Prepared for the Volunteering Coordination Group, Essex Resilience Forum
15th April 2020
Sarah Troop, MDCVS Director, Chair Volunteer Essex, Co-chair Essex Alliance. Written in consultation with ECVS Chairs Clive Emmett and Jemma Mindham.
Government Funding for charities
On 8th April Chancellor Rishi Sunak announced a funding package for the voluntary and community sector. This came after weeks of campaigning from national representative bodies such as NAVCA (National Association for Voluntary and Community Action) and NCVO (National Council for Voluntary Organisations).
The funding announced was £750 million. It was referred to by Karl Wilding CEO of NCVO as a “good start” and it is 1.2% of the amount of financial support provided to businesses.
£360 million of the £750 million has been identified for specific purposes. Of this £200 million will go to hospices and this has been welcomed by the Hospice association. The remaining £160 million is intended for named charities such as St Johns Ambulance and Citizens Advice Bureaux and charities working in the specific areas of children’s charities ad charities supporting victims. This funding will not be available for grant applications but will be centrally allocated by Government departments.
£370 million has been made available to small to medium charities. In England, this will be channelled through the National Lottery Community Fund. It will support locally-focused charities doing most during the outbreak – such as delivering food and medicines and providing financial advice. This will be managed through the Awards for All process for grants with a maximum value of £10,000 although the NLCF have stated that efforts supporting the Coronavirus are the main focus of all their funding including the larger Reaching Communities fund.
£20 million will be match funding for the “Big Night In” fundraising appeal due to take place on the 23 rd April. Funds raised on this night will be split between Comic Relief and Children in Need for distribution through an open grant process, again focusing on corona virus response.
Central government funding is not available for charities affected by loss of or threats to funding for business as usual to shore themselves up and stabilise. NCVO estimate the loss to the sector over a 3 month period is around £4 billion. Over half the charities that responded to a survey by the Directory of Social Change said that they will collapse within six months if they don’t get additional help. A useful summary of the findings of this survey
can be found here: www.dsc.org.uk/content/over-half-of-charities-could-disappear-within-6-months
Other Funding options
A number of grant makers have announced support for charities to respond to the Corona outbreak including
The National Lottery Community Fund prioritising coronavirus response for the next six months on all funding programmes
The National Emergencies Trust have distributed over £5 million across the UK. In Essex this is being managed by the Essex Community Foundation who have set up the Essex Coronavirus response and recovery programme and has to date given grants of a quarter of a million pounds. They will consider applications that include some sector stability elements
The Charities Aid Foundation announced a £39 million pound fund for community response. This is now closed to applications
Barclays have announced the creation of the Barclays Foundation initially to provide a COVID-19 Community Aid Package of £100 million to charities working to support vulnerable people impacted by COVID-19, and to alleviate the associated social and economic hardship caused by the crisis.
Tesco bags of help are making grants of £500 to support communities to provide supplies to people affected by coronavirus
Nationwide have announced a community grants scheme opening in June to help further support the housing emergency, particularly focused on the impact of the coronavirus
Persimmon Housing have announced 2 special grants schemes around the coronavirus – one for the over 70s and one for children and young people specifically around health, sport, education and the arts.
The Charity Excellence Framework has published a Covid-19 Funder Toolkit for the sector, which can be found here.
Flexibility for grant holders
Covid19 funders is a website that has been set up to enable grant making bodies to pledge to be flexible during the corona outbreak. This includes:
Adapting activities
Discussing dates and timescales
Financial flexibility
Listening to grant holders
The full list of funders who have signed up to this pledge can be found here: covid19funders.org.uk
Ian McLintock, founder of the Charity Excellence Framework, has produced a very in-depth list of details and links to emergency funding for charities. These include UK wide, UK country, regional, global, Government financial support, specialist funding and platforms.
The latest funder list and 4 charity toolkits can be downloaded from the Charity Excellence website: www.charityexcellence.co.uk
There are also lots of free funding finders, funder lists and fundraising guides on the website.
If you would like some virtual digital, marketing or communications support, please visit our Volunteer Platform. The platform connects charities with professionals from across the media and creative industry who want to share their skills and expertise with charities. We have seen an increase in volunteers who want to help charities at this time.
Essex Safeguarding Children’s Board have kindly put together a resource pack (attached) for online safety aimed at parents and carers, children and young people and professionals.
Sadly, data from Italy has highlighted an increase in online grooming and exploitation during lockdown. Please cascade as appropriate.
SinglePoint is a 24/7 advice and support helpline which helps to coordinate an individual’s care
SinglePoint also works alongside other healthcare services such as GPs, Community Nurses or Specialists. Members of the public, patients, relatives, carers, GPs and other medical and health and social care professionals can also get expert advice over the phone 24/7.
