Our funding principles
As we reflect on the last six months, we have been thinking about where we go next. We want to continue the commitments we made at the start of the crisis and we want to reassure all those seeking funding from us, that we will use the following principles to continue to guide our approach in supporting communities.
- We will do more than support organisations to survive and continue; we want to support communities to thrive and grow. This means pro-actively seeking to support activity which enables organisations to work in new ways including becoming more digitally capable, enabling even more mutual help, and building and strengthening the social and civic infrastructure that can nurture and support grassroots community action. It also means working hard to ensure that we engage with everyone who can help make that happen.
- We will use our funding to continue to support people and communities most affected by COVID-19 building on and strengthening the connections, organisation and resilience which enables communities to thrive. This includes ensuring that we continue to fund flexibly, engaging and supporting new and established organisations to enhance and build on vital community support and action which has been highlighted by COVID-19.
- We will convene, listen and learn the lessons of the pandemic. We will make sure we engage with all of the communities we serve across the UK and work hard to ensure that our funding is shaped by, and responsive to, their experience. We will share what we learn and help to broker ways in which those we fund and those we work with can learn from each other and help to ensure more joined up understanding and responses to issues as they emerge.
- We want to ensure that our approach as a funder is straightforward and supportive. This means we recognise that some organisations will need more support from us to access our funding and that we will manage our funding relationships so that organisations are able to respond to the changing needs of the communities they serve now and in the future.
