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Our funding

We fund projects and organisations, small and large, that help people get more people active. Every penny we spend ties into our vision that everyone in England should feel able to take part in sport and physical activity.

Apply for our funding

Our Movement Fund offers crowdfunding pledges, grants and resources to improve physical activity opportunities for the people and communities who need it the most. 

We offer investments up to £15,000. If your project aligns with our priorities, we can fund a broad range of costs and items. 

Find out more

A boy with a prosthetic leg stands on a paddle board, on water. while an instructor kneels behind him

Our priorities

Each year we invest over £250m of National Lottery and government money to help people play sport and take part in physical activity. 
 
As we receive more applications than we can fulfil, we have to decide which projects to prioritise. 

  • How we prioritise

    Our main focus is to support projects that match our goal of getting more people active, reducing the number of inactive people and tackling long-standing inequalities.

    This means our investment supports the goals of our Uniting the Movement strategy.

    We especially want to support projects that give opportunities to groups of people who typically haven't had as many chances to be active.

    These groups include: 

    • people living on low incomes 
    • disabled people or those with long-term health conditions 
    • older people 
    • people from culturally diverse communities 
    • pregnant women and parents with very young children 
    • girls aged 5-16 
    • LGBTQ+ people 
    • people who are in foster care 
    • people who provide care without pay.

    We're particularly interested in projects that address these combined hurdles, such as people with long-term health conditions alongside caring responsibilities. 

    To help recognises the intersectionality of individuals' characteristics that impact their activity levels, we've created the Inequalities Metric.

    Find out more about this metric.

    We also give priority to projects in communities where there's a greater need.

    To help with this, we use our Place Needs Classification (PNC)  this combines physical activity data from our Active Lives Surveys, as well as wider social data including the index of multiple deprivation (IMD), community need and health inequalities data, to help us understand the needs of an area. 

    Find out more about the PNC.

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A female player holding a ball smiles during a game of wheelchair basketball, with a male player next to her

Our charter

Our charter commits us to supporting and inspiring active communities by simplifying funding, promoting inclusivity, fostering collaboration, and driving innovation in community sports and physical activities.  

Read our charter

Our impact

We help local communities to thrive by funding projects that make a real difference.

From revamping sports facilities to inspiring community engagement, our grants and pledges create lasting benefits.  

Find out more about our projects making a difference

People play basketball on a community court as the sun sets, casting long shadows
A girls uses a skipping rope in a sports hall and smiles at the camera

Our historic funds

We've several historic funds which we’ve awarded grants and pledges for.

These funds addressed specific needs and helped promote community engagement in physical activity and sport. 

Learn about our historic funds

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