UKSPF Cultural Development Grant - Round 4 - Grants

The deadline for applications was midnight on Friday 30 August 2024.

The grant is now fully closed. There will be no further funding rounds.

Round 4

This grant scheme is designed to help local natural, cultural and heritage sites or organisations to strengthen their operation, enhance their visitor offer and put on more outreach, engagement and participatory programmes.

We aim to fund improvements and programmes that align to one or more of the following interventions from the UKSPF investment priority - Communities and Place:

Herefordshire Council core interventions – E4: Enhancing existing cultural, historic and heritage institutions offer

This grant scheme is designed to help local natural, cultural and heritage sites or organisations to strengthen their operation, enhance their visitor offer and put on more outreach, engagement and participatory programmes.

What we mean by cultural development

We want to support and help strengthen Herefordshire's existing cultural offers – whether a historic building, natural site, landmark, museum, heritage asset, community initiative or creative organisation – so that we can continue to celebrate our incredible heritage and culture, and provide a quality offer for local people and tourists visiting our county.

This is a revenue-based grant scheme.

Activities should deliver the following outputs:

• Increased visitor numbers
• Increased number of programmes
• Improved perception of facilities, amenities and organisations

We are particularly looking for cultural enhancement projects that:

• Help to improve the overall quality of a natural, cultural or heritage offer/organisation in Herefordshire
• Help to strengthen or build on its operation or service, and improve sustainability
• Help to offer more engagement programmes linked to its offer and
• That could not otherwise happen, where the grant enables the project to happen sooner, or enables the project to be larger or of greater quality

This is a county-wide grant scheme. Only organisations registered in Herefordshire with legal status can apply, including:

• Charities, voluntary, community and not-for-profit organisations including charitable incorporated organisations (CIOs) and social enterprises (e.g. CICs)
• Businesses (with a core operation in the natural, cultural or heritage sector)
• State and independent schools (as long as the project or activity benefits and involves the community and does not deliver activities that are part of the standard curriculum)
• Town and parish councils
• Community benefit societies
• Community clubs or trusts
• Religious organisations (as long as the project or activity benefits the wider community and does not include religious content)

• Individuals including sole traders
• Unconstituted organisations
• Organisations who are based or registered outside the county
• Organisations who are registered in the county but propose to deliver activities and programmes outside Herefordshire

The grant will support a range of improvements and programmes including (but not limited to):

• Enhancements to the operation and visitor offer of a natural, cultural or heritage site, amenity, asset or organisation in Herefordshire (the grant does not cover improvements to buildings)
• Community outreach or engagement programmes linked to a natural, cultural, historic or heritage site, amenity, asset or organisation in Herefordshire
• Community-led programmes linked to a natural, cultural or heritage site, amenity, asset or organisation in Herefordshire
• Other programmes that improve local access and participation, help to overcome barriers of engagement, or support volunteering and skills development linked to a natural, cultural or heritage site, amenity, asset or organisation in Herefordshire

This is a revenue-based grant scheme. Revenue funds can be used to contribute to the costs of ongoing operational expenses required in the running of the organisation or programmes as long as they are clearly linked to your project:

• Staff salary costs (including employer National Insurance and pension contributions)
• Overheads related to employing staff involved in delivering activities funded through the grant - capped at 15% of direct staff costs
• Transport costs
• Training costs
• Hardship support for community participation, or support for participants, staff or volunteers with special needs
• Hiring of equipment
• Small items of equipment (under £250), for example workshop resources
• Marketing and publicity costs
• Printing costs
• Ticketing software and printing costs
• Rental costs, for example venue or room hire
• Insurance costs specifically linked to the project

The following costs are considered ineligible and must not be included in applications:

• Purchases of large items of equipment or assets (over £250)
• Capital works, renovation or conservation projects
• Paid for lobbying, entertaining, petitioning or challenging decisions, which means using the fund to lobby (via an external firm or in-house staff) in order to undertake activities intended to influence or attempt to influence Parliament, government or political activity including the receipt of UKSPF funding; or attempting to influence legislative or regulatory action
• Payments for activities of a party political or exclusively religious nature
• VAT reclaimable from HMRC
• Gifts, or payments for gifts or donations
• Statutory fines, criminal fines or penalties
• Payments for works or activities which the lead local authority, project deliverer, end beneficiary, or any member of their partnership has a statutory duty to undertake, or that are fully funded by other sources
• Contingencies and contingent liabilities
• Dividends
• Shares or bonuses
• Bad debts, costs resulting from the deferral of payments to creditors, or winding up a company
• Expenses in respect of litigation, unfair dismissal or other compensation
• Costs incurred by individuals in setting up and contributing towards private pension schemes
• Alcohol

You can apply for a grant of up to 100% of the total project costs.

• Minimum grant of £1,000
• Maximum grant of up to £9,000

Organisations can apply for funding towards one project for 2024/25.

