Frequently Asked Questions: Climate & Environmental Justice — Round One

£5.6m — distributed via five-year core grants of £125,000, £200,000, £300,000 or £450,000 for organisations with an income of between £50,000-£1.5m.

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 aligns with our programme priorities and you do not use 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.

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 and 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 and a minimum annual income of £50,000. Please refer to our General eligibility and exclusions for further details on who we can and can’t fund. 

If your organisation has only recently been formally constituted, we would still expect to see evidence of a relevant track record (for example, through previous delivery, partnerships, or the experience of key staff or trustees).

Organisations must have a total annual income of between £50,000 and £1.5m, based on your latest signed accounts. In limited circumstances, if your organisation’s income is just below or above one of these bands, we may consider your application, but only if we discuss and agree this in advance via a pre-application call.

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

Yes. Through Standing with Londoners, City Bridge Foundation anticipates awarding around £26m per year across our four justice areas: Access to Justice, Economic Justice, Racial Justice, and Climate & Environmental Justice.

We will continue to open further funding rounds and programmes in 2026. For the latest information on upcoming opportunities, please visit our website and/​or sign up to our newsletter. 

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

We will make final decisions by no later than Friday, 29 January 2027. If your funding application is approved, we’ll 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 two to four weeks (12 weeks from the start of Stage 2), but this timeframe may 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 (no longer available)
• 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 call 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 Friday 6 November 2026. 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 the glossary page in our downloadable Funding Guidelines for more clarification on the terminology we use, such as community-led, social action, and systems change. 

Yes, as long as you commit to doing so on receipt of our grant.

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

• Eligibility Checker or 
• Grant pages

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

Yes, we accept partnership applications; however, both organisations must meet the income threshold and the eligibility criteria.

By ​‘community-led’, we mean work that is shaped and driven by the people most affected by the issues you’re addressing. This could include communities having real decision-making power, influencing priorities and strategy, or being meaningfully involved in leadership and governance. It also means being accountable to the communities you work with through strong, ongoing relationships.

For an extended definition, please see our downloadable Funding Guidelines. 

‘Systems change’ means addressing the root causes of climate and environmental inequality, not just the immediate issues people face.

In practice, this could include building community power and leadership, influencing policy or service delivery, shifting public narratives, or developing community-led solutions that inform wider change. We recognise this will look different for each organisation, but your work should show how it contributes to longer-term change. Examples can be found in the Funding Guidelines.

For an extended definition, please see our downloadable Funding Guidelines. 

Your work does not need to cover all approaches, but your organisation must be working towards longer-term systems change (in a way proportionate to your role and approach). Work can span more than one approach if those approaches link together and strengthen the overall impact. All work must demonstrate a commitment to longer-term systems change, and all organisations must be community-led.

Your work will not be eligible if it does not contribute to longer‑term systems change, i.e. it is one‑off, short‑term, or only responds to immediate needs, without addressing underlying causes.

Your organisation does not need to work exclusively on climate issues, but it must be able to demonstrate a clear and credible track record in climate and environmental justice work over time.

This includes demonstrating that this work is ongoing (not one-off or short-term), shaped by trusted relationships with the communities you work with, and that it informs your organisation’s priorities, partnerships and plans. Your work should also contribute to longer-term systems change.

Yes. You can include service delivery in your work, particularly where it responds to immediate needs and challenges faced by the communities you work with. However, this programme focuses on work that also contributes to longer-term systems change. This means your service delivery should be clearly connected to broader goals, such as building community power, influencing policy or practice, or shifting narratives.

We are less likely to fund work that focuses only on short-term services without demonstrating how it contributes to longer-term change.

Yes. This is core and flexible funding, so it can support organisational development, partnerships, collaboration, and learning. You must show how this contributes to your organisation’s work and longer-term impact.