Fantastic news …. for some time BGU (Bolton Green Umbrella) have been lobbying Bolton Council to formalise on-going funding for us to continue supporting the work of the voluntary groups registered on our website.
For the last two financial years we have received funding of £25,000pa from Bolton Council which has had a beneficial impact on environmental volunteering. Read our 2023/24 Funding Feedback report to see how the money was spent and the benefits it brought for communities, green spaces and wildlife, in particular the micro grants programme which awarded 68 grants of £200 each to all kinds of groups and activities which are listed on Page 8. The second year of funding is April 2024/March 2025 and we will be producing another feedback report at the end of that period.
That funding came from the allocation of UKSPF (UK Shared Prosperity Funding) which Bolton Council received from central Government, but BGU demonstrated that one-off funding like this makes it extremely difficult for us to plan for the future, and may have resulted in us having no funding at all from April 2025. We need a sustainable source of support going forward so that we can assure our member groups that we can continue to support them. We submitted a Business Case to support this request and to justify the investment by the Council.
We are delighted to report that Bolton Council have responded, and here is link to Councillor Richard Silvester’s speech at the full council meeting where the new budget was passed, in which he specifically refers to BGU, volunteers, and the fact that funding is now mainstreamed. He also outlines the additional £1.6 million investments being made by the Council into a range of services relating to the environment. This article in the Bolton News provides additional information about investment for improvements in some of Bolton’s parks.
So here’s to the coming year!
