Applications can only be accepted from voluntary, ‘not for profit’ organisations, associations, groups and clubs or consortiums/partnerships which have a strong community focus for their activities.

The range of organisations eligible to apply are:

• Scottish Charitable Incorporated Organisations (SCIO)
• Unincorporated Associations
• Companies Limited by Guarantee
• Trusts
• Not-for-profit company or asset locked company or Community Interest Companies (CIC)
• Cooperative and Community Benefit Societies
• Community Councils
• Unconstituted Groups

If your group doesn’t have its own bank account, an alternative constitute group or third sector organisation (such as a local community centre) would be allowed to hold the grant on your behalf. The group would be expected to seek and manage this arrangement. The organisation ‘hosting’ the grant would simply need to complete the ‘Bank Account Host’ form, and this would be submitted to ACVO along with the application form.)

• Parent Councils**

(**Parent Councils are eligible to apply, subject to the funded activities meeting the aims of the Fund and specifically focusing on supporting young people aged 16 or over or supporting adults rather than their children. Any Parent Council applying to this fund must have a statutory duty to keep proper accounts, for which there may already be legal and regulatory requirements for them to do so depending on the status of the Parent Council, for example, some parent councils are registered with OSCR as a charity.

ACVO encourages applications that will support one or more of the following groups:

• Women particularly women experiencing gender-based violence.
• People with a long-term health condition or disability.
• People from a Minority Ethnic background.
• Refugees and those with no recourse to public funds.
• Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender and Intersex (LGBTI) communities.
• People facing socio-economic disadvantage.
• People experiencing severe and multiple disadvantage.
• People with diagnosed mental illness; people affected by psychological trauma (including adverse childhood experiences).
• People who have experienced bereavement or loss.
• People disadvantaged by geographical location (particularly remote and rural areas).
• Older people (aged 65 and above).
• Unpaid Carers.
• People with Dementia/Alzheimer’s disease.
• Neurodiverse groups.

The focus of the Fund is to support the adult population (defined as members of the population aged 16 years and over). Children can be a secondary beneficiary of the Fund; however the primary beneficiary must be adults from the targeted ‘at risk’ group. The Children and Young People’s Community Mental Health and Wellbeing Supports Fund, managed by local authorities, focuses on supporting the ‘Fit Like? Family Wellbeing Hubs in Aberdeen City.

We Can Fund

• Equipment.
• One-off events.
• Hall hire for community spaces.
• Staff costs (these should be one off, fixed term and hourly rate should be paid at a minimum of the Real Living Wage of £12 pr/hr).
• Training costs.
• Utilities/running costs.
• Volunteer expenses.
• Small capital spend up to £5000 – e.g. construction, refurbishment and/or purchase of buildings, amenities or vehicles.

We Cannot Fund

• Contingency costs, loans, endowments, or interest.
• Electricity generation and feed-in tariff payment.
• Political or religious campaigning (please note that faith-based organisations are eligible to apply with the exclusion of any religious campaigning activities or activities restricted only to members of the faith-based organisation. TSIs should undertake due diligence around these matters).
• Profit-making/fundraising activities.
• VAT you can reclaim.
• Transport.
• Statutory activities.
• Overseas travel.
• Alcohol.
• Direct therapeutic interventions, such as counselling or CBT.
• Initiatives whose primary beneficiaries are under 16 years old.

Please see the Year 4 Application Guidance PDF for more details

NEW APPLICATION AND ASSESSMENT PROCESS FOR YEAR 4

In previous years, the Fund opened to Level 1 and 2 application, they were submitted and members of the Fund Partnership Group for Aberdeen City aimed to assess applications within 5-10 working days of submission to ACVO.Grant offers and grant payments were then made following confirmation of grant approval of each eligible application.

However, in Year 3, with the funding landscape being extremely competitive due to the cost-of-living crisis, the increase in the awareness of the Fund and many funded organisations in year 1 and year 2 applying for continuation funding, an overwhelming number of excellent applications were received in just a couple of weeks, resulting in the fund closing very quickly and lots of organisations sadly being disappointed as they were still preparing their applications.

Unfortunately, the funding landscape is equally challenging this year.In response to feedback from organisations and to ensure that those groups less experienced in applying for funding and/or needing time to develop their application, the Fund Partnership Group has agreed to change the application and assessment process for Year 4. This will allow organisations time to access support from ACVO’s Funding Officer, plan and submit their applications.

THERE WILL BE TWO ROUNDS OF FUNDING IN YEAR 4.

Round 1 of funding is now closed to applications. 

Round 2 of the Fund opened on Monday 13th January and will close on Friday 7th February 2025. 

The first stage of the application process is to complete the eligibility checker to ensure that your organisation and/or project is eligible to apply to the Fund.  This can be found on the Fund application page at acvo.org.uk/cmhwfund.  If your organisation is eligible to apply, you will then be able to access the application form. If your organisation and / or project is not eligible to apply to the Fund, email our Funding Officer at claire.shaw@acvo.org.uk if you would like support with identifying other funding opportunities. 

Constituted organisations and Unconstituted Groups can only submit one application in Round 2 of the Fund. The maximum grant that can be awarded is £3000. 

The primary aim of Round 2 is to encourage applications from small grass roots organisations and groups with a maximum annual income of £150,000* operating at a very local level within Aberdeen City.  Applications for new and innovative community-based activity are particular sought.  Small organisations who have not applied or received funding in Round 1 will be given priority in Round 2 to strengthen the ambition of the Fund in Aberdeen City outlined by the Scottish Government.   

If you submitted a Level 1 application in Round 1, however you were unsuccessful (due to the extremely high volume of applications received) you can request that your application is resubmitted in Round 2 if the application meets the eligibility criteria highlighted above.  All resubmitted applications will be reassessed against the revised criteria and success is dependant on the volume and quality of applications received in Round 2. Your organisation is also welcome to submit a new application to support new activity if you were unsuccessful in Round 1.  Confirmation of successful Round 1 applications will be announced on Wednesday 15th January. For further information, please email claire.shaw@acvo.org.uk.  

Assessment of Round 2 applications will take place in February and early March (after the closing sate of the 7th February). The Partnership Group will then assess all eligible applications. The constitution of this group includes representatives from the Third Sector, Aberdeen City Council, NHS Grampian and Aberdeen Health and Social Care Partnership. New for year 4 will be the establishment of a Lived Experience Panel who will sit alongside the Partnership Group. Collectively members will score each application using a clear scoring criteria that aligns with the Scottish Governments guidance.

ACVO’s Funding Officer will be responsible for conducting an initial quality assurance check to ensure applications are complete and eligible to be put forward for consideration, due diligence checks, overseeing compliance and management of conflict of interest throughout the assessment process.

Notification of Round 2 funding decisions are dependent on the number of applications that have been submitted as this will impact the amount of time that needs to be dedicated to assessment.

Round 1 of funding took considerably longer than had been anticipated due to the very high number of applications that were received. It is recommended that you do not schedule your activity to commence until April 2025 at the earliest.

To access further advice or support relating to the Fund, the application process, or for any other reason, please email ACVO’s Funding Officer, Claire Shaw at claire.shaw@acvo.org.uk. Claire will either contact you directly or forward your request onto the appropriate team member to help you with your enquiry.