The National Lottery Community Fund distributes over £680 million a year to communities across the UK, raised by players of The National Lottery.
The National Lottery Community Fund (NLCF) announced that from 1 April 2025, the Reaching Communities programme has new priorities which will help the funder to deliver its missions and create fairer, stronger, more resilient futures for communities across England.
Objectives of Fund
The priorities are for projects that:
- Support places, people or communities experiencing poverty, disadvantage or discrimination
- Support people and communities to shape the decisions that affect their lives.
Projects must help achieve one of the NLCF missions, which are to support communities to:
- Come together through inclusive places, spaces and activities (either physical or virtual), especially for communities where people are least able to come together.
- Help children and young people thrive, by developing positive social and emotional skills.
- Tackle health inequalities by addressing the conditions in which people live, work and grow.
- Be environmentally sustainable by engaging with climate issues, having a positive environmental impact, and improving access to quality natural spaces.
Grants of between £20,001 and £20 million are available for projects of up to five years.
Although most grants awarded are for less than £500,000 (last year the average was £319,000 over three years), larger organisations with ‘ambitious’ projects can receive up to £20 million over five years.
Who Can Apply
Applications will be accepted from:
- Voluntary or community organisations with a written constitution.
- Registered charities.
- Charitable incorporated organisations (CIOs).
- Not-for-profit companies limited by guarantee (must be a registered charity or have a not-for-profit “asset lock” clause in the articles of association).
- Community interest companies (CICs).
- Schools.
- Statutory or public bodies (including local authorities, town, parish, or community councils).
- Community benefit societies (registered with the Financial Conduct Authority)
- Co-operative societies (must have a not-for-profit “asset lock” clause in their society rules and be registered with the Financial Conduct Authority).
Partnerships or groups of organisations can also apply as long as all the partners are one of the types listed above.
To be eligible, applicants must:
- Serve communities in England.
- Have at least two board or committee members who are not related.
- Have at least two directors who are not related.
The following legal structures must have an asset lock:
- Community Interest Companies (CICs)
- Company limited by guarantee that is not a registered charity
- Community benefit society
- Co-operative society
Eligible Expenditure
NLCF aims to fund projects of all sizes.
Grants can be for both existing work and new projects or ideas.
The following can be funded:
- Direct costs to deliver activities in the community, such as:
- costs for project staff or volunteers
- equipment or materials
- room hire
- evaluations of the project.
- Organisational development, such as:
- business planning
- testing new ways of working
- staff training and development
- developing governance and leadership
- buying or upgrading tech or IT equipment
- developing and sharing information about impact and learning
- increasing capacity to work with others, like collaboration and working in partnership
- becoming more environmentally sustainable.
- Costs that reduce negative impacts on the environment. Applicants do not need to be a climate or environment focused organisation to do this.
- Costs for the normal running of their organisation (also known as ‘core costs’ or ‘fixed costs’), for example:
- core salaries
- rent
- utilities, like gas or electricity
- equipment.
- Land or building costs (also known as ‘capital’ costs), for example, funding to:
- build, buy or improve a building
- make a building more environmentally sustainable
- buy or develop an outside space, like a community garden.
NLCF can also fund communities to change the services or systems that affect their lives.
How To Apply
Applications may be submitted at any time and are likely to receive a decision within 40 weeks.
The full programme details and the online application form can be found on the National Lottery Community Fund website.
There is a two-stage application process. It can take:
- Up to four months to get a decision at the first stage, from when the application is submitted.
- Up to six months to send extra information and get a decision at the second stage. The second stage is by invitation
Contact the National Lottery Community Fund for further information.