In April 2025, the National Lottery Community Fund (NLCF) refreshed its strategy, ‘It Starts With Community’, building on its original 2023–2030 framework. The updated version places greater emphasis on addressing inequality, promoting community leadership, and creating a lasting impact through both service and infrastructure.
A central shift is the introduction of two explicit funding priorities: supporting people and communities experiencing poverty, disadvantage, or discrimination, and enabling them to shape the decisions that affect their lives. Alongside these are four thematic “missions”, covering inclusion, health, young people, and the environment, all of which require applicants to be more targeted and strategic in how they frame their work.
For charities already embedded in their communities or working in partnerships to improve local outcomes, these changes present new opportunities, particularly in terms of capital funding, co-designed projects, and even work that contributes to structural change.
But with this opportunity comes greater complexity. Applications now require sharper focus, clearer alignment, and more thought about both impact and legacy. Here are five key things to keep in mind as you navigate the new strategy.
1. Understand Disadvantage, Discrimination and Poverty
All applicants must now clearly demonstrate how their work supports individuals or communities experiencing poverty, disadvantage, or discrimination. This is a central priority in the refreshed NLCF strategy, and a significant shift for organisations that haven’t previously framed their work in these terms.
For charities already embedded in underserved or marginalised communities, this change is a positive opportunity to make their case more directly. For others, it’s essential to reflect on who benefits from your work, how you reduce barriers to access, and whether your project can be positioned more explicitly around tackling inequality.
NLCF wants applicants to demonstrate not only who they support, but how they reach those who might otherwise be excluded, how they adapt their services to meet different needs, and what knowledge or experience they bring to the issues. A good response will show an understanding that disadvantage is complex and layered, sometimes shaped by intersectional factors like race, disability, income, and care experience.
Craigmyle tip: Use both data (e.g. the Index of Multiple Deprivation, local health statistics, or school exclusion rates) and community insight to explain who you’re working with, why they are affected, and how your work makes a difference.
For example, if you’re running a youth mental health programme in an area that is only ranked in the top 50% most deprived in the country, show how your service reaches young people who are also more likely to be excluded from school, have SEND, or face racial discrimination—then explain how your model is designed to address those intersecting challenges.
2. Prioritise Community Leadership, Not Just Consultation
The NLCF strategy now goes well beyond encouraging community consultation. It places real emphasis on community leadership, asking applicants to show how people with lived experience of the issues are helping to shape, lead, and deliver the work, not just give feedback on it.
This represents a step change; they now want to see that projects are being co-designed with the communities they aim to support. That means involving people, and communities in planning, delivery and decision-making, not just testing ideas or asking for input after the fact.
Examples of this in practice might include partnering with a local charities or other grassroots or peer-led organisation to co-develop and deliver a service, setting up a steering group made up of service users or local community representatives, or ensuring that your staff or Board includes people with lived experience of poverty, discrimination, or the specific challenges your project addresses.
NLCF is also encouraging stronger local partnerships, especially those that show genuine power-sharing and avoid duplication. Collaboration with other charities, schools, faith organisations or community leaders can strengthen your case.
Craigmyle tip: Be clear about who is involved in shaping your project and how. Don’t just name partners—explain their role. Don’t just say you involve the community—show how they influence decisions. Funders will be looking for substance, not slogans.
For example, if you’re an arts organisation that already works with groups like a local youth theatre, a mental health support charity, and a migrant women’s creative collective, show how you’re collaborating with these partners to co-design new programmes based on shared community needs—from inclusive workshops and exhibitions to creative wellbeing sessions or public engagement projects. Demonstrate how community voices have shaped your priorities, and how your team or Board includes people who reflect the diversity of those you work with.
3. Create Inclusive Spaces for Coming Together, and Plan for Lasting Impact
One of the clearest developments in the NLCF’s updated strategy is a renewed emphasis on capital funding, particularly where it helps people come together in safe, inclusive and community-led spaces. This marks a real shift in approach, opening up opportunities for organisations that may not have previously seen themselves as eligible.
Schools, churches, and other groups with community buildings now have a stronger case for applying, especially where their spaces are can be used by local partners, or have the potential to do so with investment.
