375,921
Restricted income funds 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 Total
Calderwood Lodge 2,929 2,100 3,220 1,650 500 6,100 16,499
Glasgow Maccabi 6,000 6,000
Habonim 22,000 10,000 15,000 15,000 62,000
UJIA 10,865 16,730 16,730 16,730 16,451 20,730 28,137 26,648 153,021
Prism The Gift Fund 1,000 1,000
Total 35,794 28,830 35,950 39,380 16,451 20,730 28,637 32,748 238,520
Total grants 131,794 140,380 149,466 142,130 79,951 130,230 142,387 179,603 1,095,941

Note: Data from Glasgow Jewish Community Trust Financial Statements 2016-2023.

2024-2025

Recipients - Unrestricted grants 2024 2025 Total
Calderwood Lodge 5,000 5,000
Clarkston Chanukah Celebration 1,500 1,500
Friends of Lubavitch Scotland 7,000 10,000 17,000
Glasgow Jewish Representative Council 250 250
Glasgow Maccabi 2,700 2,700
Glasgow Rabbinical College and Mikveh 18,000 22,000 40,000
Glasgow Reform Synagogue 3,201 3,201
Interfaith Glasgow 5,000 5,000
Jewish Care Scotland 15,000 15,000 30,000
Scottish Council of Jewish Communities / Jewish Council of Scotland 40,000 40,000 80,000
Jewish Student Chaplaincy Scotland 17,000 18,000 35,000
Newark Care 10,620 10,620
Scottish Jewish Archives Centre 4,000 4,000
Scottish Jewish Heritage Centre 1,000 1,000
Miscellaneous (each under £5,000) 5,304 22,711 28,015
Total 130,575 132,711 263,286
Recipients - Restricted income funds 2024 2025 Total
Calderwood Lodge 6,500 13,129 19,629
Giffnock Newton Mearns Synagogue 14,000 14,000
Glasgow Jewish Representative Council 2,500 2,500
Habonim 10,000 10,000
Jewish Council of Scotland 16,000 16,000
SJYA/UJIA 32,200 31,800 64,000
Total 51,200 74,929 126,129
Total grants 181,775 207,640 389,415

Note: 2024 figures from the itemised note 5 in the Trust's 2024 financial statements; 2025 figures from note 5 of the 2025 financial statements, which fold smaller grants into Miscellaneous and restate the 2024 SJYA/UJIA line as "SJYA". The Scottish Council of Jewish Communities and the Glasgow Jewish Representative Council merged in early 2025 to form the Jewish Council of Scotland (OSCR records the change of name on 19 February 2025; the accounts give 19 January).[15][16] The 2024 accounts are a redacted copy.[17][18]

Total grants 2016-2025: £1,485,356 (2016-2023 £1,095,941; 2024-2025 £389,415).

See also

People

List of those who have served as a permanent Trustee[20]
Name Role
Adam Berkley
Fred S Berkley
David M Cohen
Dr Kenneth Collins
John Dover
Victor Fields
Clarisse Goldberg
David Goldberg
Irene Goldberg
Mark M Goldberg 2nd Chairman
Stephen Kliner
Dr Jack E. Miller OBE JP
Paul Morron
Geoffrey P Ognall 3rd Chairman
Abigail Peters
Melville A Robinson
David Strang
Henry Tankel OBE
David Wolfe
Walter Wolfe
Original & Funding Trustees[21]
Name Role
Sir Maurice Bloch Funding Trustee
Dennis Cohen
Samuel Campbell Funding Trustee
Harry Coutts
Leslie Diamond
Harold Dykes
Maurice Felstein
Ephraim Goldberg Funding Trustee & 1st Chairman
Michael Goldberg Funding Trustee
Philip Jacobson
Isaac Jesner
Joseph Mellick
Symie Miller
Isaac Sclar
Robert Spence
Sir Alexander Stone
Isadore Walton Funding Trustee
Berl Wober
Joseph Wolfson
GJCT Trustees as at April 2024[22]
Name Role
Howard Beach
Delia Berkley
Laura Bernstein
Ralph Gurevitz
Rabbi Adrian Jesner
Samuel Kingsley
Adam Lewis Chairman
Malcolm J. Livingstone MBE Hon President & 4th Chairman
Stanley Lovatt
Lewis Orchant
Larry Sellyn
Raymond Strang Vice Chairman
Mark Tenby Treasurer
Evelyn Tiefenbrun
David Walton CBE Hon President
Michael Walton
Helena Winocour Secretary
Office Bearers[23]
Name Title From To
Isaac Jesner Original Hon President
David Walton & Malcolm Livingstone Current Presidents
Ephraim Goldberg Chairman 03/07/1963 29/03/1987
Mark Goldberg Chairman 29/03/1987 08/12/1996
Geoffrey Ognall Chairman 08/12/1996 02/07/2000
Malcolm Livingstone Chairman 30/10/2000 28/06/2023
Adam Lewis Chairman 28/06/2023
Adam Berkley Vice-Chairman 30/06/2022
Raymond Strang Vice-Chairman 28/06/2023
Harold Bach Secretary 06/06/1963 30/06/1970
Jack Goldman Secretary 11/10/1970 16/10/1988
Larry Sellyn Secretary 12/02/1989 25/03/2007
Mark Tenby Secretary 25/03/2007 28/06/2023
Helena Winocour Secretary 28/06/2023
Mark Tenby Treasurer 28/06/2023

