Children's Services Integrated (CSI) Grant

Grant Purpose

The Children's Services Integrated Grant (CSI) process has been created to support projects delivered by the voluntary or not for profit sector.

Grants can support existing, developmental, and new work.
Under the CSI grant programme, universal services with open access to all children and young people, will not be given as high priority as targeted services to our primary focus groups of children and young people which are (in no order):

• Young Carers
• Young parents
• Young offenders
• Living in relative poverty
• Victims of neglect or abuse
• Children in care (including post adoption)  
• At risk because of mental health problems
• Lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender
• Young People who are not in Education, Employment or training
• Black, minority, ethnic, Traveller or are facing barriers to participation or experiencing prejudice and discrimination because of their ethnic background (including refugees and asylum seekers)
• Disadvantaged because of learning difficulties and/or disabilities. (Please also refer to the Short Breaks website as this may be a more appropriate funding stream for your project. If in doubt as to which grant programme to apply to please contact either the CSI or Short Breaks team to discuss your application)

When to apply

The second grant round for 2013/14 will be open from 25 April to 6 June 2013.

Grants are available to fund projects from October 2013 to 31st March 2014.

Eligibility and criteria and Who can apply:

Voluntary, community and not for profit organisations. These are also known as ‘third sector’ organisations, as they are separate from the public and private sectors. They are value-led organisations established for social purposes rather than the pursuit of profit.

They include:

• registered and unregistered charities
• voluntary and community groups
• co-operatives
• faith organisations
• social enterprises

A social enterprise is a business with primarily social objectives whose surpluses are principally reinvested for that purpose in the business or in the community, rather than being driven by the need to maximise profit for shareholders and owners. Within this definition, social enterprises can take on a variety of legal forms, including:

• unincorporated associations
• trusts
• limited companies
• some industrial and provident societies such as community benefit societies
• Community Interest Companies
• charitable incorporated organisations.

Consortia or partnerships made up of these groups are also able to apply.

While you do not need to be a registered charity to apply for funding, your organisation must have a written governing document which details your aims, objectives and methods of working (for example, a constitution, set of rules or trust deed) and your own bank account.

Voluntary and community organisations must have at least three unrelated people on their governing body, management committee or board of directors.

Your organisation should be open to all members of the community with interests relevant to your publicly stated aims.

To be eligible for support the organisation must:

• Benefit children, young people and their families and carers in the Hampshire County Council area (Not Southampton, Portsmouth or the Isle of Wight).
• Demonstrate how their work meets at least one of the outcomes of the Children and Young People’s Plan (CYPP)  and Local Children’s Partnerships priorities.

If you would like information about the CYPP or your LCP please use the following web links:

Hampshire's Children and Young People's Plan
Local Children's Partnerships

Local Children’s Partnerships have provided updated priorities  45 kB for their local areas.

• Have in place appropriate insurances:

CSI funded organisations are required to hold £10,000,000 Employers and Public Liability Insurance. If your application is successful and you hold a lower level of cover you will be required to provide a risk assessment for consideration.

Hampshire County Council requires all organisations providing advice to young people to hold Professional Indemnity Insurance. This level is currently set at £5,000,000 but may be risk assessed down to £1,000,000.

Hampshire County Council will not award a grant to an organisation that does not hold, or is not willing to obtain the required level of insurance following risk assessment, irrespective of advice given to organisations by third parties.

• Have policy statements and guidelines in place for Safeguarding, Equal Opportunities, Health and Safety, and Quality Assurance (where applicable).

• Ensure all staff, both paid and voluntary have an up to date Enhanced Criminal Records Bureau clearance and appropriate training.

• Apply for funding from other sources such as trusts, district/borough councils, businesses or other sponsorship or contribute to the costs in kind.

Financial eligibility

Organisations will not normally be eligible for grants where they hold unallocated reserves in excess of one year's running costs, or where it is judged that these reserves are unreasonably in excess of what is required or not allocated for legitimate purposes.

The Children’s Services Grant Programme has adopted the Charity Commission’s reserves policy in this respect.

The Charity Commission’s definition of reserve is:

Income funds that are freely available for its general (unrestricted) purposes. "Reserves" are therefore the resources the organisation has or can make available to spend, for any or all of the charity's purposes, once it has met its commitments and covered its other planned expenditure. It is not yet spent, committed or designated.

Grants are generally a contribution to core costs or service/project costs. We expect your organisation to secure additional funding from other sources, to contribute to the costs in kind (through volunteer time, for example), or both. In the current financial climate it is even more essential that projects or organisations applying for funding are able to demonstrate a direct and demonstrable, cost effective impact on the priorities outlined above.

Who we can’t fund:

• Individuals
• Statutory organisations (including all schools)
• Private businesses, ‘for profit’ organisations or projects.
• Projects that promote religious or political beliefs
• Services that do not benefit children and young people aged 0-19 years (Up to 25 for a young person with a disability or a care leaver)
• Services and organisations that do not meet the programme’s criteria or priorities. (Examples could be Childcare provision, After School Clubs, services delivered to schools, support or promotion of political or religious activity, land purchases, large equipment/capital purchases, or refurbishments).
• Activities or services that schools have a statutory responsibility to provide for example, curriculum based activities or any activity taking place during curriculum time. Projects should be delivered before or after school, during lunch time or in the holidays unless you are able to provide a good reason in your application why this is not possible.
• Services commissioned via a contract for the Children’s Services Department.
• Services provided solely within the unitary authority areas of Portsmouth City Council, Isle of Wight, Southampton City Council or outside Hampshire, which do not support children and young people living in Hampshire.

If you are in any doubt as to whether your project qualifies, we would recommend that you speak to an Officer before submitting an application. We would also strongly encourage all applicants requesting a grant of £10,000 or above to contact the unit to discuss your proposal prior to submission.

Monitoring

If successful, projects will be required to sign a grant agreement and submit targets to tell us what they aim to achieve over the duration of the grant period. As your targets will depend on the value of grant you are awarded we will agree these with you separately once an award has been agreed.   

Successful projects will be required to submit 6 month and end of year self monitoring reports to feedback how the project is being delivered and if the proposed outcomes and targets are being met. Depending on the value of the grant and the nature of your service a review visit may also be arranged.

Application guidance notes and online form