New Funding to Help Improve the Health of Local Areas

The Local Government Association (LGA), in partnership with the Health Foundation, seeks to improve health and health inequalities in local areas through a new grant funding opportunity – Shaping Places for Healthier Lives.

The programme encourages local systems and partnerships to start with a health (or health-related) outcome that is considered a key issue in their area. They will identify the system of interrelated factors that drive the health outcome. Teams will then work out what actions to take to shape the system to improve health of the local population through cross-sector working. 

The objectives are to:

Mobilise cross-sector action through sustainable system change at a local level

Support local authorities to facilitate and enable local partnerships for system change

Learn how to make changes that impact on the wider determinants of health so that learning can be shared.

As a result of this programme five projects will be funded to make sustainable changes to local systems, which are consistent with improved population health, and designed to last beyond the lifetime of the programme. Learning will be captured to allow these approaches to be applied in other areas and to wider health-related issues.

This programme will fund applications that are led by local authorities in England which have responsibility for public health and have strong engagement from communities and other sectors (e.g. private, voluntary, community and faith sectors).

Following an expression of interest and submission of a further developed proposal, 12 applicants will be supported with a development grant of up to £20,000 plus expert advice. This will enable councils to fully develop their final proposal through system mapping, developing a theory of change and building local partnerships.

Final awards will be awarded to five selected proposals, up to a total of £300,000 over three years.

The deadline for expression of interest forms is 17 January 2020 (4pm).

Following an initial expression of interest, up to 30 council-led projects will be taken into the next round of selection in January 2020. Councils will be supported via workshops to understand the complex systems in their area and develop proposals further. In April 2020, up to 12 councils will be offered a development grant to develop their full proposal.

More information about this funding opportunity and the application process is available on the GRANTfinder funding information platform. GRANTfinder provides up-to-the minute content, insight and analysis on funding news and policy. To find out more about how GRANTfinder can keep you in the know, and subscription fees, contact us today.