Frequently Asked Questions — Access to Justice

£6.5 million – distributed via 3‑Year Development Grants of £75,000 and 5‑Year Transformation Grants of £200,000, £300,000 and £450,000.

We’ve designed the 3‑Year Development Grant to enhance your organisation’s capacity for social action and systems change work. Over the 3‑year grant period, you are likely to introduce new activities, which could be described as ​‘expansion’. 
 
With the 5‑year Transformation Grant, you’ll need to demonstrate how you’ll use flexible funding to support your core costs and long-term strategic objectives, and develop your social action work to bring about systems change. 

Yes, however, receiving a Development Grant does not guarantee or preclude you from receiving another grant in the future.

Yes, if you are currently receiving any other grant from us, you are eligible to apply for this round. However, we may prioritise organisations we’ve not funded before. 

We recognise that faith-based organisations play an important role in supporting London’s communities. We can consider applications from faith-based organisations, provided your work meets our programme priorities and that you are not using our funding to promote or advance religion. We would typically expect the activities to be inclusive and open to all, regardless of faith or belief. See General eligibility and exclusions.

Please refer to our downloadable Funding Guidelines for comprehensive information on recognised definitions of advice and the types of advice we fund. You can also find further information on our Access to Justice grant page. 

Our funding is core and flexible, covering staff salaries, overheads, and other organisational costs. However, we do not fund capital costs except for essential small equipment, such as laptops. For more information on what we can and can’t fund, please refer to our General eligibility and exclusions page, as well as our downloadable Funding Guidelines. 

Yes, we fund new organisations. However, to be eligible, your organisation needs to have at least one year of independently examined or audited accounts. Please refer to our General eligibility and exclusions for further details on who we can and can’t fund. 

As a guide, Development Grants are for organisations with an annual income of around £50,000 to £250,000, and Transformation Grants are for organisations with an annual income of between £50,000 and £1.5 million. If your organisation falls just under or over these bands, you may still apply if it operates within and serves London’s communities and meets our programme’s priorities and eligibility criteria. 

However, we are prioritising smaller community-led, grassroots-led or previously underfunded organisations for this first funding round. We are willing to be flexible and consider each application carefully, but we’re unlikely to accept applications from organisations with an annual income of over £2 million. 

Yes, as long as your organisation meets our programme’s priorities and eligibility criteria.

Yes, we will open further funding rounds and programmes under Standing with Londoners in 2026. 

This funding round is now open. We’re offering £6.5 million across the two streams. We anticipate awarding 20–25 grants in this round.

Download our Funding Guidelines for detailed information on every aspect of this programme, including our programme aims, priorities and eligibility. 

We will make final decisions by no later than Friday 29 May 2026. If your funding application is approved, we will notify you as soon as possible with a formal offer and grant agreement for your review and signature. We’ll release the first payment within 2–4 weeks (12 weeks from the start of Stage 2), but this timeframe could vary. Visit our programme Timeline for further information. 

We’ve created comprehensive resources to answer as many questions as possible before you commit to applying. For example:

• A webinar with a British Sign Language interpretation, accompanied by a list of questions and slides
• Pre-application calls to help you with any eligibility queries
• An Eligibility Checker
• Detailed help with our application form via our downloadable Instructions for Applicants
• A sample application form in Word for offline editing 

Contacts for extra help: funding@citybridgefoundation.org.uk or 020 7332 3710 (open 8am-6pm, Monday to Friday).

Please refer to our Supporting documents guidance for a list of the documentation you need to submit with your application.

If your application is not successful at Stage 1, we’ll notify you by email by the end of March. After this date, you can request written feedback. If your application is not successful at Stage 2, you can request a feedback call with a member of our funding team. Please refer to our Timeline for information on our two-stage, decision-making process.

Yes, but if you need to submit your application in a different format, require any accessibility adjustments, or are otherwise struggling to access our online form, please contact a member of our funding team at funding@citybridgefoundation.org.uk for advice. 

For any technical issues with using our Application Portal, please contact us at funding@citybridgefoundation.org.uk or by phone on 020 7332 3710 (open 8am-6pm, Monday to Friday).

Yes, please visit our glossary page for more clarification on the terminology we use, such as ​‘led by and for’ organisations, accreditation, social action, and systems change. 

We expect you to hold (or be working towards) a recognised quality mark such as AQS, Lexcel, IAA (formerly OISC), or an equivalent mark within your advice area. You can find more information on advice standards and quality assurance marks on our Access to Justice grant page.

Yes, as long as you commit to doing so on receipt of our funding. If your current contracts prevent you from doing this, please explain how you would transition to paying at least the London Living Wage during the grant period. The Living Wage Foundation sets the London Living Wage (£14.80 per hour from April 2026). We do not require your organisation to be accredited by the Living Wage Foundation. 

No, our programmes have different eligibility criteria. You can access these via each programme’s:

• Eligibility Checker or
• Grant pages

You can also visit our General eligibility and exclusions section for more information.

If you are a ​‘led by and for’ organisation, you are wholly accountable to the communities and people you serve. For example, 75% of your Board of Trustees or Management Committee, and at least 50% of your senior staff, self-identify as being from the specific marginalised community or protected characteristic your organisation serves. 

If your organisation falls just outside our 75% and 50% thresholds, you can still apply, as long as you can demonstrate strong community accountability and representation in your work. You can find more information on our Access to Justice programme page or in our downloadable Funding Guidelines. 

Yes. If you serve several marginalised groups, your leadership and governance should collectively reflect all your communities. 

If your organisation falls just outside our 75% and 50% thresholds, you can still apply, as long as you can demonstrate strong community accountability and representation in your work. For example, in addition to your leadership and staff being members of your community: 

• Your work clearly responds to the needs and lives of the people you are trying to support. 
• You encourage those who’ve experienced marginalisation to move into leadership positions and contribute to decision-making in your organisation. 
• You help to build power within the community/​communities you are supporting. 

Yes, we encourage applications from partnerships and collaborations, although it’s not mandatory for this programme. If you choose to apply as a partnership, you must select the lead organisation during the process. At Stage 2, we will be keen to meet representatives from both organisations. The total grant funding will be allocated to the partnership, not to each partner organisation. 

As a guide, our annual income guidance applies mainly to the lead organisation. Please explain the roles of each partner, particularly the lead partner, and how you will allocate or distribute the funding between the two organisations. 

No, we can only accept one funding application per organisation. 

Yes, if your organisation meets our programme priorities and criteria. However, we will consider the overall portfolio of applications and take an ecosystem-based approach to funding. This means we may consider factors such as geographic spread, potential duplication, and the need to ensure both breadth and depth across the funded organisations’ cohort, in line with the programme’s priorities. 

Not at all. Partnerships are welcome but not prioritised over applications from individual organisations. 

No, the same award levels apply; however, you should clearly explain how you will distribute the funding between the two partners. We would explore this further at Stage 2.