Women’s Aid and Comic Relief to distribute ‘Big Night In’ Gender Justice fund to member services
We are delighted to be partnered with Comic Relief in order to distribute some of the ‘Big Night In’ Gender Justice fund to Women’s Aid Federation England (WAFE) member services.
In line with our commitment to the Charity So White open letter, we ring-fenced a proportion of this fund for our led by and for Black and Minoritised women’s services. We developed an independent and representative panel in order to maximise transparency around distribution of this fund. We thank our sister organisations for their support with this project and for sharing their expertise as part of the decision-making panel. The panel was made up of:
- Rehaila Sharif and Jo Costello (job share); Interim Head of Member Support Services, WAFE
- Dion Spence; Head of Membership and Sustainability, Imkaan
- Rehana Reid; Head of Grants, Rosa Fund for Women
- Naomi Dickson; WAFE board member and CEO Jewish Women’s Aid, who are an existing Comic Relief grant holder and so ineligible to apply for this fund.
We are delighted to have made awards to 35 of our member services, spread across every region in England. In total, we allocated £720,544, with £363,422 (50.4%) of this fund being awarded to specialist ‘led by and for’ Black and Minoritised women’s services, who are facing a ‘dual pandemic’. The full list of grantees is published below. We thank every member service who applied and we hope for the unsuccessful applicants, it was a process that helped them to understand more about the impact of Covid-19 on their organisations.
The funds awarded to our life-saving member services will make a significant difference to the support they are able to provide to survivors’ and their children during the coronavirus pandemic. We are grateful to Comic Relief for supporting us to grant the donations to our member services and we thank the general public and corporate supporters for their very generous donations which made this project possible.
Appendix 1
| Number | Name of Service | Region | Specialist BME | Amount Awarded (£) | Round |
| 1 | Wycombe Women’s Aid | South East | N | 20,000 | 1 |
| 2 | EVA Women’s Aid | North East | N | 21,450 | 1 |
| 3 | Stepping Stones | East of England | N | 24,244 | 1 |
| 4 | Living Without Abuse | East Midlands | N | 16,204.61 | 1 |
| 5 | Coventry Haven | West Midlands | N | 25,250 | 1 |
| 6 | HARV | North West | N | 30,000 | 1 |
| 7 | Anah Project | Yorkshire & Humber | Y | 36,000 | 1 |
| 8 | Opoka | South West | Y | 36,000 | 1 |
| 9 | Crossroads Derbyshire | East Midlands | N | 20,000 | 1 |
| 10 | Panahghar | West Midlands | Y | 36,000 | 1 |
| 11 | Apna Haq | Yorkshire & Humber | Y | 36,000 | 1 |
| 12 | The Dash Charity | South East | N | 24,798 | 1 |
| 13 | Roshni | West Midlands | Y | 35,962 | 1 |
| 14 | My Sister’s Place | North East | N | 29,559 | 1 |
| 15 | Peterborough Women’s Aid | East of England | N | 20,000 | 1 |
| 16 | Sahara In Preston | North West | Y | 16,000 | 2 |
| 17 | Rochdale Women’s Welfare Association | North West | Y | 16,000 | 2 |
| 18 | Al-Hasaniya Moroccan Women’s Centre | London | Y | 21,000 | 2 |
| 19 | SATEDA | South East | N | 14,372 | 2 |
| 20 | KMEWO | London | Y | 21,393 | 2 |
| 21 | LAWA | London | Y | 16,000 | 2 |
| 22 | Havering Women’s Aid | South East | N | 10,000 | 2 |
| 23 | Newcastle Women’s Aid | North East | N | 11,700 | 2 |
| 24 | Claudia Jones Organisation | London | Y | 22,754 | 2 |
| 25 | VOICES | South West | N | 15,000 | 2 |
| 26 | Amadudu | North West | Y | 19,395 | 2 |
| 27 | The Halo Project | North East | Y | 12,000 | 2 |
| 28 | Vida Sheffield | Yorkshire & Humber | N | 11,500 | 2 |
| 29 | We R Here | East Midlands | N | 12,500 | 2 |
| 30 | Haven House | Yorkshire & Humber | N | 12,450 | 2 |
| 31 | Eden House | Yorkshire & Humber | Y | 18,300 | 2 |
| 32 | Saheli | North West | Y | 20,618 | 2 |
| 33 | SLDAS | North West | N | 15,000 | 2 |
| 34 | Women’s Aid in Luton | East of England | N | 8005 | 2 |
| 35 | Gilgal | West Midlands | N | 15,000 | 2 |
