Published Friday 19 July 2019 at 16:21
This insight outlines a range of funding opportunities open to the public sector, businesses, community groups etc. Regular funding opportunities are also available via the websites below:
National Lottery Grant for Heritage
Community groups can now access potential grant funding opportunities through the free Blackburn with Darwen Open4Community online search tool.
For all Blackburn with Darwen Council funding bids
Please check whether match funding is required, if it is please contact and inform your Finance colleague.
Funding opportunities greater than £100,00
New £3.5 Million Fund to Develop Data Access and Sharing Methods (UK)
UK Research and Innovation has announced that it will invest up to £3.5 million to develop responsible data access and sharing methods in the accountancy, insurance and legal services sectors.
The first part of this competition involves individuals participating in a 3-day residential Innovation Lab to develop their collaborative proposals. Applicants are invited across a range of disciplines and backgrounds to create project teams – consortia – that might not otherwise work together that might not otherwise work together, and will be considered by an assessment panel, with desirable traits including:
- an open, flexible and creative outlook
- the ability to work constructively with people from diverse disciplines
Following the Innovation Lab, consortia will be able to refine and finalise their proposals with their consortium before applying to the £3.5 million funding. The Innovation Lab takes place over 3 days on 14th-16th October 2019.
Up to £1.5 million per project will be available.
Organisations can be a UK-based business, regulatory body, academic organisation, charity, public sector organisation or research and technology organisation (RTO), and must intend to carry out its project work and exploit the results from the UK.
The closing date to join the Innovation Lab is the 4th September 2019, and applicants will be notified by the 4th October 2019.
New £100 Million heritage Horizon Awards launched
Not for profit organisations and partnerships led by not for profit organisations can apply for grants of over £5 million to support heritage projects. The funding is being made available through the National Lottery Heritage Fund’s new £100 million Heritage Horizon Awards. These awards will be made over the next three years.
The focus for this year’s awards are:
- Landscapes and nature (natural heritage)
- Revitalising heritage at risk.
The Heritage Fund is looking to support projects that are:
- transformative;
- innovative;
- collaborative.
There are two phases to the programme.
A development phase lasting up to 2 years and a delivery phase lasting up to 5 years.
The deadline for submitting an Expression of Interest is the 11th October 2019. Applicants successful at this stage will then have until the 31st August 2020 to submit their development phase application. Projects will have up to two years to submit their delivery proposals.
Applicants must contribute at least 10% of the costs of their development phase and 10% of the costs of their delivery phase.
Funding to Recycle Plastic Packaging or Textile Materials
Grants of between £200,000 and £1 million are available for projects that provide new infrastructure and technologies which significantly increase recycling capacity for difficult to recycle plastic packaging or textile materials. The funding is being made through the Environmental charity WRAP who are looking to support organisations that are creating new methods of recycling plastics or textiles in England.
The following activities are eligible for support under this grant:
Lot 1 – Plastics recycling:
- Wash plants
- Extrusion
- Innovative sorting / Segregation equipment
- Sorting software (Artificial Intelligence / NIR auto sort)
- Smart marker systems
- Conveyor systems
- Weighbridge and load equipment
- Infrastructure – bays, buildings
- Storage / containers / shelving
Lot 2 – Textiles recycling:
- Plant / Machinery
- Tools or technology/software that helps disassemble and sort textile materials
- Automated processes for removing unwanted items from clothing prior to recycling (e.g. zips, studs)
- Automated sorting processes for used textiles by fibre type, and/or by colour
To receive funding projects must demonstrate that they go beyond ‘state of the art’ i.e. beyond current industry norm, and they must have a measurable impact, e.g. in terms of quantity in tonnes, of plastics or textiles collected.
The closing date for applications for Stage 1 Outline Proposals is 13.00 on the 2nd August 2019.
Funding opportunities between £25,000 and £100,000
Funding to Protect Places of Worship from Hate Crimes (England and Wales)
Places of worship and associated faith community centres in England and Wales that are vulnerable to hate crime can apply for grants of up to £56,000 to enhance their protective security measures. Applicants can submit bids for up to 3 protective security measures. The security measures must be specifically for hate crimes and cannot include measures for general improvements, lead theft, security upgrades or measures to tackle anti-social behaviour or other criminality unconnected with hate crime. Places of worship can include churches, gurdwaras, mosques, temples and associated faith community centres. Applicants will need to contribute 20% of the total cost of the security measures. The closing date for applications is 23.59 on the 31st August 2019.
