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Member Spotlight: Mayor's Fund for London

Being part of the London Funders movement means building strong trusted connections based on shared values and ambitions. The Member Spotlight series is an opportunity for members to share about their work, values and expertise, and provides fellow funders an opportunity to connect with them.

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Funding change and changing funding: what we’ve learnt from the first two years of Propel

It’s been five years since 67 funders came together to give out over 3000 grants to support the communities hardest hit by the pandemic, through the London Community Response. Investing over £57m, funders prioritised groups led by and for communities experiencing racial inequity, LGBT+ communities, Deaf and Disabled people, women and girls.The London Community Response showed us that collaboration at pace and scale is possible. It also showed us that when funders and community groups come together to pool their knowledge, funding and experience, we can make lasting change.

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What does it take to fund systems change?

Over the last six months, London Funders’ learning programme has focused on what it takes to fund and support systemic change. This followed our 2024 annual Festival of Learning where over 900 people from across London Funders’ membership came together to share, challenge, and be inspired by colleagues and changemakers from across the capital and beyond. What emerged from the Festival was a strong desire from funders to support real change for London’s communities.

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Mapping funding equity and justice infrastructure: what we've learnt so far

Last year, London Funders embarked on a new piece of work with funders and equity partners to map the current state of funding for equity and justice infrastructure. Over the past six months, we have reviewed existing literature, analysed existing datasets, and talked to a range of stakeholders.

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Q&A: on the journey of changing systems - what we can learn from the Advice Workforce Development Fund

For the last few months, our learning programme has focused on what it takes for funders to support and enable systemic change to happen. Systemic change is at the heart of London Funders’ collaborations – we have been working with different funders and civil society groups over the years to test, support and observe what it takes to tackle underlying systemic inequality facing Londoners. One of those collaborations is Propel – a long-term funder collaboration coordinated by London Funders, which involves 12 funders, 5 equity infrastructure organisations and now, 131 funded organisations. Through Propel, London Legal Support Trust along with City Bridge Foundation, Trust for London, the National Lottery Community Fund, The Legal Education Foundation and GLA have been working with advice organisations on the Advice Workforce Development Fund (AWDF) to address the root causes of workforce challenges in the advice sector. To help deepen our understanding of what it takes to both fund change and change funding, we spoke with Nezahat Cihan, Chief Executive of the London Legal Support Trust and some of the advice organisations working to tackle the root causes of the advice workforce crisis, including Bruna Boscaini (Director at Indoamerican Refugee and Migrant Organisation), Jerry During, (CEO and Co-founder of Money A+E), Tracey Lazard (CEO of Inclusion London) and Liz Mercer (Associate Business Consultant at Inclusion London).

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Getting beneath the headlines of rising demand: findings from our survey

Our Research Manager Shreya Gautam shares some of the insights from our recent survey on demand for funding.

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What Propel is teaching us about funding change and changing funding

As part of our ongoing learning programme on what it takes to fund and support systems change, we’re reflecting on what Propel – the long term funder collaboration coordinated by London Funders – is teaching us about funding change as well as changing the funding system.

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Communities in the driving seat: London Funders’ new Chair reflects on our autumn conference

London Funders’ new Chair, Jenny North, Director of The Clothworkers’ Foundation, shares her reflections from London Funders’ annual autumn conference where over 100 people from across our membership came together to explore how we can work in solidarity with the communities we support.

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Q&A with Letícia Ishibashi: Practising anti-racism and exploring alternatives systems for the future

As part of our ongoing learning focus on what it takes to fund and drive systemic change, we recently spoke to Letícia Ishibashi, Head of Programmes (Migration) at Paul Hamlyn Foundation about the new vision for their Migration Fund, which envisions a radical alternative to the existing hostile immigration system – one where “everyone is free to move and no one is forced to move”. We spoke with Letícia about how Paul Hamlyn developed this vision together with those working in migration and related fields, how their funding processes changed as a result and where she sees the Foundation’s role in the fight for an immigration system rooted in justice, solidarity and freedom.

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Demand for Equity & Justice Infrastructure

Earlier this year, we embarked on a project to map the current state of funding for equity and justice infrastructure. While some efforts have been made to better evidence the scale and funding of more generic forms of infrastructure support, we still lack understanding about the infrastructure sector specifically for equity and justice organisations. This project will improve our understanding of the current funding position of the sector and the needs they are seeking to address.  

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Rising demand: getting beneath the headlines

Over recent weeks we’re hearing more and more about increased demand on open grant rounds. High demand on funds isn’t new, but it seems that the number of applications to many grant programmes has reached new heights. If funding applications have sharply increased, it is crucial that we understand the underlying reasons behind this change. 

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Reflections from the Big Network Day: How can we come together to create meaningful change?

Last week, London Funders' members came together for our Big Network Day – a half day event where our thematic, member-led networks had the opportunity to connect, share learning and together explore one key question: How can we come together to create meaningful change in London? Chaired by London Funders’ members, the Networks are a space for funders working on specific areas to meet on a regular basis to exchange knowledge and ideas, troubleshoot challenges, and identify opportunities to collaborate. The Big Network Day was a chance for all of the networks to come together – for the first time since 2020 – to build stronger connections and foster collaboration between the Networks. Here are some of the key learning points we took away from the day.

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