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ECB County Grants Fund

ECB County Grants Fund

The Lancashire Cricket Foundation are pleased to provide details of the ECB County Grants Fund.

Launched in September 2021, the County Grants Fund aims to support affiliated Cricket Clubs to deliver sustainable projects in the following three areas:

  • Creating Welcoming Environments
  • Providing Enhanced Facilities and Playing Opportunities for Women’s and Girls’ Cricket and / or Disability Cricket
  • Tackling Climate Change

To access the guidance notes in full - including the eligibility criteria for each of the themes above - please click here. Clubs can apply for between £1,000 and £10,000.

Prior to applying, clubs are strongly encouraged to complete our Expression of Interest form this will help us to determine whether your project is eligible, your readiness to proceed and the wider benefits to cricket in Lancashire. The EOI will also enable us to support you with a full application at the relevant time, or to signpost you to other funding opportunities as appropriate.

To assist clubs in identifying where they may need to improve their facilities and to demonstrate why a project is needed, ECB have also produced a ‘Creating Welcoming Environments’ resource. The CWE guide includes some useful self-assessment documents, which can be found below:

 

HOW WILL THE COUNTY GRANTS FUND BE MANAGED IN LANCASHIRE?

Eligibility and Prioritisation – The County Grants Fund is an ECB-funded scheme and as such priority will be given to clubs actively engaged in ECB programmes - All Stars, Dynamos, Junior Cricket, Women’s and Girls’ Cricket and / or Disability Cricket - this is clearly communicated within the guidance notes. The ‘tackling climate change’ theme is open to all affiliated clubs. Projects that have been thoroughly thought out, with wider club consultation, partnership funding and use of the ECB Creating Welcoming Environments resource, will be looked on more favourably.

Additionally, clubs will need to achieve compliance on the Safe Hands Management System (SHMS) to demonstrate that basic safeguarding standards have been met.
Non-Clubmark clubs will be asked for evidence that the Club Safeguarding Officer and other volunteers working in roles with children have the necessary safeguarding and vetting checks in place.

Affiliation - Clubs must have paid their LCF Affiliation Fee for 2021 (or must do so prior to an application proceeding) - these are collected in the main via your league.

 

Club Audit - Clubs must have returned their Club Audit for 2021 (or must do so prior to an application proceeding).

Awards Panel – The annual budget for the CGF is set nationally by ECB, however the scheme will be administered locally, with County Boards given the autonomy to make decisions about which (eligible) projects they wish to support. In Lancashire we have appointed an ‘Awards Panel’ who will meet monthly to review all applications.

Scale of support – The County Grants Fund has been launched by ECB as a priority for supporting the recreational game and to deliver on the ambitions of its Inspiring Generations Strategy. As such there are very positive levels of investment attributed to the fund. Within Lancashire’s annual budget it may not be possible however to support every application, with some projects deferred to the next funding window or signposted to other sources of funding as appropriate. 

NB – The County Grants Fund is not a direct replacement for the ECB Small Grants Scheme. The project themes are very different with potentially higher levels of investment and as such there may be a greater degree of interaction between club and County Board to ensure the aspirations of both organisations are supported.
 

APPLICATION PROCESS

Applications are now open via the ECB IMS system and the process is explained in the ECB guidance notes. Clubs are encouraged to complete the Expression of Interest form first.

  1. Lancashire aim to respond to any expressions of interest within 7 days. ‘Eligible projects’ from affiliated clubs will then be signposted to the full application process.
  2. Full applications will be reviewed by the Awards Panel at the first available opportunity. The Panel will meet at monthly intervals and will aim to communicate a decision within 30 days of receiving the application – where the next Panel meeting sits outside of this window, clubs will be notified of when they can expect a decision.
  3. The amount of grant offered for successful applications may differ from that requested by the club. Applications will be referred to clubs if this is the case.
  4. There will be an appeal process for clubs should they wish to contest the Panel’s decision. Appeals will be heard by group independent of the Awards Panel. 
  5. Funds applied for cannot be used to cover professional fees and applications will not be accepted from bid writers (support is provided free of charge to clubs by the LCF Cricket Development Officers - see below).

NEXT STEPS 

  1. Familiarise yourself with the guidance notes 
  2. Use the ‘Creating Welcoming Environments’ resource, survey and checklist to help develop your project plan.  
  3. Identify who from your club will lead on your project – you will need two contacts both of which must be officers of your club with at least one being Chair or Treasurer.
  4. Applicants must use individual email accounts and not generic email accounts to register on IMS.
  5. All signatories MUST be an Officer of the Cricket Club.
  6. When you feel you have a project, please use the Expression of Interest form

CONTACT

For further information please contact your local Cricket Development Officer:

If your project has a women’s & girls’ theme, please also contact your Women & Girls Cricket Development Officer:

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