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A \u00a3200m government fund for smaller charities, run by the National Lottery Community Fund (NLCF), received a record-breaking number of applications when it opened last week.<\/h3>\nA \u00a3200m government fund for smaller charities, run by the National Lottery Community Fund (NLCF), received a record-breaking number of applications when it opened last week.<\/h3>\n<\/p>\n
Civic Society News<\/em> writes:<\/p>\n A spokesperson for NLCF\u00a0said that the funder has\u00a0received bids to the Coronavirus Community Support Fund worth \u201cmulti millions of pounds\u201d.<\/p>\n They\u00a0added that on Friday, the day that \u00a3200m from government became available, the fund received a record number of applications.<\/p>\n However, NLCF\u00a0declined to confirm how many applications it had received since the fund opened, how many grants have been agreed, and how much money has been allocated, despite repeated requests for further details.<\/p>\n It is still not clear when the first payments might reach charities, although the Lottery has previously said that it hopes to release funds \u201cas soon as possible\u201d.<\/p>\n Government funding is being distributed alongside the NLCF\u2019s normal funding, and charities do not need to apply separately for the different pots. The money is part of the \u00a3750m package for charities announced in early April. There has been significant criticism of how long it has taken to launch the application process.<\/p>\n The Coronavirus Community Support Fund opened last week to distribute the first \u00a3200m in emergency government funding to small charities in England impacted by the coronavirus crisis. Another \u00a3110m will be made available at a later date.<\/p>\n There is no deadline for applications to the fund, with rolling decisions on grants made on a first-come-first-served basis. This process has been\u00a0criticised<\/a><\/u>\u00a0by some sector leaders for encouraging \u201capplicants to apply as quickly as possible, rather than as well as possible\u201d.<\/p>\n A Lottery spokesperson said: \u201cWe\u2019ve received hundreds of applications to the Coronavirus Community Support Fund since it opened, with requests totalling multi millions of pounds. A record was broken on Friday, when we received the most applications we have ever seen in one day.<\/p>\n \u201cThere is high demand for this funding, and we’ll continue to assess applications at speed so that we can get funding out to communities as quickly as possible.\u201d<\/p>\nFirst-come-first-served<\/h3>\n
High demand<\/h3>\n