Deadline: 14-May-21
The Inspiring Scotland is pleased to announce the Equality and Human Rights Fund to support organisations that deliver work focused on tackling inequality and discrimination, furthering equality, and advancing the realisation of human rights in Scotland.
The Equality and Human Rights Fund is a new funding programme to support organisations working to advance equality and realise human rights in Scotland.
The programme is an evolution of previous Scottish Government funding streams including the ‘Promoting Equality and Cohesion Fund’ (PECF) and Scottish Government funding for national partners.
Vision: A Scotland which is inclusive, free from discrimination, where the human rights of everyone are respected, protected, and fulfilled.
Aim
The aim of the funding programme is to: Support civil society organisations and partners to develop, embed and mainstream equality and human rights within policy and practice in Scotland in line with the ambitions of relevant Scottish Government strategies and the National Performance Framework.
Objectives
To fund, support, develop and learn from civil society organisations and partnerships that:
- Develop and deliver work that is grounded in the progression, protection and realisation of human rights.
- Deliver support to address the needs of people facing structural inequality and develop and deliver work to increase participation and empowerment.
- Support delivery of commitments within relevant Scottish Government equality and human right strategies, action plans and documents.
- Generate data, learning and insight into the experience of people to support analysis and challenge on equality and human rights issues, across a wide range of policy areas.
Funding Information
- The Fund will distribute up to £7 million annually for three years from October 2021 to September 2024.
Funding Priorities
A range of activity with different groups will be considered for funding through the Equality and Human Rights Fund. There are themes of work that they would like to see included to help support equity of provision and contribute to the learning required as they work towards the intended impact of the programme.
These include:
- Proposals that support individuals and groups of people with protected characteristics, particularly where they face barriers to equality or to realising their human rights.
- Proposals that demonstrate how different protected characteristics and other factors (such as socio-economic deprivation and geographical location) interact and impact on the realisation of equality and human rights and that take an intersectional/ holistic view of the needs, challenges and barriers for these people.
- Proposals that address or inform responses to the unequal impacts and magnified inequality that has resulted from the COVID-19 pandemic.
- Proposals that develop the learning and understanding about ways to support individuals and communities realise their human rights.
For the purposes of the funding programme, protected characteristics are (a) age, (b) sex, (c) sexual orientation, (d) gender reassignment, (e) disability and (f) race.
Other protected characteristics (i) religion and belief; (ii) marriage and civil partnership; and (iii) pregnancy and maternity are not included, as this work is led by other Scottish Government portfolios.
This does not exclude organisations working in these areas from applying to deliver work related to protected characteristics (a) – (f).
Outcomes
- Intermediate Outcomes
- People have greater awareness of their human rights and how to access them
- People with protected characteristics have increased influence in decisions that affect them
- People with protected characteristics have increased access to remedy where their rights have not been upheld
- People with protected characteristics have increased participation in public life
- The Scottish Government has better access to data and depth of information about the experiences of people with protected characteristics
- Longer-term Outcomes
- Actors in civil society increasingly use Scotland’s domestic and international equality and human rights framework to influence and effect change
- The experience of people with protected characteristics is increasingly used to inform the policy and practice of public bodies
- Public services increasingly embed equality and human rights in their strategic planning and their day-to-day functions
Eligibility Criteria
- The Equality and Human Rights Fund will invest in a range of civil society organisations that deliver work focussed on tackling inequality and discrimination, furthering equality, and advancing the realisation of human rights in Scotland.
- Single applications are welcome from: civil society organisations including incorporated third sector organisations that are registered with the Scottish Charity Regulator (OSCR), and Community Interest Companies (CICs)
- Partnership applications are welcome from: civil society organisations including incorporated third sector organisations that are registered with the Scottish Charity Regulator (OSCR), Community Interest Companies (CICs), and public sector organisations where the third sector body is the lead partner.
- All applicants should be able to demonstrate how their work supports the Equality and Human Rights Fund vision, aim and objectives, and how it will contribute to intermediate and longer-term outcomes.
- Applicants will also need to evidence that they have good governance and a commitment to equality and diversity.
For more information, visit https://www.inspiringscotland.org.uk/what-we-do/our-funds/equality-and-human-rights/