The Women’s Sector Resilience Fund

We are delighted to announce that Smallwood Trust’s £2.1 million application to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport’s Community Match Challenge has been successful.

Continuing our response to the Covid-19 crisis, the funding will provide grants to women’s sector organisations that will safeguard vital frontline jobs and support services as well as help 15,000 women across England who are most at risk of poverty and financial hardship.

Smallwood submitted an application to the Community Match Challenge having raised funding of £2m with an additional £100,000 being donated by the Sisters Trust. This has been matched pound for pound by the Government.

For more information about the funding and how to apply visit our fund page here. 

The funding is essential given that recent research highlights that 70% of women’s organisations fear for their survival and the economic impacts of the pandemic are likely to push many more women, who already make up the majority of low-earners, into poverty.

The Smallwood Trust has been helping women out of poverty for nearly 135 years and has a track-record of making grants at pace having awarded over £2.3m across all our grant programmes between March and July 2020: https://www.smallwoodtrust.org.uk/news/covid-19-making-grants-pace

Paul Carbury, Chief Executive of the Smallwood Trust said: “The DCMS matched funding is vital as it means that Smallwood can now support even more frontline women’s organisations through this critical time and it also allows us to identify new organisations that Smallwood can help fund in the years to come.”

Application Details:

We are now accepting applications from women’s sector organisations with an income of less than £1 million that meet Smallwood’s mission of enabling women to be financially resilient. Please apply here.

National or regional women’s organisations that provide capacity building, networking and support to frontline organisations will also be eligible to apply. Early applications are encouraged.

Organisations can apply for up to £30k.