£5.5m fund available for social enterprises in North of England and the Midlands
Howard Lake | 22 September 2016 | News
Social enterprises in the North of England and the Midlands can now apply for a new £5.5 million fund. The Northern Impact Fund offers grant and unsecured loan finance to social enterprises.
It is being made available by Key Fund, an investor in community and social enterprises since 2001. It is designed for new and early stage enterprises which are seeking finance to support growth.
It is open to applications from social enterprises operating in the Midlands, North East, North West and Yorkshire and the Humber. It is aimed to help cover the initial costs related to social impact, such as investing in training for young people and staff, as the enterprise gets up and running.
“Without the Key Fund support, we’d be finished. They’ve handed us at least two ‘get out of jail’ cards. Without them we wouldn’t be here today.” – Barnsley Community Build
Growth Fund
The Northern Impact Fund has received support from the Growth Fund, an initiative of Access, the Foundation for Social Investment. The Growth Fund has been designed to increase the availability of small, affordable, unsecured loans for charities and social enterprises.
The Growth Fund currently stands at £45m and provides a mixture of loan from Big Society Capital and grant from the Big Lottery Fund, to social investors across England.
Seb Elsworth, Access’s Chief Executive, said:
“The blend of loan and grant, which we make available to social investors, like the Key Fund, means that they can provide smaller loans on affordable terms with appropriate support. We are also encouraging the development of partnerships which can help to open access to social investment for more charities and social enterprises to help them to sustain and grow their impact.”
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About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.