CAF launches £20m charity resilience fund
Melanie May | 20 October 2020 | News
The Charities Aid Foundation is offering £20 million in financial support to charitable organisations in England supporting those hardest hit by Covid-19.
The CAF Resilience Fund will deliver grants of between £10k and £100k. Both registered and unregistered small and mid-sized charitable organisations, including community interest companies and community education organisations can apply. The grants are also flexible, so organisations can spend them on core costs such as rent and utilities.
The causes and communities the fund aims to help include people living in poverty, Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) communities, children and young people, the unemployed, the homeless, people with physical or learning disabilities and those pushed into crisis because of Covid-19.
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Due to anticipated high levels of demand, CAF expects to focus on:
- Charities and other organisations whose established charitable activities have been severely reduced or are at risk of being severely reduced to the detriment of vulnerable or disadvantaged groups
- Organisations that are having to deliver core services in fundamentally different or unusual ways in order to respond to the crisis and still reach their beneficiaries within vulnerable or disadvantaged groups
- Organisations that are deeply embedded with communities and have established networks to deliver their charitable activities
The funding for the CAF Resilience Fund has been provided by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) as part of its Community Match Challenge funding scheme, and matched by the Covid-19 Support Fund, created by the insurance and long-term savings industry.
Monica Brown, Head of Charity Advisory at CAF, said:
“This fund represents an opportunity for CAF to help get desperately needed funds to the charities that have been at the very heart of the response to this pandemic, the ones that have been there for those most in need.
“This money will be spent to help the areas of the country where the need is greatest, including communities that have struggled to access earlier funding, those that face cultural barriers and those that have lacked a voice through these long, difficult months.
“Be they charities or other organisations helping the homeless, those serving Black, Asian and minority ethnic communities, assisting the elderly facing isolation or providing urgent shelter to those fleeing abuse, this CAF Resilience Fund will provide a lifeline to as many organisations as possible.”
Charities applying must deliver their services in England and be able to spend the grant money before 31 March 2021, and applications must be submitted by no later than midday on 10 November 2020.
About Melanie May
Melanie May is a journalist and copywriter specialising in writing both for and about the charity and marketing services sectors since 2001. She can be reached via thepurplepim.com.