Jane Tewson - Background in The UK

Background in The UK

She is the daughter of Edward Tewson and Jocelyn (née Johnston), a doctor in rural SE England. With serious dyslexia she left Lord Williams's Grammar School in Thame without qualifications, but later attended lectures at Oxford while working as a cleaner in the city.

In 1981, at age 23, she founded Charity Projects in London, with funding from Lord (Tim) Bell and numerous other donations. Its initial focus was tackling homelesness in Soho.

The highly successful Comic Relief concept emerged in 1985, combining 'Red Nose Day' with a BBC TV telethon featuring Britain's top entertainers and comics. Tewson had worked in a refugee camp in Sudan in 1985, where she was pronounced clinically dead after contracting cerebral malaria. She recounts the sensation of looking down on her own body and but then returning to it and surviving - there were no drugs left in the camp. Her response to the African famine, Comic Relief was launched on Christmas Day 1985 from the refugee camp in Safawa, Sudan, (Helen Fielding's novel Cause Celeb, 1994, may be partially based on the launch). By 2005 Comic Relief it had raised £337 million for famine relief and community development, notably for Africa and in disadvantaged areas of the UK. Comic Relief distributes much of its aid through partner organisations.