Most cases can be dealt with over the phone, however in some circumstances a home visit can be offered if the need is urgent. The SinglePoint number can also be used for referrals into St Helena services or you can https://www.sthelena.org.uk/referrals/medical-referral
Please note that when a patient is added to the My Care Choices Register they are not automatically referred to St Helena, a separate referral is required to access our services.
£1.5 million of essential food products to FareShare’s 23 regional centres, and then supplied to a network of local community groups across the country.
Asda donates £5 million to food banks and community charities as well as extending accessible hours for NHS workers and offering additional support to colleagues.
Asda has announced it will be donating £5 million to its partners FareShare and the Trussell Trust to help the country’s most vulnerable people through COVID-19.
The extensive package of measures will provide over 4 million meals to families in poverty impacted by Coronavirus as well as giving more than 3000 charities the ability to access free food over the next three months as they fight to tackle the impacts of Coronavirus in their communities.
The donation from the supermarket also will help the networks of the two charities as they experience a huge increase in demand over the coming months, as more vulnerable people turn to food banks for help through COVID-19.
Asda is also investing in the logistics and support services that will allow FareShare and the Trussell Trust to support families through the crisis, including funding for telephone, and online and food delivery systems for people unable to afford food, as well as supporting the recruitment of 20,000 volunteers to support food banks.
The funding will also continue the work of the Fight Hunger Create Change partnership between Asda and the two charities by helping tackle the root causes of poverty through supporting 800,000 people over the next year with access to income maximisation services for people at food banks.
CEO Roger Burnley comments;
“These are the most extraordinary of times and I am keenly aware of our responsibility to help feed the nation – both by keeping our shelves stocked and deliveries moving – but also by providing employment opportunities where we can and supporting our charity partners to help the most vulnerable in our communities. The efforts my colleagues are going to support our customers every day are fantastic, and we will continue to recognise their efforts wherever we can. I also want to thank our amazing customers who continue to donate to our food bank trollies and who continue to think of others, even in such worrying times.”
Asda has already confirmed that it is working to recruit more than 5000 people into temporary roles from industries impacted by the crisis – helping to ensure people are kept in jobs and wage cost pressures are lifted from struggling companies.
Asda colleagues are working around the clock to keep shelves filled for customers and have been told this week that they will receive full pay should the need to self-isolate as a result of coronavirus symptoms. Today, Asda’s store and distribution colleagues who do not need to self-isolate were told they will receive an additional weeks pay in June as a thank you for their efforts.
Asda has also confirmed that it will be prioritising NHS workers in larger stores every Monday, Wednesday and Friday from 8-9am.
To protect colleagues, as well as following Government advice on hygiene practice, Asda is also asking that where possible customers use card and contactless payment method in order to reduce the amount of cash colleagues are handling.
Burnley concluded;
“We all have a clear responsibility to look after each other during this crisis, particularly our most vulnerable groups. I was heartened to see how our customers respected this priority access and so am proud to be able to extend it to more regular days and also include our amazing NHS colleagues can access our stores with a little more ease.”
Emma Revie, chief executive of the Trussell Trust:
“Food banks face an unprecedented challenge in the coming months. As the coronavirus outbreak unfolds, more people are likely to need emergency food at exactly the same time as fewer volunteers are able to help. The resilience of food banks is nothing short of outstanding, and we’re working closely with our network to help ensure that wherever possible, people unable to afford the essentials can access help. But this is not easy. That’s why this support from Asda will make such a difference.
“This funding will help us recruit and train new food bank volunteers across the UK, and support the coordination of packing and delivering pre-made food parcels to people who need a food bank’s help, but can’t leave their homes. Protecting people from hunger cannot fall to food banks alone, and we’ll be continuing to push for crucial changes that get money into the pockets of people who most need it – while that work is underway, Asda’s support will help us ensure the safety of everyone who needs a food bank during the pandemic.”
Lindsay Boswell, chief executive of FareShare said;
“In this unprecedented time of COVID-19 crisis, we are immensely grateful to our partner Asda for their incredible support of £5 million. This will aid FareShare to adapt its models to reach the 1m vulnerable people who we currently serve and work with our network of frontline charities to achieve the vital doorstep food deliveries and new food distribution methods we know are so essential at this time.”
Staff from a Essex’s public sector organisations have united to support their colleagues in the NHS to ensure community care provision continues during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Last weekend, volunteers from a number of public sector organisations worked alongside staff at Braintree and Brentwood community hospitals to prepare the areas for the creation of new wards.
Coordinated through the Essex Resilience Forum (ERF), volunteers from Essex County Fire and Rescue Service, the local military, Witham-based logistics company SIMARCO and NHS employees, spent the weekend clearing furniture and moving hospital beds.
Essex Communities Foundation (ECF) Vice President, Bishop Stephen Cottrell, signed a powerful letter to the Government, asking for clarity on financial support for the voluntary sector during the pandemic.
It is vital that a package of substantial financial help for the sector is announced as soon as possible.