We aim to improve life chances of disadvantaged and often marginalised groups. Our primary themes of support are in the areas of Housing, Education and Environmental crises, with secondary themes in support of Young people, Mental welfare and Social mobility and inequality. We make grants to UK registered charities that tackle disadvantage in these areas in a range of different projects.
We actively engage and understand the organisations we support and our trustees always visit the programmes supported by our Strategic grants.
We assess the impact of our support for charities by agreeing the anticipated outcomes with the organisations while receiving regular reports from them on their work and evaluating the impact of the programme at its conclusion.
Our priority for housing is to fund charities and invest in companies that work with homeless or vulnerable people, including those recovering from drug or alcohol addiction or domestic violence, which provide for their immediate needs and support services that help them with long term accommodation and rehabilitation.
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Our priority is to support charities that provide social programmes in school and communities, and those that widen access to education in a range of different mediums to those from deprived or disadvantaged backgrounds.
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Our priority is to support a charity undertaking environmental action through legal action by making changes in regulation and policy, helping people and communities most affected by environmental degradation to defend their rights. We will also support projects in biodiversity and species preservation, climate and atmosphere and holistic approaches covering coastal ecosystems, fresh water, land use, consumption, waste, toxics and pollution.
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Our priority for funding charities that work with children and young people is to increase life chances by developing life skills, emotional resilience and mental well-being and by promoting social mobility.
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Our priority is to make grants to a range of projects in support of people with mental health problems to see that they get the support they need, when they need it.
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Our priority for funding charities that work to improve social mobility and address social inequality is to support those making practical improvements, primarily in the motivation, education, skills and training of disadvantaged people of all ages and backgrounds.
View grant recipientsAs part of their overall investment policy, the Trustees decided that up to 15% of the Charity’s net assets would be allocated to Social investments and Impact investments.
The Charities Act 2011 (as amended) gives charities a power to make Social investments, which arise where charity trustees use money or property with a view to both:
Provided we have satisfied ourselves that the proposed arrangement may be treated as a Social investment and falls within the social sectors supported by the Charity, we will have broad discretion regarding the nature of investment.
We may invest in any form of legal entity (e.g. a housing association, a charity, a community interest company, a private company, an investment fund etc) and the investment may take the form of:
Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
In procedural terms, when deciding to make a Social Investment we would satisfy ourselves in each case that:
When deciding to make a Social investment we would satisfy ourselves in each case that:
Provided we have satisfied ourselves that the proposed arrangement may be treated as a Social investment and falls within the social sectors supported by the Charity, we will have broad discretion regarding the nature of investment.
We may invest in any form of legal entity (e.g. a housing association, a charity, a community interest company, a private company, an investment fund etc) and the investment may take the form of:
Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
In procedural terms, when deciding to make a Social Investment we would satisfy ourselves in each case that:
When deciding to make a Social investment we would satisfy ourselves in each case that:
Impact investments are investments made with the intention to generate positive, measurable social and environmental impact alongside a financial return. Impact investments can be made in both emerging and developed markets and target a range of returns from below market to market rate, depending on investors' strategic goals. The Trustees intend to make an allocation to impact investing, which will be used to test the potential for achieving strong financial returns by investing into impact funds that align to their impact goals and which generate a measurable impact.
The Global Impact Investing Network (GIIN) has stated that impact investing has four core elements being:
An investor’s intention to have a positive social and/or environmental impact through investments is essential to impact investing.
Impact investments are expected to generate a financial return on capital or, at a minimum, a return of capital.
Impact investments target returns that range from below market (sometimes called concessionary) to risk-adjusted market rate, and can be made across assets classes, including but not limited to, cash equivalents, fixed income, venture capital and private equity.
A hallmark of impact investing is the commitment of the investor to measure and report the social and/or environmental performance and progress of underlying investments, ensuring transparency and accountability while informing the practice of Impact Investing and ‘building the field’ by sharing the learnings where possible to enable others to benefit from their experience.
The Trustees have agreed to consider a combination of private equity and private debt impact investments with a global investment mandate to ensure diversification from a risk perspective. The procedure to be followed when making such investments will be the same as that followed for the Social investments:
An investor’s intention to have a positive social and/or environmental impact through investments is essential to impact investing.
Impact investments are expected to generate a financial return on capital or, at a minimum, a return of capital.
Impact investments target returns that range from below market (sometimes called concessionary) to risk-adjusted market rate, and can be made across assets classes, including but not limited to, cash equivalents, fixed income, venture capital and private equity.
A hallmark of impact investing is the commitment of the investor to measure and report the social and/or environmental performance and progress of underlying investments, ensuring transparency and accountability while informing the practice of Impact Investing and ‘building the field’ by sharing the learnings where possible to enable others to benefit from their experience.
The Trustees have agreed to consider a combination of private equity and private debt impact investments with a global investment mandate to ensure diversification from a risk perspective. The procedure to be followed when making such investments will be the same as that followed for the Social investments: