Launch of the Improving Lives Through Advice grant programme

We are delighted to announce the launch of “Improving Lives Through Advice” - a new multi-year core costs grants programme being delivered in partnership with the Community Justice Fund.

Improving Lives Through Advice is supported by £30 million from The National Lottery Community Fund, the largest community funder in the UK, to provide access to specialist social welfare legal advice. Thanks to National Lottery players, the funding will enable expert organisations to support some of the most marginalised communities in England – including people with disabilities, women fleeing abuse and families facing eviction.

We will be holding a Q&A session via Zoom at 12pm on Monday, 14th August 2023 to answer any questions you may have about the Improving Lives Through Advice programme and the application process. You can register HERE. A recording of the event will be made available on the website.

You can find out more information on this new programme, including how to apply, here – Apply for a Grant

Our work

Since 2020 we have raised £17.3m which has provided 420 grants to advice giving charities all across the UK. You can find out more about the grants which we have made here: https://grantnav.threesixtygiving.org/org/360G-ATJF#

These funds have helped advice agencies do a wide range of things including:

• helping older people access the support they need to live independently for longer.
• keeping families in their homes
• keeping women and children safe from domestic abuse
• It helps disabled people access the income they are entitled to so they can eat and stay warm.
• It helps people to rebuild their lives after feeling war and persecution.
• It helps people from minoritized communities challenge unfair and discriminatory behaviours which prevent them from fulfilling their potential.

As the cost-of-living crisis disproportionately impacts those in poverty, we’re hearing loud and clear from the frontline the need for secure, multi-year core cost funding. This will enable organisations to meet the needs of their communities, properly support their staff and help deal with the staffing crisis which the social welfare legal sector is facing. The people working to resolve these problems are not limitless, but they are indispensable.

As a group we are committed to making the case for specialist legal advice in order to improve our collective fundraising and influencing capacity. We understand that we need to grow the pot of available funding and we will resource and invest in the work that is needed to achieve this for the long term. Having reviewed progress so far and considered what is needed for the future, we recognise that a new way of working is needed which involves more stakeholders and enables to focus our resources where they can have the most impact. We do want to emphasise that we remain committed to that long term goal of sustainable funding for advice provision and think a new structure/ way of working will better help us achieve that. We’re working through what this means in practice, but we have agreed that -

1. Rather than exploring a single pooled fund vehicle, we will align funding streams for maximum impact and consider pooling funds where this would be appropriate.
2. We will rebrand the Community Justice Fund in the latter half of 2023 to reflect the work we want to do beyond funding.
3. We envisage that the “new CJF” will focus on specific interventions around key objectives, co-designed with relevant subsets of stakeholders. For example:
   • informing & improving funder practice
   • strengthening resilience of the sector
   • making the case for specialist legal advice (and increased funding to the sector)
   • delivering funding programmes
   • Exploring alternative sources of funding for the sector

Part of this shift will mean changing the governance structures, including the existing project development group and the steering group. We’d like to involve the wider sector in discussions around the best way to do this, this is likely to happen in the second half of 2023.

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