Mayor announces fund to help vulnerable Londoners recover from the pandemic

A new £1m fund aims to help older, disabled and low-income Londoners to recover from the pandemic by supporting community-led activities and projects.

The Community Grants Fund is expected to help Londoners lead and shape the recovery of their own communities, with community and civil society organisations invited to apply for grants from £1000 to £10,000.

Potential projects could include supporting mental health needs, food growing initiatives, creative and intergenerational projects, and initiatives working with children and young people.

The new fund builds on the work of the London Community Response Fund, which brought together over 67 funders and awarded more than £57m in grants in 2020/21 to support essential community action.

The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, said: ‘Every Londoner has been affected by the pandemic but older and disabled Londoners, our Black and Asian communities and those living on lower incomes have been impacted disproportionately.

‘Many experienced lockdown in overcrowded housing, increased social isolation affecting their mental health, or difficulties accessing education and health and care services due to digital exclusion. This new £1million Community Grants Fund – which will enable grassroots community organisations and charities to enhance their work – will make a real difference to the lives of many Londoners.’

Michael Hamilton, Programme Director at Ubele, who are supporting the fund, added: ‘The Ubele Initiative welcomes this opportunity for communities to come together and identify their own needs as we emerge out of the confusion, upheaval and challenge of 2020/21. We particularly endorse the focus of this fund on smaller and medium sized projects as we know it was, they who were most challenged by the Covid emergency.’

The funding will be distributed in three separate rounds, with the first round now open for applications until 14 February 2022. City Hall hopes that around 160 organisations will benefit from the investment overall.

Photo by David Marcu