Interest Free Loans for Enterprising Ideas that Improve Community Spaces
Community organisations that own or manage a building or outdoor space that’s used for a wide range of community activities can apply for interest free loans of up to £50,000 for up to 5 years to develop their trading activities and generate a more sustainable income.
The aim is to generate a regular income that allows community organisations to maintain and invest in community spaces. The funding is being made available through the Co-op Foundation. Organisations based in more deprived areas or who work mainly with more disadvantaged members of the community may also be eligible for grant funding alongside the loan.
Successful applicants do not make any repayments in the first year whilst there are developing their trading activities.
Applications can be submitted at any time via an Expression of Interest form.
Useful Links:
Funding for Special Schools and Colleges
Special needs schools and colleges can apply for grants of between £15,000 and £75,000 through the Wolfson Foundation’s Funding for Special Schools and Colleges grants programme. The funding is available for projects that are focused towards helping pupils to develop skills which would help them to gain employment or live independently after leaving school or college.
The funding covers capital costs such a buildings and equipment.
The applicant organisation should meet all of the following criteria:
- be a registered charity, local authority
- be registered with the relevant regulatory authority, where applicable, and have at least a good rating
The project should be for a new building, refurbishment work or equipment and aim to produce one or more of the following outcomes:
- Increased access to services for new and existing users
- Improved quality and range of services
- Improved financial stability of the organisation
Previous projects supported include:
- a grant of £16,000 to the Lindsworth School in Birmingham for the refurbishment of an on-site house for Independent Living Skills programme;
- a grant of £25,000 to BeyondAutism for the Redevelopment of Rainbow School’s Earlsfield Campus, South London; and
- Victoria School and Specialist Arts College in Birmingham which received a grant of £35,000 towards a Food Technology Room.
Projects requesting £50,000 or more need to have matched funding in place.
There is a 2-stage application process and the next stage 1 closing date is the 5th January 2020. Applications successful at this stage will have until the 1st September 2019 to complete the stage 2 application.
Grants for Urgent Structural Repairs to Churches
National Churches Trust has changed its grant programmes in line with the new Building Resilience Strategy for 2019-2023 and now offers three grant streams.
The Cornerstone Grant Programme supports the conservation and sustainable use of church buildings, focusing on larger and more complex projects.
Grants are offered towards the cost of urgent structural repair projects costed at more than £100,000 including VAT. The Trust will also consider projects that introduce kitchens and accessible toilets to enable increased community use, costed at more than £30,000 including VAT.
Grants of between £10,000 and £50,000 are awarded to represent a maximum of 50% of the project cost.
Applications are accepted from listed and unlisted Christian places of worship, of any denomination, across the UK. The Trust particularly encourages applications from priority areas i.e. North East England, Northern Ireland and Wales.
The next deadline to apply for a Cornerstone Grant is 4th November 2019.
Funding for Community Projects that Tackle Knife Crime
The Home Office has launched a new funding round of the government’s anti-knife crime Community Fund. The fund, now in its third year, was set up to support community projects in England and Wales delivered by voluntary sector organisations which tackle knife crime.
The Fund is intended to help communities to respond to the challenges around knife crime, and in particular support activities preventing young people from engaging in knife related offending.
Grants of up to £30,000 are available.
Bids will need to demonstrate a previous proven history of delivering anti-knife crime work, especially to young people, and will be assessed on the basis of the extent to which they demonstrate a proven track record of an organisation’s ability to deliver knife crime interventions in work with children and young people.
The Home Office is accepting applications from:
- Constituted voluntary and community sector groups that have a minimum of 3 management committee members
- Registered charities
- Social enterprises
- Co-operatives
- Community interest companies
- Religious / faith groups
- Companies limited by guarantee without share capital
- Charitable incorporated organisations
The deadline for submitting applications is midnight on 24th July 2019.
Safeguarding Training Fund Opens for Applications
The National Lottery Community Fund, together with the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport have launched phase 2 of the Safeguarding Training Fund.
The first phase is currently supporting the ‘Safer Social Sector Partnership’ led by NCVO to design a national and generic online safeguarding training package, suitable for all charities big and small, to improve safeguarding/safe culture practice.
The overall objectives of phase 2 of the Safeguarding Training Fund are:
- To improve awareness of good safeguarding practice through the delivery of a national and generic safeguarding training package. This will improve access to safeguarding training and support to protect both children and adults at risk, and promote a safe culture within charities.
- To extend the reach of existing resources around safeguarding, and support engaging mechanisms to deliver safeguarding training which reaches both small and large organisations.
