Be a #Fivergiver!
You may have heard the news of the new indestructible plastic £5 notes, featuring Winston Churchill, about to hit our wallets. A social media campaign to encourage people to donate their first fivers to the charity of their choice is gathering pace. It’s featured on UK Fundraising.
Fundraising Preference Service model published for consultation
The Fundraising Regulator has published for consultation its plans for the Fundraising Preference Service (FPS), including a new proposal that donors will have to renew their registration every two years.
The FPS is a system proposed in the final report of the Etherington Review of fundraising regulation, which will allow donors to opt out of all contact from charities. However the new model contains a number of measures which make it less threatening to charities than first feared, including limited opt-outs, time limits, and the option for charities to contact donors to check their intentions. The plans are reported on in Civil Society.
Read NCVO’s good practice recommendations on donor communications.
£80m for youth projects
Last week, Theresa May announced an £80m fund for youth projects in England. The fund, derived from money from the government and National Lottery funds, will be split between the Youth Investment Fund and the Step Up To Serve #iwill social action campaign. Local youth groups will be able to bid for a share of the cash, which could be used to fund sports clubs, drama courses, volunteering or training opportunities for young people.
Funding available for Hate Crime Community Projects
Hate crimes are crimes that are motivated by hostility on the grounds of race, religion, disability, sexual orientation and gender identity. Hate crimes target an intrinsic part of the victim’s identity and have no place in our society.
Providing funding for projects which prevent hate crime is one of the actions included in the UK government’s hate crime action plan. The aim of the fund is to work with affected communities to develop a range of pilot projects to tackle hate crime, by funding the development of innovative projects that support the delivery of the UK government’s plan for tackling hate crime.
Other fundraising news
Innovation fund
Last year the Home Office ran an Innovation Fund for Prevent. This helped fund a number of new projects designed to build understanding and prevention of radicalisation and support for terrorism. Prevent are now launching the second Project Innovation Fund (PIF). The fund is open until 12 October 2016, with registration for applications required by 5 October. Applicants are able to bid for between £10,000 and £100,000 (including VAT) for innovative projects which support Prevent objectives.
Gift Aid Small Donations Scheme
Charity representative bodies have said they will be pushing the government to strengthen a bill to amend the Gift Aid Small Donations Scheme (GASDS), which was introduced in the House of Commons earlier this week. The small charitable donations and childcare payments bill seeks to widen access to the Gift Aid Small Donations Scheme and was announced in the Queen’s speech earlier this year.
Michael Birtwistle, senior policy officer at NCVO, said:
We’ll be seeking further conversations to improve this bill. We’ll be pushing MPs to do more. Given how rare it is to get Parliamentary time for giving, we think there’s more which can be done to enhance this bill for smaller organisations. They haven’t fully addressed the concerns we had around GASDS. Half the organisations we spoke to said the biggest problem was that they couldn’t use GASDS without having some gift aid income already. This matching requirement is their biggest priority, but it isn’t in the bill.
Social media toolkit
Also worth checking out is the charity social media toolkit, produced by Skills Platform and Zoe Amar Communications. It features case studies and insights from Breast Cancer Care, Fawcett Society, NCVO, Joseph Rowntree Foundation and others.
Training and events
Go to the training and events section of the NCVO website for information about training courses, including e-learning, one-day events and annual conferences.
And do join us at the NCVO/BWB Trustee Conference 2016 on Monday 7 November for essential updates on governance regulation. You’ll get practical tools and guidance in our range of expert-led workshops on topics including:
- overseeing charity finances – real life guidance for trustees
- fundraising regulation and data protection: how can charities build strong relationships with their donors?
- effectively managing risk.
Book your place today
Or you can always contact us about training or consultancy support. And if you have anything you think we should include in next month’s round-up, please do drop me a line.
How to write a winning funding bid
NCVO members get free access to Studyzone, our online training video platform. Take a look at our course on how to write a winning funding bid.
Richard Sved is an NCVO sustainable funding consultant. He has worked and volunteered in the charity sector for 25 years. He has led the fundraising function (in-house and as an interim) for six national charities, including National Literacy Trust, Leap Confronting Conflict and Girlguiding. 
