Champion grants scheme

Overview

Each of our county council Champions is allocated a sum of £10,000 per annum for use at their discretion to finance their activities including:

• Organising and attending meetings, seminars, conferences or other similar events;
• The payment of a grant to outside bodies and organisations within the scope of their remit; and
• Other incidental costs necessary to enable them to fulfil their roles.

Champions Grants can be used to fund projects that benefit the community and support a Champion's area of work. Organisations can apply for a grant from one of our Champions, and the councillor will decide how to award the money from their budget. The approval of expenditure to be incurred by a Champion has been delegated by the Leader of the Council to the Director of Law and Governance.

Any unspent balance up to a maximum of £2,500 can be carried over from one financial year to the next, giving each Champion a maximum annual budget of £12,500.

Information about our Champions 

Who can apply

The payment of a grant can be made to outside bodies and organisations.

Outside bodies or organisations must:

• Have a constitution, set of rules, or articles of association in place
• Have a group bank or building society account
• Be a not-for-profit organisation

Who cannot apply:

• Individuals
• Schools, colleges, academies or universities (however, we can fund parent, teachers and friends' associations)
• NHS organisations
• Local authorities, police, fire or rescue services (except parish councils, who can apply)

What the grants will fund

Champion grants can be used to fund different projects or activities in the community which support the work and aims of the county council's Champions.

Projects must fit in with our corporate priorities, particularly 'better lives for all' and 'stronger communities'.

Examples of what Champion grants can fund:

• Provision of equipment, such as sports equipment, play equipment and computer hardware
• Funding towards costs of community events/activities such as: advertising and publicity, equipment, materials, and transport
• Repair or refurbishment of equipment or property which will benefit the community
• Activities to improve the wellbeing of vulnerable or isolated people, such as outings, clubs, health and fitness

Champion grants can't fund:

• "Core funding" such as staffing/salary costs or office rental expenses
• Political and religious activity (as set out in our VCFS compact), although political and religious groups may apply for funding for community activities
• Research
• Projects or activities that run contrary to county council policies or are unlawful

Grants cannot be awarded retrospectively.

Even if your project meets the above criteria, your organisation may not be awarded a grant. The decision on whether to approve the funding will be made by the Champion and the Director of Law and Governance.

Grant funding levels

The minimum amount organisations can apply for and be awarded is £100.

There is no maximum amount organisations can apply for. However, each Champion has a maximum of £12,500 to spend.

The maximum grant will be determined by each Champion but will not exceed the amount they have available from their annual budget for the year.

How to apply for a grant

Please ensure you read this guidance on completing the application form below, before applying for a grant. Please note, we recommend submitting your grant application at least one month before your project date to allow time for it to be processed.

Champion grant application form (DOCX 158 KB)

Guidance

You will need to submit an application form and supporting documents to provide your organisation meets the criteria, so that the Champion can make their decision.

You can either print off the form and fill it in and return it as a paper copy, or you can fill it in on your computer and return it via email.

Note – if you are emailing your completed form, you don't need to scan in your signature. You can just type your name. Because we need two signatures, we would ask that both people named send us a separate email confirming they are happy to sign the application.

If you don't have all the documentation requested, you may still be able to apply. Please read the guidance notes below – which correspond to the sections on the application form - and contact the grants team if you need to discuss anything further.

1. Your details

Please fill in your details, or the details of the person in your organisation who we should deal with.

2. Proof of your organisation's status

You need to provide us with a document that demonstrates that this application is on behalf of an organisation. You should have a set of rules (it may be called something like "Terms of reference" or "Articles of Association"). If you don’t think you have anything like that, you can use the "Declaration" template (DOCX 22.4 KB) to demonstrate that you are a legitimate organised group.

You also need to provide us with a copy of a bank statement. This helps verify the name of your organisation, the sort code and account number. If you don’t want us to see your organisations' income and expenditure, that's fine – please cover them up. We only want to see the name and sort code / account number.

It is fine to send us scanned or electronic versions of both these documents.

3. Bank account details

Please provide the bank or building society details for your organisation. It must not be a personal account. You should take care to ensure that the sort code and account number match the copy of the statement you have sent us.

4. Amount

Enter the total amount you are applying for.

5. Champion's details

Please tick the appropriate box for the county council Champion whose funding you are applying for.

If you are note sure which Champion your application falls under, please find the Champions' details here.

6. Purpose of the grant

Please provide a brief description of what you want to grant for. The rules set out in this guidance explain what is and isn't allowed.

7. Date of your project

Please provide the date of your project, event or purchase of goods.

Note – you must spend the funds within 12 months of the grant being approved, and grants cannot be awarded retrospectively.

8. Benefits

Please briefly explain how the grant will help local people and how it will support the work of the Champion. For example, it might be a scheme that is just aimed at encouraging young people into employment, or supporting people with disabilities to live actively and independently.

9. Local Area

Please tell us if your project will benefit a particular area, community, neighbourhood.

10. Breakdown of expenditure

Use this section to explain in more detail what you will be spending the money on. For example, if you are buying equipment, what equipment exactly will you be buying and how much will each bit cost. This helps us by showing that you have got a good plan for the money.

