May Funding Opportunities

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Barchester Charitable Trust

Barchester’s Charitable Foundation is a registered charity that helps older people and adults with a disability across England, Scotland & Wales. Our focus is on connecting or re-connecting people with others in their local community, and we support applications that combat loneliness and enable people to be active and engaged.

We help small community groups and local charities with activities, outings, equipment and materials for members/service users. Our grants range from £100 up to £2,500. Before starting the application, make sure to have a cost breakdown/budget and your latest annual accounts ready to upload.

We do not have a formal definition for a small charity, but if a charity has financial reserves in the hundreds of thousands or millions, it is very unlikely that we would be able to help.

We help groups with:

  • Activity projects
  • Equipment and materials for use by members
  • Member transport
  • Day trips, outings and group holidays in the UK

Our grants for groups range from £100 up to £2,500. It takes us up to 10 weeks to process an application.

Cycling UK – Big Bike Revival Grants Programme

Grants are available for voluntary groups, social enterprises, and other not-for-profit organisations to deliver cycling projects and activities across England (outside of London) for people who do not normally cycle.
Application deadline: 25 June 2024

Creating A Fairer Society & Healthier Planet

Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.
The Treebeard Trust is a charitable foundation supporting transformational initiatives that have the potential to create a healthier planet and fairer society. We try to invest time as well as money. We advocate on behalf of causes we are passionate about and try to support our partners, by amplifying their work, or by providing advice, connections or simply a general sounding board. If you think your organisation might be a good fit for the trust, visit our website for more info.

Veolia Environmental Trust

Applications re-open in May 2024.
We award grants towards projects that make improvements to community facilities and the natural environment. Grants are for projects by constituted, not-for-profit organisations and local authorities that are located near a qualifying Veolia site in England.

The Chestnut Fund

Applications accepted on a rolling basis.
The TCV Chestnut Fund grant scheme has been designed to support grassroots community groups and initiatives wanting to deliver practical volunteering that improves the natural physical environment and better connections between people and green spaces. Groups must be members of the TCV Community Network prior to applying. Start-Up grants are for groups who have little or no money when they are first set up and are available to groups in their first year of existence. The grant will enable them to begin practical work and will cover administrative expenses, e.g. insurance fees, postage, publicity or hire of meeting rooms. Maximum grant is £200. Support grants are for existing groups who have little or no money for tools, equipment and training. Maximum grant is £500.

SPAR £100k Community Cashback

About Us: SPAR is launching its third £100,000 Community Cashback scheme.Our grant scheme is aimed at supporting and giving back to the communities that we serve.
Criteria: Local voluntary or community organisations and charities.
Grant Size: up to £10,000
Deadline for applications: 22 May 2024

Find out more about the SPAR £100k Community Cashback

The University of Reading’s Community Engagement Fund

About Us: The University of Reading’s Community Engagement Fund (CEF) sets aside a total of £30,000 every year to support local charities and community groups’ projects across the Thames Valley region.
Criteria: Local charities and community groups’ projects
Grant Size: The Community Engagement Fund provides one-off, small awards (usually around £1,000 per year), as well as larger awards (up to a maximum of £10,000 per year) on a one-off or multi-year basis, depending on the project.
Deadline for applications: 30 June 2024

About Us: Eden Projects is inviting communities to tell them how the act of sharing supports their community including their plans for sharing food on The Big Lunch weekend on 1-2 June.
Award: The community receiving the award will receive a specially designed The Big Lunch Sharing Table made by the people at City & Guilds, plus funds towards their community projects and ideas, and a hamper of food and resources for a Big Lunch that are together worth £5,000.
Three finalists will each receive a hamper of goodies to support them to have a Big Lunch, and £500 towards their project or idea to support the local community.
Deadline for applications: 9am, Monday 20 May 2024.

Find out more at www.edenprojectcommunities.com/sharing-tables-award#apply

Persimmon Community Champions

This scheme supports local charities, sports clubs and good causes across the country.
They have 30 offices across the UK that will each make a donation of up to 6,000 every quarter to those local organisations who are the lifeblood of our communities. Smaller donations are also available.

Deadline: ongoing

Women’s Health Community Fund

The Women’s Health Community Fund is designed to support small, grassroots organisations and community groups to deliver health information and support to women, girls and people from underrepresented groups.

