Young Westminster Foundation & Westminster City Council are delighted to announce that we have awarded 17 grants totalling £280 000 to youth organisations across Westminster as part of the inaugural round of The Westminster Brighter Futures Fund. This investment will support Westminster’s young people and their families over the upcoming 12 months.
This funding was made available by Westminster City Council, with further contributions from The St. Giles Charities, The Mercers’ Company, Shaftesbury, Colas Rail, LandSec, Capital Arches Group, London & Regional Properties and Howard de Walden Estate. The investment in youth services sits at the heart of the Council’s ambition to create a City for All and contributes to the growing community of like-minded stakeholders investing in young people in Westminster.
Phil Barron, CEO of Young Westminster Foundation, said “we would like to thank all of our contributing partners who recognise the importance of investing in young people and help building an even stronger community in Westminster through cross-sector collaboration. We are thrilled to be able to support our members in this way and hope to give grants to many more organisations in the years to come.”
This grants programme builds upon the findings of YWF’s report A City within a City. It has been designed to respond to the identified needs of young people in Westminster, to allow providers to work with Youth and Family Hubs across Westminster and to test approaches to engaging and supporting young people and to sign up to Westminster City Council’s Early Help Strategy 2019 – 2022.
This represents an opportunity for all organisations in Westminster to create an Early Help system which puts children, young people and their families first and strives to create a joint response to emerging needs, ensuring the best use of resources.
Cllr Heather Acton, Cabinet Member for Family Services and Public Health, added “the uptake of this funding only announced last summer is a positive development for youth services in Westminster. We know that well-run youth services have a massive role to play in helping our young people to develop into productive members of society and also in tackling social issues such as serious youth violence. With 17 providers organisations involved as partners with us and our five Youth Hubs to help implement our Early Help Strategy, it means we are taking a strategic approach across the sector to improve young people’s lives.”
The YWF Members who have been awarded funding are:
- Adventure Play Hub
- Avenues Youth Project
- Caxton Youth Organisation
- Dragon Eggs Digital
- DreamArts
- Eat Club
- Fourth Feathers Youth Club
- London Sports Trust
- London Tigers
- Marylebone Bangladeshi Society
- Paddington Arts
- Pan Intercultural Arts
- Positive View
- St Andrews Youth Club
- The Westminster Society
- Westminster Befriend a Family
- Wigmore Hall
Young Westminster Foundation is a cross sector partnership which connects youth charities, young people, businesses, Westminster City Council and other government & strategic organisations such as universities, the Met Police & the NHS. Together the YWF community creates the best opportunities and services for the children & young people of Westminster. This positively impacts young people with better outcomes around health & resilience, staying safe with success in employment & education and better social mobility.
If you are interested in supporting The Westminster Brighter Futures Fund please contact phil@ywfoundation.com.
