We offer core support, project grants and grants towards capital costs within revenue projects (e.g. small items of equipment). We do not offer grants for building projects. We are happy to make grants to support salaries and employment costs, and if your proposal includes these, you should read our additional guidance on employing people before applying.
We will support tried-and-tested activities that can prove they are still meeting a clear need, and genuine innovation where it is warranted. It is up to you to say how your chosen approach fits within the aims of our programmes.
You should be a properly constituted organisation. You do not have to be a registered charity but the purpose for which you are applying must be charitable according to law and you must be allowed by your constitution to take on the task you propose. You need to show us that you are capable of carrying out the proposal you put to us. You are more likely to be successful if your organisation is led by or effectively represents the people you are trying to help. We would prefer to assist by responding to people’s own views of what needs to be done and equipping them, financially, to make changes themselves.
We encourage and support organisations to work together where this will produce better results for their beneficiaries. We will accept consortium applications, although our grant must be made to a specified lead organisation.
If we have previously turned down your proposal, you should not reapply for the same purpose unless your rejection letter explicitly tells you that you can and under what circumstances.
You should carefully work out the genuine costs of your proposal, and apply for what you need to do the job. We have a policy of funding fewer applicants properly rather than giving many smaller grants. We will, if necessary, go through your budget with you to see if it is sound and to test whether you could manage with less if we cannot offer all you need. We encourage you to apply to other funders as well as us since we cannot always fund the whole cost of a project.
Click here for more information about grants given, and the average amounts awarded.
We make most of our grants over one, two or three years, but we will consider making grants over longer periods if there is a good reason to do so. If your project has a clear goal that you intend to reach within a certain period, we will try to fund it for the time needed to do the job properly. We may fund work we have supported previously, but you should not assume we will offer another grant. If you want to continue your core or project funding, you should discuss the matter with us at least nine months before your current grant expires.
We would rather you did not become too dependent on us for the bulk of your income so we discourage organisations from asking for too many grants to run at the same time. But we take a sensible and practical view: if your organisation serves different groups of people in different ways we may be able to help more than once. You must talk to us to see if another bid might be possible before applying.
We will acknowledge your application and let you know straight away whether or not it is eligible. If it is eligible, we will tell you which staff manager will assess it. They will be your main contact should there be any queries. They will usually visit your organisation, but sometimes we carry out assessment interviews by telephone. We may ask others about your organisation or proposal, so let us know if there is anything confidential about your plans or situation, which we should not divulge.
Trustees make their decisions based on the staff manager’s assessment. They meet five times a year to make decisions on grants over £20,000, and aim to spend approximately the same amount of their annual grants budget at each meeting. For grants over £20,000, we aim to give you a decision within six months of receiving your application, though sometimes it necessarily takes longer. For grants under £20,000 there are more regular meetings, and we aim to respond within two to four months, though, once again, some applications take longer.
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