Deadline: 19-05-2024

Thank you to Berkshire CVS’s for the information contained in this article – Slough CVS, Wokingham & Bracknell InVOLve and West Berkshire Volunteer Centre.



Adult Community Learning in West Berkshire

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We recently organized a Dementia Awareness session for adults in West Berkshire in Pangbourne. The session included presentations from the Alzheimer’s Society and Age UK Berkshire to help learners become a Dementia Friend and understand how to support someone living with dementia.

All learners were provided with Dementia Friends badge and a booklet explaining how to audit and adapt their Village Hall or space to make it easier and more comfortable to navigate for those living with Dementia.

We emphasized five key messages during the session:
1. Dementia is not just about memory loss.
2. Dementia is not a normal part of ageing.
3. Dementia is caused by diseases of the brain.
4. People can still live well with dementia.
5. There is more to a person than the dementia

Learners found the session informative and useful.


One learner said, “I especially found useful the information Georgia, from the Alzheimer’s Society, shared on the difference between factual and emotional memories. It increased my understanding of the huge variances that people experience when they have dementia.”

Another learner said, “I found the tips for improving living spaces very useful.”

In the last academic year (Sept 23 – April 24), we delivered a range of courses specifically designed for volunteers and people involved in running community buildings and spaces. These courses included Key Policies for Your Community Building, Fundraising for Your Village Hall, Financial Planning & Budgeting, Low Carbon Roadshow, and How to Effectively Engage with Your Community.

We also delivered two courses with British Red Cross that supported people living and working in West Berks rural communities to ensure they can have greater confidence to help and support in an emergency situation and use a defibrillator if required.

We are now planning our delivery for 2024-25. If there are any courses that you feel would be particularly beneficial to your rural community, please get in touch with us. admin@ccberks.org.uk

What is a Rural Exception Site?

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Have you heard of a Rural Exception Site? These were originally introduced in 1991 as a mechanism for delivering affordable homes on small plots of rural land that would not otherwise be granted permission for housing development.

An exception site is literally an exception in planning terms. It allows for planning permission to be granted on land that would not normally be granted planning permission, possibly due to contraints like Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, Green Belt, or simply because it is outside the settlement envelope or boundary of the village. Almost all exception sites are adjacent to a settlement boundary, as land within the boundary often has development value. It is this very fact of not having development value that makes the land more affordable for affordable housing development.

Our Rural Housing Enablers (RHEs) are keen to hear from Berkshire parish councils or rural community groups that think there may be a housing need in their village or parish. They have recently produced a Developing New Affordable Housing in Rural Exception Sites guide which can be found here.

Our RHEs can help groups and parish councils plot a route through the various processes and help put them in touch with others who might need to become involved.

“Building the homes people need brings vitality to rural communities and helps boost the rural economy at this difficult time,” our CEO Tim Parry observed. “This project helps rural communities in Berkshire carry out a housing needs survey and identify potential sites. We have already engaged with eight rural communities looking for advice and guidance about affordable housing and we have two housing needs surveys in the pipeline. Any rural community interested in exploring their options for meeting the local need for affordable housing should contact our Rural Housing Enablers at the earliest opportunity.”

Funding Opportunities in April

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The Syder Foundation

Applications accepted on a rolling basis. We aim to award around eight large grants per year, with a focus on regional charities located in Berkshire and the surrounding
counties. Total large grants awarded annually will be between £3-4 hundred thousand with each grant at around the £50K level. We also set aside around £100k per year from which
small awards may be made. Should you have a project to bring to the Foundation’s attention, applications may be submitted via email (postal applications are accepted if you are unable to access email). Please note that requests for general running / core costs (including salaries) are unlikely to be funded. Find out more.

The Rank Foundation

Applications accepted on a rolling basis. Pebbles is our small funding stream for UK registered charities and recognised churches which are raising money for projects where the total cost is less than £150,000. This money can be spent on short breaks, equipment, or capital costs. Pebble grant applications are processed on a quarterly basis and can take up
to 4 months for a decision and payment to be made. Grants are awarded on a discretionary basis; the Rank Foundation’s contribution ranges from £250 up to and including £4,000, depending on the total cost of the project. Find out more.

