Having awarded grants of £1.2M in December, we are on track to award another £1.2M at the end of March. As usual, we are oversubscribed with bids for grants, which demonstrates not only the volume of good work that applicants for grants are doing to help the armed forces community but also, perhaps, the difficulty some organisations are experiencing in the current economic environment to raise money. Your support as a subscriber to the Veterans’ Lottery, or as a donor to the Veterans’ Foundation is so important, so thank you.
You will also be delighted to know that as a result of the growth of the Veterans’ Lottery we are making changes to the prize structure in March. The first prize will rise from £5,000 to £7,000, while the second prize will be boosted from £2,000 to £3,500. The number of third prizes on offer will be doubled, so there will now be 80 chances to win £120 in each monthly draw. The Rollover Jackpot still gives players a chance to win up to a total of £50,000 and these changes will come into effect from March's draw.
Occasionally we award repeating quarterly grants to organisations (subject to certain requirements) that meet particular needs of the armed forces community. The one I would like to highlight has been the £200K we awarded last year (and more to come this year) through the Contact Group and via the following organisations to help veterans with mental health challenges: WWTW, Combat Stress, Icarus, PTSD Resolution, Rock to Recovery, Brooke House.
Some users of this large grant enable rapid intervention for individuals in trouble, intervention that may have save lives. We continue to see this as an important area to fund and acknowledge that the Veterans’ Foundation’s funding dovetails well with the Government’s 'Op Courage' funding for mental heath.
Another beneficiary of the Veterans’ Foundation’s grants is Walking With The Wounded (WWTW), which delivers employment, mental health support, care coordination and volunteering programmes in collaboration with the NHS, all to get those who served, and their families, whether mentally, socially or physically wounded, back on their feet and making a positive contribution once more.
Veterans’ Foundation grants to WWTW amounted to some £240K over the past couple of years. I recently visited their North East Hub and am more than satisfied that these grants are being put to very good and very important effect to help those people with complex needs.
Finally, I would like to enlist your support to find some corporate funders who would like to support the Veterans’ Foundation in providing considerable social impact. If you know of any businesses who’d like to join us in making a difference to those in need, please pass them our contact details: fundraising@veteransfoundation.org.uk
Thank you for your invaluable support.
