WIREDGOV

FIFTY communities across England are today each taking charge of £1million to spend on making their areas better places to live – in a pioneering Lottery funding scheme to empower local people.

The funding is part of a £200 million Big Lottery Fund initiative, called Big Local, which will give local people a key role in deciding how to improve their areas and tackle local problems.

Fifty new areas are being allocated the £1m funding today, bringing the number of communities who are so far benefiting from the scheme to 100. A further 50 communities will be awarded funding through the scheme by the end of 2012. Each of these areas will receive at least £1m to spend over 10 years – along with support, training, and networking opportunities – to make their areas better places to live.

Locals know best – says survey

The new funding comes as figures published today* reveal that only 14 per cent of English adults feel that that those traditionally responsible for decision-making in local areas - including local councils (10%), government (1%) or local MPs (3%) - know best about what is needed to make their community a better place to live.

The Big Lottery Fund-commissioned YouGov survey shows that the majority of people - 74 per cent - think local people and community groups (local people (55%) charities and community groups (8%) or residents associations (11%)) know best.

The communities selected to receive the £1m Lottery funding through Big Local have a history of difficulty in getting support and funding - from the Lottery and elsewhere - and may face a range of issues, for example, the decline of local industry, high unemployment or low average wages, or a pressing need for new support services or activities.

BIG Local Working with local groups, charities, the public sector and local businesses, residents in each of the selected communities will come together to decide what can be done to make their areas better places to live and devise a plan to spend the £1m funding over the next 10 years.

The funding can be used for anything that people feel would improve their area, from training and employment schemes, to tackling anti-social behaviour, creating new community facilities or providing more activities for young people.

Rather than using the money to simply allocate grants for initiatives, residents are encouraged to use different, more sustainable ways of financing, for example giving loans or funding social enterprises, where money could be reinvested in the community.

Nat Sloane, Big Lottery Fund’s England Chair, said: “We know that local people are often best placed to identify what’s needed in their communities, and through this scheme we are putting them at the heart of decision making. Big Local is about so much more than simply awarding Lottery funding to communities. It is a very different approach to addressing need at a very local level. While this money is going to help these communities make some very important changes, crucially, it’s going to build people’s trust, knowledge and skills in these areas. It will ensure that they are well equipped to respond to the different challenges that they face and improve their local area for generations to come.”

The £200m Lottery funded scheme is being managed by Local Trust, a recently established, independent organisation set up by the Community Development Foundation and its consortium partners to run Big Local. They will work in close consultation with residents in each area to offer guidance on their plans and ensure that they are properly supported to make best use of their funding.

Debbie Ladds, Chief Executive, Local Trust said: “Big Local is an exciting community initiative working with residents, community groups and others in the Big Local areas across England to help them make their area an even better place to live.

“Local Trust will work with communities and a range of partner organisations to help them identify what matters most to them, and to take action to change things for the better – now and in the future.”

One of the areas to benefit from the first round of Big Local awards is the Warwick Estate in Knottingley,Wakefield, an area surrounded by fields, a power station and two motorways.

When a local colliery - which employed a high proportion of men from the estate - closed in the early 1990s, a lot of people became jobless and the social infrastructure of the pit – summer holiday trips, football clubs, the brass band and canteen – all disappeared. The miner’s club has since closed, as has a local school, and now the area’s only pub faces closure. There are no buses outside the estate beyond 6pm, isolating many members of the community, particularly older and young people.

Since becoming a Big Local area, a new craft group and cheerleading group for young people has already started, and residents are busy raising awareness of the scheme to encourage as many people as possible to become involved in developing their improvement plan.

Their ideas so far include creating a community cafe, which could provide meals for older people, training local people to coach children for sports and leisure activities, creating more activities for local young people, and regenerating run-down areas of the estate, where council houses have been demolished.

For the locations of the areas to benefit; see the map below, or download the complete list 

Further Information

Big Lottery Fund Press Office: 020 7211 1888
Out of hours media contact: 07867 500 572
Full details of the Big Lottery Fund programmes and grant awards are available on the website: www.biglotteryfund.org.uk
Ask BIG a question here: https://ask.biglotteryfund.org.uk
Follow BIG on Twitter: www.twitter.com/BigLotteryFund #BIGlf
Find BIG on facebook: www.facebook.com/BigLotteryFund

Notes to Editors

• The Big Lottery Fund (BIG), the largest distributor of National Lottery good cause funding, is responsible for giving out 46% of the money raised for good causes by the National Lottery.
• BIG is committed to bringing real improvements to communities and the lives of people most in need and has been rolling out grants to health, education, environment and charitable causes across the UK. Since June 2004 BIG has awarded over £4.4bn.
• The Fund was formally established by Parliament on 1 December 2006.
• Since the National Lottery began in 1994, 28p from every pound spent by the public has gone to good causes. As a result, over £27 billion has now been raised and more than 370,000 grants awarded across arts, sport, heritage, charities, health, education and the environment.
• *YouGov survey: All figures, unless otherwise stated, are from YouGov Plc.  Total sample size was 1723 English adults. Fieldwork was undertaken between 14th - 16th February 2012.  The survey was carried out online. The figures have been weighted and are representative of all English adults (aged 18+).
• Big Lottery Fund’s £200m Big Local programme was launched in July 2010 when the first 50 communities to benefit from the scheme were announced. Some 150 communities are set to receive at least £1m each over the next decade as part of Big Local. The £200m is being invested as a charitable endowment into an independent trust called Big Local Trust.
• Community Development Foundation (CDF), a charity and social enterprise passionate about helping communities, were appointed to lead a consortium of partners (Capacity Global, CCLA, Institute for Voluntary Action Research, the National Association for Neighbourhood Management, Renaisi, UnLtd) in setting up a Company Limited by Guarantee (CLG), which has been named Local Trust. Local Trust will act as Corporate Trustee of the Big Local Trust.
• Local Trust will deliver the Big Local programme on behalf of BIG working on the ground in each of the 150 Big Local areas to help local people make their areas even better places to live now and in the future.
• These Big Local areas have been identified as places where many people face multiple barriers to meeting their needs, and which have a history of difficulty in accessing funding resources in the past.
• More information on Big Local is available at http://www.cdf.org.uk/content/funding-programmes/big-local
• For general enquiries about Local Trust or Big Local please call Amanda Moss, 020 7812 5448, email or Sharon Watson 020 7812 5456, or email: info@localtrust.org.uk