The NLCF wants to support places where communities can connect, especially in areas where people are least able to come together, due to poverty, discrimination, digital exclusion or lack of accessible facilities.
This might include adapting a school hall for after-hours community use, transforming a church space into a warm hub or social kitchen, creating a new sensory garden or outdoor learning space, or developing hybrid and digital platforms for people who can’t access in-person services. Importantly, capital projects are not just about buildings; they’re about what happens inside them, who uses them, and what they make possible over time.
That’s why legacy planning is essential. NLCF will want to see how your space or platform will remain relevant, welcoming, and financially sustainable in the long run.
Think about:
· Who will use the space in future, and how their needs will be met
· What partnerships, income or volunteer networks will support its upkeep
· What lasting impact will the space have on health, wellbeing, relationships or local resilience
Craigmyle tip: If you’re developing a shared space, emphasise both inclusion now and legacy later.
For example, a church working with a mental health charity, a toddler group, and a local ESOL provider to co-design a welcoming community hub could show how different groups will use the space from day one. If the project also includes a long-term plan, like training local volunteers to run activities, securing small rental income from regular groups, it shows the legacy of lasting, community-owned impact that the NLCF is keen to support.
4. Structural Change Is Now Explicitly Part of the Picture
The refreshed NLCF strategy opens the door more clearly than ever before to organisations tackling structural inequality. While the fund has always supported projects that improve individual lives, it now explicitly acknowledges that lasting change often requires shifts in systems, institutions, and policy, and that this is important when supporting communities.
This is good news for charities already working in advocacy, campaigning, or second-tier roles, those who may not have previously considered themselves eligible for funding, such as NLCF. That said, you don’t need to be a policy organisation to engage with this theme, but it is worth considering if your work does/could have an impact on structural inequalities. Many community-focused projects contribute to structural change by:
· Elevating lived experience in service design
· Influencing how local systems respond to need
· Strengthening community voice in decision-making
The key is to reflect on whether your work helps shift how things work, not just what happens.
Craigmyle tip: If your project helps communities change the systems affecting them, even in modest ways, make that clear. For example, an advocacy charity that supports disabled people to campaign for accessible local services and works with the council to revise its access policies is making a structural intervention. It’s not just solving individual problems—it’s improving how the system works for everyone. Funders like the NLCF are increasingly open to this kind of impact.
5. Get Ready for a Longer, More Demanding Application Process
While the NCLF’s strategy brings welcome clarity and opportunity, it also comes with a more involved and demanding application process, particularly for Reaching Communities and larger or capital grants.
The average timeline from start to finish is now up to 9 months, split into two main stages:
· Stage 1 (Expression of Interest): Up to 4 months for a decision after submission
· Stage 2 (Full Application): Up to 6 months for final approval after submitting further detail
But it’s not just about timing, the structure of the strategy itself makes applying it more complex.
Organisations now need to address two explicit funding priorities and show how their work aligns with one or more of the four missions. Many projects will naturally touch on more than one mission, such as improving health, supporting young people, or promoting inclusive spaces, so applicants must think carefully about which thread to lead with and how to keep their application focused and clear within a limited word count.
There’s also a stronger expectation that applicants demonstrate how they are reaching and responding to diverse communities, including those experiencing poverty, discrimination or disadvantage. In addition, funders are looking for evidence of co-design, where services are shaped with the community, not just for them, and for clear signs of shared leadership, for example, through partnerships with grassroots organisations or the involvement of people with lived experience on delivery teams or Boards.
For some, this will mean strengthening or reframing existing work. For others, it may involve building new relationships or revisiting how decisions are made.
Craigmyle tip: With more expectations and more moving parts, clarity is key.
Decide early which priority and mission your work best aligns with, and structure your application around that core. Be honest about how you’re working with your community—and if you’re still developing that aspect, say so and explain your next steps. Funders don’t expect perfection, but they do expect purpose, focus, and integrity
Final Thoughts
The National Lottery’s refreshed strategy offers more clarity, ambition, and opportunity, particularly for those working at the sharp end of inequality. But it also demands more from applicants: stronger leadership, deeper insight, and sharper articulation of long-term impact.
If you’re considering a bid and want to ensure your project is well positioned, Craigmyle can help. From shaping your strategy to drafting compelling applications, we bring insight, experience, and practical support.