Organisations with an existing project continuing from 2023/24 are eligible to apply for a separate project in 2024/25. This is in addition to your current project.

Following the assessment process, successful applicants will be required to submit additional supporting documents including copies of insurance, policies and quotes where applicable, a copy of the organisation's constitution, evidence of financial standing (for example, recent bank statements), evidence of match funding (if relevant), and an equality and diversity policy or statement.

Once received, we will acknowledge receipt of your grant application.

Overview of the required stages from programme registration to decision making:

1. Application
2. Eligibility check
3. Funding panel assessment
4. Funding panel recommendations
5. Approval and due diligence
6. Applicants receive decision notification

The grant application will be assessed by a project panel who will make recommendations either for the application to be approved or rejected, or the panel may ask for further information before a decision can be made. This will require approval.

Grant applications are assessed on their individual merit by an independent panel against the grant funding eligibility criteria, the impact of the project and that it demonstrates value for money. All applications are subject to funding availability.

Based on your application and any further information you may have been asked to provide, we will advise you of the decision to either:

• Offer a grant; or
• Offer a grant with some specific conditions; or
• Reject the application detailing the reasons why the application was not accepted.

When to start your project

If your application meets the eligibility criteria and you are offered a grant, you will receive an offer letter setting out how much grant has been approved and detailing any specific terms and conditions. If you are happy to accept the grant offer and associated conditions, you will need to return a signed copy within 10 working days.

You should not start your project until you have signed the acceptance of grant and returned it to the Delegated Grants Team.

How to submit your claim for payment

The organisation is permitted to make two claims based on defrayed expenditure (if required). The first claim must be a minimum of 30% of grant value. The final claim, which will be submitted with a final report, will be for the remainder of the funding. All claims are based on actual defrayed eligible expenditure as set out in your grant offer and must be supported by invoices, payslips and payroll report, bank statements, photographic evidence of projects or programmes, including publicity and promotional activities with the required logos.

When to submit your final report

You will need to submit your final report within four weeks of project completion, along with your final claim as set out above. The report will summarise what your project has achieved. If you are successful, your offer letter will set out the information that you need to collect and provide to the council. The council may request further reports and output data up to a year post end of project, such as to 31 March 2026.

If you have any queries on the application process, please email delegatedgrants@herefordshire.gov.uk

If you have any questions on the grant scheme, please email Sarah Lee at sarah.lee@herefordshire.gov.uk

Read more about the Herefordshire UK Shared Prosperity Fund.

Alignment with local strategies

Applications should demonstrate how they align with relevant existing or proposed local strategies, such as the Herefordshire UK Shared Prosperity Fund Investment Plan, Herefordshire Big Economic Plan, the Herefordshire Cultural Strategy 2019-2029, and Herefordshire's journey to net zero carbon by 2030.

Herefordshire Council is committed to furthering the objectives of sustainable development and expects projects, as far as possible, to take account of all long-term benefits and costs - environmental, social and economic.

All applications should demonstrate how the resulting projects will be run and that they will be financially and environmentally sustainable.

UK subsidy control regime

Applicants must ensure that any project or programme put forward is compliant with the UK subsidy control regime. You are asked to confirm this within the application form.

UKSPF procurement

All projects must comply with UKSPF procurement procedures, this includes three quotes for the purchase of any goods or services between the value of £2,500 and £25,000 and once the value of contract exceeds £25,000 opportunities should be advertised via a formal tendering process. For more details, see UK Shared Prosperity Fund: procurement (8). This will be monitored and checks undertaken before a grant agreement is issued.

Applicants must ensure value for money for all goods and services provided as part of the project.

Branding and publicity

Successful applicants are required to work closely with Herefordshire Council to develop promotional resources and to ensure recognition of funding through the necessary UKSPF branding.

All projects must adhere to the UKSPF branding and publicity guidance.

If you are offered a grant, you will be sent terms and conditions specific to your project.

Key points to consider are:

• You should not start your project or incur any expenditure until you have signed the acceptance of grant and returned it to the Delegated Grants Team. Any project spend before the date of the grant offer will be ineligible for payment
• You need to keep all paperwork relating to your project, such as all invoices, receipts and bank statements, as they will need to be submitted as evidence with your claims
• Information relating to user feedback and progress towards the outputs of your project should also be kept
• The grant will only be paid on invoices or receipts that have been paid, and are dated after the offer letter has been agreed by all parties
• Other specific conditions of grant will be included within your offer letter
• If your project or budget changes we will not be able to give you more grant money if your costs increase, but will consider variations within the agreed budget as long as these are approved in advance

You need to notify the Delegated Grants Team in writing as soon as you realise that you may need to make some changes to your project or budget in order to deliver your project.

When the activity must take place

Year 2024/25

Projects must start no earlier than 1 October 2024.

Activities must have taken place no later than 31 March 2025.

Where your project must take place

Projects, programmes and activities must be held in Herefordshire and all members of the public must be able to attend (via a reasonable charge if necessary) at all times.