Learning Through Landscapes Nature Grants

Applications close on Friday 26th April. Grants are available to provide outdoor learning training and equipment to schools and early years providers. Up to £500 worth
of products are on offer, plus the potential to receive our additional Climate Curriculum Pack, to help schools to branch out into nature. Find out more.

Schroder Charity Trust

Applications accepted on a rolling basis. We are an independent grant-making family trust which supports a wide range of charitable activities. We make grants of up to £5,000 towards core and project costs to charities registered in the UK for work under the categories of arts, culture, heritage education training, employment, environment, conservation, health, wellbeing and overall strengthening communities. More info.

February Foundation

Applications accepted on a rolling basis. We make grants to a range of charities and charitable activities in accordance with our grant making policy which is set out in our annual report and accounts. We support project or core / capital costs. Please send us the details and budget of the proposed project, how many people would benefit, how those benefits might be measured, what the estimated cost of raising funds for the project is, and the full cost of raising voluntary income. Our median award is £5,000 and we are happy to part-fund projects. Click here for more.

Big Bike Revival Grants

About Us: The Big Bike Revival is all about helping adults to begin or return to cycling through a programme of FREE activities and services, delivered by local community organisations
Criteria: For voluntary and community cycle groups to deliver projects and activities that:
• Encourage people who don’t cycle to cycle.
• Encourage people to cycle more often.
• Increase short cycling trips.
• Improve the perception of cycling safety.
• Improve people’s confidence to cycle.


For the Summer 2024 funding round, there is a focus on encouraging partners to inspire participants to return to subsequent events, to help sustain increases in cycling, and to help make a much bigger difference through Big Bike Revival.
The Big Bike Revival Grants Programme will support events and activities that use the ‘fix-learn-ride’ model to provide sessions for people groups that are underrepresented in cycling, such as:
• Women.
• People on low incomes.
• People who suffer from poor mental health.
• People who are not meeting physical activity guidelines.
• People who are lacking confidence.
• Unemployed people.
• Military veterans.
• People who are experiencing substance abuse.
• Ethnic minorities.
• Refugees and asylum seekers.
• People who are experiencing transport poverty.
Funding is for activities delivered between 29 March 2024 and 31 October 2024.
Grant Size: up to £3,500
Deadline for applications: 25 June 2024 Find out more about Big Bike Revival Grants

FA Snickers Just Play Support Fund

About Us: Interested in setting up an adult (16+) recreational football session?
Criteria: to individuals, clubs, organisations and community groups to set up a new Just Play football session in their area or to develop an existing session. Just Play is for men and women aged 16+ of all abilities
Grant Size: £250
Deadline for applications: Rolling programme
Find out more about FA Snickers Just Play Support Fund

Tesco Stronger Starts – Footie for All Fund

Grants are available to support grassroot football clubs across the UK with a priority on supporting children up to the age of 18 access sport and physical activity and/or providing more equipment and opportunity for children. Application deadline: 30 April 2024. Click here for more details.

Community Ownership Fund

Grants are available to voluntary, community and charitable organisations in the UK to support them in taking ownership of local assets such as sporting and cultural venues, meeting spaces, community centres, pubs and shops that are at risk of closure. For more detail click here

Youth Music Trailblazers

The Youth Music Trailblazer fund offers grants of £2,000 to £30,000 to organisations in England to run projects for children and young people (25 or under) to make, learn and earn in music. The project should trial work for the first time, test a new way of working, or disrupt the status quo (or all three!).
Your work must meet one of our themes:
• Early years
• Disabled, d/Deaf and neurodivergent young people
• Youth justice system
• Young people facing barriers
• Young adults
• Organisations and the workforce.
Deadline: 30 August 2024

Rectory Foundation

Registered charities, community groups, social enterprises, community interest companies (limited by guarantee) or other not-for-profit organisations which are based in, or operate for the benefit of residents in the shaded circle areas on the map. This includes parish & town councils where the activity is not statutory in nature. The groups must be formally constituted and operate for public benefit.

To be eligible, groups (and projects) that apply for funding should clearly demonstrate why they meet the vision for “thriving people and places in our local communities”. Additionally, they must have one (or more) of the following areas of focus:
• Helping those most in need within the community, particularly those who are isolated or disadvantaged.
• The improvement of the local environment, accessible community areas or buildings, and green spaces.
Priority is given to projects/groups that best align to our vision of; “thriving people and places in our local communities”. Grant of up to £5,000 are available.