- To provide an insight into the impact of the safeguarding training, which helps to build a long term legacy for this work and embed good safeguarding practice and awareness into the sector.
Grants of between £50,000 and £115,000 are available to charities and other not for profit organisations that can demonstrate the capacity and reach to enhance the safeguarding culture within smaller organisations. It is anticipated that 5 – 10 organisations / partnerships will be supported.
Expressions of interest need to be submitted by the 21st July 2019. Applicants successful at this stage will have until the 22nd September 2019 to submit a full application.
Funding for Rural Community and Education Projects
The NFU Mutual Charitable Trust, which supports charities in the UK working in agriculture, rural development and insurance has announced that the next closing date for applications is the 1st November 2019.
Trustees are particularly interested in funding larger initiatives, which would have a significant impact on the rural community. The Trustees are particularly interested in initiatives in the areas of education of young people in rural areas and relief of poverty within rural areas.
Grants of between £1,000 and £50,000 are available. In 2016, the Trust made donations totaling £256,500 to a total of 15 organsiations.
Projects supported in the past include:
Farms for City Children, which aims to expand the horizons of children from towns and cities by offering them a week in the countryside living together in one of their farms and the Royal Highland Education Trust which aims to create an opportunity for each child in Scotland to experience the countryside and to facilitate a wider understanding of the environmental, economic and social realities of rural Scotland. Its key activities include farm visits, classroom speaker visits and a number of high profile national competition.
The NFU Mutual Charitable Trust also provides small grants of up to £250 through the NFU Mutual’s Community Giving Fund which supports worthwhile community events, charities, schools and community group activities that are local to their operations.
Funding opportunities under £25,000
Grants for Small Organisations Making Good Use of Volunteers (UK)
The Woodward Charitable Trust primarily funds charitable organisations (charities, social enterprises and community interest companies) in the UK and can make grants for overseas projects usually via UK charities. Priority is given to projects that make good use of volunteers, encourage past and current users to participate, ensure that funds awarded are being well used and fall within the following areas:
- Children / young people who are isolated, at risk of exclusion or involved in antisocial behaviour.
- Prisoners and ex-offenders and prisoners’ families.
- Disadvantaged women, covering refuges, domestic violence and parenting.
- Disability projects, including rehabilitation and training.
- Arts outreach work by local groups involving disadvantaged people.
- Projects that promote integration and community cohesion amongst minority groups, including refugees and travelers.
Three types of grant are awarded following bi-annual meetings in February and October:
- Small grants of £100 – £5,000
- Large grants over £5,000 – these are usually given to charities known by the Trustees
- Preference is given to small to medium-sized charities with an income of less than £300,000 where small grants can have more impact. Most grants made are for one-off projects although some grants fund salaries and running costs.
Grants for Inter Faith Projects Organised by Young People (UK)
Small Grants of up to £800 are available for events and projects that promote understanding and co-operation between different faiths groups and are organised for and by young people aged 11-25 years. Applications are welcomed from non-statutory organisations e.g. youth clubs, scout and guide groups, local voluntary and community organisations for projects that address common interests. Bids can also be made by Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Sikh and other faith groups and from those of no formal faith. Activities planned should take place around Inter Faith Week which in 2019 takes place between the 10th and 17th of November. The funding is being made available by the Inter Faith Youth Trust and the closing date for applications is the 24th August 2019.
Invitation to Apply for Funding to Promote Organ Donation within BAME Communities (England & Wales)
Grants of up to £10,000 are available to organisations is England and Wales to positively engage local communities in organ donation, address myths and barriers, and increase support for organ donation among black, Asian, mixed race and minority ethnic communities. The funding is being made available through NHS Blood and Transplant and is part of the Government’s commitment to building support for organ donation amongst black, Asian, mixed race and minority ethnic communities. The deadline for applications is 5pm, Sunday 1st September 2019.
Funding to Support Community Businesses (England)
From the 6th August 2919, community groups in England will be able to apply for grants of up to £15,000 as well as tailored business support to help them develop their community businesses ideas. The funding will give community groups the early stage finance they need to carry out consultations with local people to develop a community business idea, and will also give them support and tools to start setting it up. The funding is being made available through the Community Business Bright Ideas Fund and the closing date for applications is the 30th September 2019. Anyone interested in applying can join a free webinar on Tuesday 16 July at 11am.
This document is produced by Corporate Policy, Research and Partnerships, Blackburn with Darwen Council.
Tel: 01254 585825