The Lloyds Bank Foundation for England and Wales is offering grants of £75,000 over three years (up to £25,000 per year) to support registered charities led by and working with d/Deaf and Disabled people who are experiencing poverty.

Small 'd' deaf people are those who have become deafened or hard of hearing in later life, after they have acquired a spoken language and so identify themselves with the hearing community. Small 'd' deaf people are more likely to use hearing aids and develop lipreading skills.

Big 'D' deaf people are those who are born deaf or experience hearing loss before spoken language is acquired and regard their deafness as part of their identity and culture rather than as a disability. They form the Deaf Community and are predominantly British Sign Language (BSL) users.

Applicants must meet the following criteria in order to be considered for grant support:

o Advice and/or advocacy casework will be a central part of your charity’s services. Alongside this you will be delivering longer-term support which empowers d/Deaf and Disabled people to participate in everyday life.
o People with lived experience (the people that your organisation exists to serve) should be at the centre of designing, developing, and managing the services to be provided. and
o Your charity reflects an inclusive, rights based social model of disability. This approach describes people as being disabled by barriers in society, not by their impairment or difference.

Project proposals should provide one or more of the following:

o A range of longer-term support to empower and support d/Deaf and Disabled people to participate in everyday life and have a voice in the decisions that impact them.
o In-depth services – delivering a range of services supporting individuals through a structured pathway over a prolonged period. This must include advice and/or advocacy, such as access to accommodation/housing support, welfare and benefits advice and advocacy, debt support, access to healthcare, and access to legal and employment rights advice.
o Personal plans – working together with the people they support to understand the challenges they may be experiencing and agree on how to help them find a way to overcome them, and/or
o Person-centred services - organisations should have trusted relationships with providers or agencies which can help people to overcome the challenges they face and meet their basic needs.

Registered charities and Charitable Incorporated Organisations (CIOs) may apply to the programme providing the meet the following eligibility criteria:

o Be an independent organisation. They will look at any formal associations you have with other organisations, parent bodies, or group structures. They will check that the Board of your charity has full control over the work and any conflicts of interest.
o Be based and working in England and Wales. Most of your charity’s time and money is spent on activities in England and/or Wales and helping people living in England and/or Wales.
o Be led by and working for the communities you support. By this, they mean that at least 75% of your trustees and at least 50% of staff self-identify as d/Deaf or Disabled.
o Be registered as a charity with the Charity Commission. They will ask for your charity registration number at the start of your application.
o Have a bank account in the name of the charity with unrelated signatories. If the application is successful, the grant must be paid into this account.
o Have a Board of at least three unrelated trustees in place, with their names appearing on your Charity Commission records.
o Have an annual income of between £25,000 and £500,000 in the last set of published accounts on the Charity Commission website. This is total income and, in the case of consolidated accounts, should cover all entities within those accounts.
o Have a safeguarding policy in place. They will ask about your understanding of this policy as well as the approach to safeguarding across your organisation.
o Have at least one set of annual accounts showing as ‘received’ on the Charity Commission website, covering a twelve-month period.
o Have a track record of delivering services, for at least one year. You must currently be delivering services. If your organisation has recently merged, then this must apply to at least one organisation pre-merger.
o Hold Public Liability Insurance.
o Not make any payments to trustees, except for out-of-pocket expenses.
o The majority of people in positions of power (including trustees, the CEO, and senior managers) must not be related nor live at the same address. Where there are some related parties, they will consider the relationship, conflicts of interest and loyalty, the balance of power of the related trustees, and how this is managed, and
o Your charity works predominately with adults over 17 years old.

Please note that for applicants who already have a current grant with the Lloyds Bank Foundation, the grant must end before 31 August 2024.

Funding is not available for:

o Hospitals, health authorities, or hospices.
o Infrastructure or ‘umbrella’ organisations.
o Organisations that are not charities registered in England and Wales.
o Organisations that require people to take part in a religious activity as part of the support provided.
o Organisations whose primary purpose is to give funds to individuals or other organisations. This means organisations use more than 50% of their annual expenditure as grants.
o Organisations whose primary purpose is to give funds to individuals or other organisations. This means organisations use more than 50% of their annual expenditure as grants.
o Organisations working predominantly outside England and Wales.
o Rescue services, or
o Schools, colleges, or universities.

Further information, guidance, an Eligibility Quiz and details about how to apply is available on the Foundation’s website.

The application deadline is 5pm on Thursday 31st August 2023, with successful applicants expected to be notified in December 2023.