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Inclusive communities

Programmes bringing our region together

The West Midlands is one of the most diverse regions in the country, home to many communities of different cultures and faiths.

The legacy fund is investing around £20m into ensuring that locally-led projects across the region can benefit from the legacy of the Commonwealth Games.

There will be three main routes to access funding:

Inclusive Communities Grants Programme

  • Open to applicants from across the whole of the West Midlands region, the Inclusive Communities Grants Programme will empower communities to design, propose and implement solutions to real problems felt in their own places and spaces, catalysed by the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games.

The fund has three key missions at its heart:

  1. Bringing people together – supporting projects that connect communities, people and places.
  2. Strengthening our communities - Capacity building across education, voluntary, community and faith sectors.
  3. Telling our story – continuing to raise the profile of the West Midlands through the legacy of the Commonwealth Games.

We will be looking to support projects in three key areas – sports and physical activity; mental health and wellbeing; arts, culture and creativity.

There are four kinds of grant funding that groups can apply for:

  • Smaller projects up to £15,000.
  • Medium projects up to £75,000.
  • Larger projects up to £300,000 (there will be a limited number of awards at this scale).
  • Small Works grants of up to £100,000 will be available for groups wishing to carry out minor renovation works eg refitting a community kitchen or resurfacing a multi-use games area.

Funding applications have now closed. 

Applications update

We are continuing to assess applications for the fund each week. Our community decision making panels are meeting weekly to review applications, assessments and to make decisions.

  • If you have applied for a Medium Grant through the programme and have not yet received a response, you can expect to hear an outcome of your application no later than 10 May 2024.
  • If you have applied for a Small Grant through the programme and have not yet received a response, you can expect to hear an outcome of your application no later than 31 May 2024.

Please do not contact us about your application at this stage.

Due to the volume of applications received, we will not be able to offer comprehensive feedback to every applicant. 

Trailblazer Programmes - United By 2022 Charity

United By 2022 has been awarded £5 million from the legacy fund to continue to engage with people from underserved and overlooked communities across the West Midlands, widening the impact they had in the build-up to last year’s Games.

Trailblazer programmes are:

  • Critical Mass, an inclusive dance and movement programme;
  • Gen22, a youth social action programme, aimed at empowering young people aged 16-24 to make real change in their own communities;
  • Bring the Power, which promotes more opportunities for people with disabilities, and to get more women and girls participating in Games-linked physical activity;
  • Social Value, a private and third sector partnership to financially support grassroots organisations; Volunteers’ Collective, a region-wide website to promote volunteering opportunities.

For more information and opportunities to engage with the work that United By is delivering, visit its website.

Social Economy Growth Programme

£2 million is being invested in helping to grow the scale and impact that social enterprise, community-owned businesses, trading Charities, Cooperatives and other not-for-personal profit organisations have in the region.

The collective term for this is the Social Economy.

The investment from the legacy fund, together with £150,000 from the West Midlands Combined Authority and £150,000 from Power to Change funding, will start the process of doubling the size and impact of this sector. The investment will provide:

  • A specialist business support programme for +160 social economy organisations aimed at building their business skills and confidence to enable growth and sustainability.
  • Seed funding to enable eight place-based cluster developments which will provide the financial resources to enable a Social Economy lead organisation to develop an action plan and investment strategy to address local social issues and create a sustainable circular economy.
  • Social economy drive 2023 – a series of events, across the region this November 13 to 17, highlighting the products and services that provide the profits that Social Economy organisations use to tackle social or environmental issues.

Speak with our Social Economy team for more information.