Finance Committee

Contact

Glasgow Jewish Community Trust, c/o Martin Aitken & Co., Caledonia House, 89 Seaward Street, Glasgow, G41 1HJ

External links

Notes

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Glasgow Jewish Community Trust, About Us Glasgow Jewish Community Trust, accessed 20 October 2026.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 2.6 2.7 2.8 Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator, Glasgow Jewish Community Trust, SC013684 Scottish Charity Register, accessed 20 October 2026.
  3. ↑ Glasgow Jewish Community Trust, Welcome to the Glasgow Jewish Community Trust Glasgow Jewish Community Trust, accessed 20 October 2026.
  4. ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20250131132313/https://gjct.org/about/
  5. ↑ Ken Smith, More Than a Helping Hand: The History of the Glasgow Jewish Community Trust, Scottish Jewish Archives Centre in association with the Glasgow Jewish Community Trust, 2024 (limited local edition for the Trust's 60th anniversary; no ISBN), p. 32.
  6. ↑ Smith, More Than a Helping Hand, 2024, p. 33.
  7. ↑ Smith, More Than a Helping Hand, 2024, pp. 36-37.
  8. ↑ Smith, More Than a Helping Hand, 2024, p. 37.
  9. ↑ Smith, More Than a Helping Hand, 2024, p. 38.
  10. ↑ Smith, More Than a Helping Hand, 2024, p. 41.
  11. ↑ Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator, Download the Scottish Charity Register OSCR, register extract CharityExport-14-Oct-2026.csv.
  12. ↑ UJIA Annual Report 2016.
  13. ↑ Companies House, Gillian Kate QUIGLEY appointments, accessed 20 October 2026.
  14. ↑ Glasgow Hillel nearer, Jewish Chronicle, 29 January 1971: 28-9
  15. ↑ Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator, Jewish Council of Scotland (SC029438) Scottish Charity Register, accessed 21 October 2026.
  16. ↑ Jewish Council of Scotland, Trustees' Annual Report and Accounts for the Year ended 31st December 2025, via Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator, accessed 21 October 2026.
  17. ↑ Glasgow Jewish Community Trust, Report of the Trustees and Financial Statements for the year ended 31 December 2024, note 5 (p. 13), via OSCR, accessed 20 October 2026.
  18. ↑ Glasgow Jewish Community Trust, Report of the Trustees and Financial Statements for the year ended 31 December 2025, note 5 (pp. 18-19), via OSCR, accessed 20 October 2026.
  19. ↑ Smith, More Than a Helping Hand, 2024, p. 101.
  20. ↑ Smith, More Than a Helping Hand, 2024, p. 103.
  21. ↑ Smith, More Than a Helping Hand, 2024, p. 102.
  22. ↑ Smith, More Than a Helping Hand, 2024, p. 100.
  23. ↑ Smith, More Than a Helping Hand, 2024, p. 101.
  24. ↑ Registers of Scotland, Land Register title sheet REN156640 (County of Renfrew) ScotLIS, 2016.
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