The Helen Hamlyn Trust

Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.
We are an independent grant-making trust which initiates medium and long-term major projects linked to the shared interests of Lady Hamlyn and her late husband Lord Hamlyn.
Our core ethos is to develop innovative projects, which aim to effect lasting change, improve quality of life and create opportunity for the benefit of the public. Our grant-making
is in the fields of medicine, arts, culture, education, welfare, healthy ageing, and more. Small grants are made to local and regional charities up to £10,000.

John Sykes Foundation

Applications accepted on a rolling basis.
We support a wide range of organisations and causes within 5 miles of Reading (including parts of the Wokingham Borough such as Woodley, Twyford, Winnersh, Earley and Arborfield)
that make a positive impact. Our grants vary depending on the type and length of support required. Please ensure you read our application guidelines and try our eligibility quiz.

Proud To Pitch In Clubs Fund

Applications accepted on a rolling basis. The Proud To Pitch In fund by Greene King is open throughout the year and offer grants of up to £4,000 to grassroots and community sports clubs across the United Kingdom. To be eligible for funding, projects must be located in the United Kingdom and project beneficiaries must be aged 18 or over. If you are involved in running a grassroots sports club you can apply online.

Asda Foundation – Cost of Living Grant

Grants are available for local community groups in the UK who are affected by the increase in the cost of living. Volunteer-related costs, rent/utilities expenses and food/essentials are supported by the grant.
Application deadline: 24 May 2024

Urban Tree Challenge Fund (UTCF)

Funding for public bodies, non-government organisations, community groups, charities, individuals and private companies, to support the planting and establishment of large and small trees in urban and peri-urban areas of England.
Application deadline: 30 June 2024

B and Q Foundation

We help charities who are supporting people in need in the UK – those experiencing homelessness, in financial hardship, impacted by health, disability, or other disadvantage or distress. We believe that everyone needs a place to feel at home. So, we are looking to fund projects that decorate, renovate, or create spaces where people can feel at home and have a sense of belonging. This can be both indoor and outdoor. Providing grants for a wide range of charities who are looking for funding to improve or develop spaces that benefit their local communities.
We know that charities are pushed for time and that is why we work with the team at Neighbourly to make the application process as easy as possible. Follow the three-step process below to apply for a B&Q Foundation grant.
We award grants of up to £10,000 for building or indoor projects, and up to £5,000 for garden projects. We want to provide funding that covers the full cost for the completion of the project, so please include an estimated value of staff time required.

Screwfix Foundation

Organisation criteria Project eligibility Your organisation must be a charity or not for profit company based in the UK and:

  • Registered as a charity in England, Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland; or
  • Registered as a Not for Profit company at Companies House or the registered on the FCA mutuals register.

We fund projects which improve a physical building (or land attached to it) that is used by people in need. The types of projects we fund are:

  • Improved energy efficient lighting & heating
  • Installation of new kitchen, bathroom etc.
  • Installation of a sensory room
  • General painting & decorating
  • Improving safety and security of a building.

You will need to provide details on the number of direct beneficiaries that will be impacted by the project, who will benefit from the project and detail what you are requesting funding for. Please think carefully about your project and whether you can accept a partial award and how funding will be raised if the total project is in excess of £5,000. We prioritise applications where we are able to fund the total project amount. To review your application, we will need to have certainty that your project will go ahead.
Screwfix Foundation | Screwfix

Deadline: 10th May 2024

Thank you to Berkshire’s CVS’s for the information contained in this blog – Slough CVS, Wokingham & Bracknell InVOLve and West Berkshire Volunteer Centre.

Boundary changes in Berkshire

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We do not know yet when it will happen but there is no doubt that 2024 there will be a general election.

Changes to the political map ahead of the next general election mean constituencies will be new or different from the last general election for millions of people, including those in Berkshire.

The boundary changes could have an impact on who becomes your local MP.

You can use a handy tool on the BBC News website to find out which constituency you are now in: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-67361138

It will also give you an estimate of the result had these new boundaries been in place at the last general election, in 2019.

The image below from Electoral Calculus; https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/bdy2023_seast_summary.html shows the changes and how they affect areas in Berkshire.