Significant public funds are available from Government departments, Europe, local authorities and government agencies. It reaches the voluntary and community sector through a raft of different initiatives, grant schemes, funding agreements and contracts from central and local government, government agencies and intermediary bodies.

Public funding broadly splits into the following categories:

• Funding for services which the public sector is legally required to deliver – like health, social care, education and transport.
• Funding for activities which support or complement mainstream public service delivery or enhance the quality of life for local residents – like community safety projects, self-help groups and lunch clubs for the elderly
• Funding for activities that contribute to economic regeneration – like job creation and skills development schemes or business start-up grants.
• Developmental funding to help get new services started and to test out new ways of working.

Public funding supports programmes in line with government policy and priorities. Because policies change so do the pots of money and even the names of the bodies that distribute it. This means you have to be alert to changes. Government departments are increasingly funding time limited programmes for local organisations with voluntary bodies or networks administering grants.

Another trend is for local authorities to become purchasers of services rather than providers and this has meant a shift away from grant aid and toward competitive tendering and contracting. Organisations wanting to access this form of funding have to bid competitively for these contracts and be able to meet a range of conditions and standards.