Funding during covid-19

The National Lottery Community Fund and the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport’s Coronavirus Community Support Fund awards grants of up to £100,000 to support small to medium-sized organisations in England through the next six months.

The Fund will priorities projects that:

• support people and communities who experience disproportionate challenge and difficulty as a result of the COVID-19 crisis;

• provide services and support for vulnerable people, for which there will be increased demand as a result of the COVID-19 crisis; and

• connect communities and support communities to work together to respond to COVID-19.

Government funding will be used to fund organisations in the first two objectives, National Lottery funding will be used to fund organisations in the last category. But the application process is the same, so you don’t need to worry about this.

Deadline: Continuous rolling programme until funds are spent. Applications will be assessed on the order they are received so it is recommended you submit your application as soon as possible.

Who can apply

We're particularly interested in projects led by, or supporting people and communities who have been disproportionality affected by COVID 19. These include communities experiencing ethnic or racial inequity, discrimination or inequality, disabled people, LGBTQ+ people, and people who’re seeking asylum or who are refugees. We want to see more people across these communities represented in our funding.  

We can support a wide range of organisations and welcome applications from both larger and smaller organisations.

We can accept applications from consortiums or partnerships. In this case, a lead partner will need to take responsibility for the application process.

You can apply if you have a current grant from The National Lottery Community Fund. We’ll consider how this funding would complement and impact on existing awards during the assessment process. If there’s a high demand for this funding, we may need to prioritise organisations that do not already have grant funding from us.

Your organisation also needs to be one of the following:   

. registered charity   

• community interest company (CIC)
• Charitable Incorporated Organisation (CIO) 
• community benefit society 
• co-operative society (if it has a not-for-profit clause and registered with the Financial Conduct Authority) 
• voluntary or community organisation   
• statutory body (including town, parish and community councils) 
• company limited by guarantee (if it has a not-for-profit clause or is a registered charity).  Board or committee members   It’s essential that organisations that apply have at least two people on their board or committee who are not related.

 By related, we mean: 

• married to each other 
• in a civil partnership with each other 
• in a long-term relationship with each other 
• living together at the same address 
• related by blood.

We cannot accept applications from:

• individuals   
• sole traders   
• organisations focused on making profits and sharing these profits privately - including companies limited by shares, organisations without the right asset locks, or organisations that can pay profits to directors or shareholders organisations based outside the UK    applications made by one organisation on behalf of another    schools.