A long-serving National Trust volunteer who was dismissed after complaining about mistakes on the charity's website has now uncovered more than 1,000 additional errors, bringing the total to around 3,000.
Dedicated Service Met with Silence
Andy Jones, a 71-year-old from Haslemere, Surrey, devoted over 5,500 unpaid hours across nearly 14 years to the heritage charity. His troubles began when he took it upon himself to proofread the Trust's online content, compiling a detailed spreadsheet of 2,000 misspellings, grammatical blunders, and factual slips.
In November 2024, Mr Jones sent the document to the Trust's director-general, Hilary McGrady, politely asking for it to be forwarded to the relevant team for correction. He received no reply to this or subsequent follow-up emails.
The Email That Ended a Volunteering Career
By January 2025, frustrated by the lack of acknowledgment, Mr Jones sent a strongly worded email expressing his dismay. In it, he complained of receiving "no reply, acknowledgement, let alone thanks" for the hundreds of hours spent reviewing what he called a "crappy not fit for purpose webs****e".
The Trust's management responded by stating his comments were "not in line with our organisational values" and informed him he would no longer be considered for volunteer roles at any of its properties. Mr Jones admitted the email's tone was inappropriate but said he was exasperated after his considerable efforts were completely ignored.
A Growing List of Glaring Mistakes
Despite being barred in January last year, the retired IT worker has continued his audit. He claims the problem is "getting worse and worse" as new content is added without proper checks. Among the fresh tranche of errors he has documented are:
- 'Yew trees' written as 'ewe trees' (a female sheep).
- 'Bridleways' becoming 'bridal ways'.
- 'Nissen huts' transformed into 'Nissan huts'.
- 'Wattle and daub' morphed into 'wattle and dorb'.
- The charity even misspelt its own name as the 'Natinal Trust' in one caption.
Other howlers include 'conservation' as 'coservation', 'car park' as 'carp park', and a photo of a sheep labelled as a red squirrel haven. Mr Jones asserts that none of his 2,000 proposed corrections have been actioned.
Charity Denies Dismissal Was Over Error Reporting
The National Trust denied that Mr Jones was barred "simply for pointing out grammatical errors on a website". A spokesman stated: "Relationship breakdown tends to occur after a series of incidents." However, Mr Jones vehemently denies any other incidents, challenging the Trust to provide documentation.
The charity added: "We have an extensive website with thousands of individual pages... mistakes can occasionally happen. We are grateful to anyone who helps by reporting errors."
Undeterred, Mr Jones plans to write again to Ms McGrady—who was recently awarded a CBE—to present his updated findings. He says he still harbours hopes of volunteering again for an organisation he believes does "a lot of very good work".
