Labour billionaire launches mobile network with charity focus

Former tax exile to the rescue

A new UK mobile network that will donate a proportion of its profits to charity has been set up by former tax exile and now Labour Party activist, Andrew Rosenfeld. Using EE’s network on a wholesale basis, the ‘The People’s Operator‘ went live yesterday [19th November 2012] offering what it claims are competitive mobile deals and nationwide coverage with a quarter of its profits poured into a charitable foundation that will then decide the beneficiaries.On its pay-as-you-go tariffs, texting on the service costs 7.5 pence, while UK calls on the network are 12.5 pence per minute.

Data is 12.5 pence per megabyte. In comparison, Vodafone offers data at £1 for a day’s access – with a 25 MB limit – with each extra megabyte costing four pence thereafter.

Rosenfeld,50, was previously co-founder, CEO and chairman of Minerva, the FTSE 250 property investment and development company.

He sold sold his entire shareholding when the firm was valued at £600 million, after which he settled in Geneva as a tax exile for five years.

In 2009 he was listed on the Sunday Times Rich List as having a personal fortune of £100 million.

His newest venture, in addition to donating a quarter of profits to the company’s foundation, will also allow customers to choose which charity, community group or other cause should benefit from a further 10 per cent of their call, text or data charges.

To start, the group will offer only pay-as-you-go deals but will expand into contract phone deals next year.

It follows a similar move by Age UK which launched its own mobile network with modified mobile handsets for the elderly last month [October 2012].

Just recently Mr Rosenfeld was given a new role as Labour’s ‘chair of nations and regions’, charged with broadening the party’s base of supporters and drumming up donations.

Before the 2005 General Election he lent £1 million to Party, a sum which has since been repaid.

• FOOTNOTE: GoMobile News has discovered that if you request your SIM online at present, it won’t be delivered until early December [2012].