£100,000 from Women and Girls Fund split equally between 10 charities
Howard Lake | 25 November 2025 | News
The Heart of England Community Foundation has donated £100,000 from its Women and Girls Fund, splitting it equally between 10 charities.
The Foundation is also supporting calls for the government to create a specific fund which supports women and girls nationally.
The announcement was made on International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, which marks the start of 16 days of activism against gender-based violence and calls for global solidarity to end violence against women and girls everywhere.
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The Foundation’s funding has been distributed to charities supporting women and girls across the West Midlands and Warwickshire who have experienced domestic abuse, sexual violence, rape, modern slavery, marginalisation and complex challenges.
It created its Women and Girls Fund after it identified a significant decline in the funding available specifically for women and girls. It seeded the fund with £50,000 of its own reserves before opening it for donations, raising its £100,000 target within just four months.
The organisations receiving the funding are:
- Anawim – Birmingham’s Centre for Women
- Birmingham and Solihull Women’s Aid
- Black Country Women’s Aid
- Coventry Haven Women’s Aid
- Coventry Rape and Sexual Abuse Centre
- Foleshill Women’s Training Limited
- RoSA
- Safeline
- The Esther Project
- WE:ARE Women’s Empowerment and Recovery Educators
The majority of the charities will be using the funds to cover the cost of core services and staffing, demonstrating the sheer need for such dedicated funding.
Tina Costello OBE, Chief Executive of the Heart of England Community Foundation, said:
“Although the funds have been distributed, our work doesn’t stop here, and we will continue to
support organisations which help women and girls on a local level. But this is much bigger than a local issue, and I would love to see the government recognise that we need a national fund to help organisations right across the UK which not only support women and girls, but are led by women”.
- Anonymous donors gives again to Heart of England Community Foundation (10 October 2018)
- Anonymous donor gives a further £1.5 million to Heart of England Community Foundation (24 July 2019)
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.