Following the terrible loss of life in the Grenfell Tower fire in 2017, London Funders brought together funders from across sectors to offer a series of collaborative funding programme to ensure that civil society groups – across the voluntary, community and faith sectors – were supported in their vital work with people in North Kensington. We commissioned IVAR to produce an independent review of this response, which led to the publication of ‘The possible not the perfect’, with important lessons for how funders should respond to future emergency situations. This has shaped how we are working now, with the London Community Response, which brings together over 50 funders to get urgent grants to groups supporting communities affected by the covid-19 pandemic across London.We’ve always been committed to listening and learning, so we hope that sharing some of our work now is helpful to others looking at designing effective funding programmes at this time, whilst we’re also keen to hear of experiences and ideas that could help us to keep improving so that communities get the support they need – do let us know what you think.
