What We Fund

The Trust's main aim is to fund well managed projects across the UK that help to relieve poverty, support disadvantaged people to reach their potential and effect long-term change where help is not readily available from the public or private purse. The Trust also provides limited funding for the arts and conservation of the natural and built environment.

If you wish to submit an unsolicited application for funding please read the following information carefully to establish the eligibility of your organisation and to see if your request  fits our current priorities, as we do not generally fund projects that fall outside these guidelines.

Please note that we are currently prioritising applications from outside London and the South East of England in order to ensure that our funds are distributed to all parts of the UK.

Eligibility

As a general rule, the Trust is only able to award grants to registered charities working in the UK.

By this we mean charitable organisations registered with the Charity Commission in England and Wales, the Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator (OSCR) or through the Department for Social Development in Northern Ireland.

Occasionally, we will fund organisations of comparable charitable status, such as Industrial Provident Societies, PCCs or Community Interest Companies, but only where there is a very strong connection with one or more of our current funding priorities.

We are unable to fund individuals or organisations based outside the UK, and due to limited resources we are also unable to respond to appeals of this nature.

Areas of Interest

Grants awarded by the Trust fall into four main beneficial areas: Social Welfare, The Arts, Heritage and Conservation and the Natural Environment. However, it may be helpful to note that the most of our funding is targeted towards our Social Welfare priorities.

We favour projects with a long-term focus and will prioritise those that meet more than one area of interest, so please click the relevant headings for further details of the types of work we fund in each category.

As a grant-maker, we aim to ensure that our grants are made to charities which do not discriminate on the grounds of age, gender, marital status, sexual orientation, religion, racial or ethnic origin, or disability, and therefore we support organisations with a clear commitment to equal opportunities. However, we recognise that the sensitive nature of some of the work we fund means that appropriate restrictions on staff or participants may sometimes need to be applied.

To gain a clearer idea of the sort of projects we fund, it may also help to look at our Annual Report & Accounts.