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What we’re looking to fund

With this funding, we want to help strengthen communities and improve lives across England.

Our funding is available to all communities. But our priority is the places, people and communities that need it most.

Our priorities

Our priorities are to fund projects that:

  • support places, people or communities experiencing poverty, disadvantage or discrimination
  • support people and communities to shape the decisions that affect their lives

Your project must also help achieve one of our missions. We can fund existing work and new projects.

By ‘project’, we mean the work you want us to fund.

Supporting places, people or communities experiencing poverty, disadvantage or discrimination

Where and who your project will support

We want to support communities that are under the most pressure, particularly people who find it hardest to access support.

We’ll prioritise:

  • places and communities with higher levels of poverty, disadvantage or discrimination
  • communities that need support and empowerment to support people
  • projects or organisations that work with people experiencing poverty, disadvantage or discrimination

If your project focuses on a particular area, tell us where. We’ll look at background statistics to understand the level of need. This helps us direct more funding to the places, people and communities that need it most.

Projects working across all of England or more than two regions  

We receive a lot of applications for England-wide and multi-region projects. To find out more about our regions, read about Reaching Communities teams in your area. 

This means we’ll only fund projects that: 

  • strongly match our priorities and criteria for funding across all locations 
  • can clearly explain how the location(s) you have chosen allow you to meet a dispersed community’s needs (for example, your community is smaller and struggles to connect within one or two areas, so needs support making connections across England) 
  • have clearly involved their communities across all locations when developing the project  
  • provide evidence of how they work with, or plan to work with, local voluntary and community organisations 
  • add to, not replace or copy, existing projects and programmes in the region(s) 

We’re also prioritising national and multi-region projects that: 

  • meet our environment mission 
  • or, focus on systems change

If you have a multi-region or England-wide project, email us at Englandteam@tnlcommunityfund.org.uk so we can arrange a call to discuss whether you should apply. You’re less likely to get funding if you have not spoken to us beforehand.

How your project will support people

We want to support projects that reach people who need it the most. You’ll need to show:

  • who your project is for
  • how you’ll reach them
  • how you’ll remove barriers that might stop them taking part

Your experience and approach

We’re also interested in your experience. Tell us how you’ve worked with people who face challenges and how your project builds on that.

Supporting people and communities to shape the decisions that affect their lives

We want the people and communities who will benefit from your project to be involved in shaping it. We want you to involve your community in designing, delivering and managing your project in a clear and active way.

Who leads or runs the organisation

We’re more likely to fund organisations that are run or led by people with lived experience of the issues the project focuses on. This could include staff, trustees or volunteers.

How your community influences what matters to them

Show us how your project will give your community real power to shape the things that matter to them. This might involve:

  • helping improve the services they use
  • having a say in decisions, plans and public services that affect their lives

Making it work for the people who need it most

We know this kind of work is not always easy. We can fund you to approach it in a way that works for your community.

We’re especially interested in projects that support communities that are currently least empowered. These are often the same communities already facing poverty, disadvantage or discrimination. That’s where this kind of work can make the biggest difference.

This could include people who face discrimination or disadvantage because of:

  • living in an area of high poverty
  • having a disability
  • their gender, sexuality or race
  • a combination of many things

Your project must help achieve one of our missions

Your project must help achieve one of these missions. It’s fine if it helps achieve more, but it will not improve your chances of getting funded.

Come together

We’re looking for projects that help people build connections and strengthen their communities. You need to show how your project will:

  • provide inclusive places, spaces and activities (either physical or virtual), especially for communities where people are least able to come together

Help children and young people thrive

We’re looking for projects that support children and young people to feel safe, grow in confidence, and have a say in their lives. You need to show how your project will:

  • develop positive social and emotional skills
  • provide safe spaces and relationships they can trust
  • involve them, and their families, in the decisions that affect their lives
  • help prevent issues before they happen

Tackle health inequalities 

Health inequalities are unfair differences in health between people and groups. They can be prevented. They are caused by poverty, disadvantage and discrimination. 

We’re looking for projects that tackle them by addressing the conditions in which people live, work and grow.  

We want to fund projects that:  

  • address health inequalities through: 
    • prevention 
    • early intervention 
    • changing systems that continue these problems, referred to as ‘systems change’ 
  • target people most affected by health inequalities  
  • make sure activities are shaped by cultural understanding and lived experiences of the communities they serve  
  • apply trauma-informed approaches when addressing trauma 
  • add to, not replace or copy, existing statutory services and responsibilities to address health inequalities 

Be environmentally sustainable

We’re looking for projects that help communities take action on climate and nature. Your project should meet one of the following:

  • empower people to engage with climate issues and adapt to the impacts of a changing climate
  • support communities to take part in activities to make a positive environmental impact, like reducing carbon emissions or creating space for wildlife
  • help communities to have access to nature, by increasing the amount and quality of natural space for wildlife. Meaning that people can experience nature around them, and that more varieties of wildlife can thrive