11. Part funding

If you are not asking for the full amount for your project or activity, please say where the rest of the money is coming from. For example, if you are organising a day trip for older people, you might be asking for all those who want to go on the trip for a small contribution to the cost. Or you might have received funds from somewhere else.

This is absolutely fine – you can ask for whatever amount you like. This helps us understand if there appears to be a difference between what you're asking for from us and the total costs of your project or event.

You also need to think about what would happen if we give you the grant, but the other funding becomes unavailable for any reason. Will you need to cancel your project and send us back the money? Or will you need to scale it back and only do the things that you have the money for? As long as you have told us here what your plan would be, it’s fine.

You are not allowed to just change what you use the grant for if you don’t have the funding, but if you have set out a reasonable "Plan B" here, then it would be fine.

12. Part-award

The Champion might not be able to award you the full amount you ask for. Please use this space to say what you would do if you don’t get the full amount. If you need the full amount and anything less would not be helpful, please say so in this section.

13. Working with vulnerable children and adults

If your application for funding is to support working directly with children or vulnerable adults, you MUST have appropriate Safeguarding Policies relating to children and/or vulnerable adults. You MUST also ensure that you are complying with the requirements of the Disclosure and Barring Service in relation to this, as well as ensuring that your staff and volunteers having undergone appropriate (standard or enhanced) checks with the Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) with appropriate Barred list checks were appropriate, in accordance with guidance, for all the individuals involved (both staff and volunteers). The only exception to this is where parents accompany their own children; please refer to our policy for working with children and vulnerable adults.

We may ask you to provide copies of the relevant policies. If you do not have them or you're unable to show them to us, we may decline your application or ask you to pay back funding already given.

14. Signing the document

Make sure you have read and are happy with the legal notice. You can either print off your application, sign it and post it to us, or scan it and email it to us. You can also type your name in and email the form back to us. Note that the two signatories would need to each send us a separate email confirming they are happy to sign the form.

15. Legal information

The declaration you sign on your application form makes it clear that you are stating the truth in the form.  It contracts you to spend any grant money as you have said you would.  And it makes it clear that it is your responsibility as an organisation to ensure you have put in place any legal requirements to enable you to carry on the activity you are requesting funding for.

You need to be clear before submitting the application that:

• Your members are covered by insurance if necessary
• If appropriate, you have Public Liability insurance in place
• If you are working on land or property you do not own, you have the owner's permission to do so - and so on

If in doubt about any of these things, contact the team in the first instance and they will be able to advise as to who you should talk to.

Please note that the two people who sign the form, who are authorised to sign on your organisation's bank or building society account, must not be related to each other (e.g. have the same surname).

Please send all completed application forms back using one of the contact methods below:

Email: lptlocalmembergrants@lancashire.gov.uk

Post:

Champion Grants Scheme
Democratic Services
Lancashire County Council
County Hall
PRESTON
PR1 0LD

If you need to contact us about your application, you can either email us, using the email address above or you can ring us on 01772 533110

16. Using your information

The county council will use the information you have provided in this form solely for the purposes of processing your grant application. The information in your application will be retained by the council for up to 6 years. However, if you application is unsuccessful, we will only retain the information for 12 months.

17. Data protection

In completing this form, you understand that Lancashire County Council has a requirement to process your personal data.

Lancashire County Council will only ever process your personal data where it has a clear lawful basis for doing so in full compliance with data protection legislation - UK GDPR and The Data Protection Act (2018).

We will ensure the security and confidentiality of your personal data at all times.

For full details of how Lancashire County Council handles your personal data please see our privacy notice.

What happens next

You will receive an email or letter informing you of the decision.

If the funding has been awarded to you, you need to allow three to four weeks after receiving the email for the payment to be made into your organisation's bank account. When you receive this email, you can make the purchases you planned to make with the funds awarded.

You can use your organisation's own funds while you're waiting for the money to be paid. Any receipts must be dated after the date of the decision, as set out in the email / letter.

Please keep the receipts. Our monitoring team will ask you to provide these and a copy of your organisation's bank statement showing the award being paid in and the money being spent.

If the cost is less than anticipated or you don't spend the money because of a cancellation for example, please contact the grants team. Do not spend the money without contacting us first as you may need to return the funds.

Monitoring

After your grant has been awarded, we will contact you to make sure everything is ok, and the money has been spent on what you intended.

We will ask for some or all of the following:

• Copies of receipts or invoices for the full amount of the grant
• A bank statement showing the invoices have been paid by your organisation
• Information about the event – for example
• Details of how many people attended
• Photographs of the event or equipment
• Copies of press or promotional activity
• Copies of child protection/vulnerable adult policies and associated paperwork
• Evidence that any conditions of the grant have been met

Publicity

Lancashire County Council and the individual Champions may wish to publicise the types of expenditure it has funded from the Champion Grants Scheme.

As a condition of the grant, Lancashire County Council reserves the right to publicise the applicant's project in the local media.

If you intend to publicise the project yourself, then you are required to inform our team.

Contact information

For more information about Champion Grants, email LPTlocalmembergrants@lancashire.gov.uk or call 01772 533110.

Postal address:

Champion Grants Scheme
Democratic Services                                       
Lancashire County Council
County Hall
Preston
PR1 0LD