Commonweal Housing: Call for New Ideas - Migration, Asylum and Human Trafficking

Overview

To streamline their work and resources, Commonweal currently focuses its projects into three broad thematic policy areas. These are:

• The migration, asylum and human trafficking systems
• Young people with difficult transitions into adulthood
• The criminal justice system

For more information on how we work please visit here

Overview

The Call for New Ideas is their invitation to not-for-profits across the UK to come to them with new and imaginative ideas for housing and support models that seek to address a specific social injustice.

Up-to three applicants will receive between £5,000-£10,000 in grant funding. This money is for you to conduct a feasibility study to evaluate your model.

The aim is to work in partnership with you to bring your models to life. It starts with your lightbulb idea, and it finishes, they hope, with a housing and support pilot project running over 5-10 years.

They would support partners throughout the project development stage until the end of its life cycle, including collecting and sharing project learnings to inform best practice and influence policy across the sector.

What is the focus?

For this Call for New Ideas, they are only looking for ideas that tackle injustice faced by vulnerable migrants, those in the asylum system and survivors of trafficking.

They are especially interested in ideas for housing projects that seek to:

• Address transition points between and within systems that drive housing insecurity (such as asylum to refugee status, the NRM lifecycle, unaccompanied minors to adulthood, family reunification, etc.)
• Support survivors of trafficking, both non-UK and UK nationals.
• Demonstrate possible long term cost savings benefits for the government through focusing on community integration or employability support, as examples.

To help guide their thinking for the Call, they commissioned housing and migration specialist Professor Philip Brown to undertake horizon-scanning research exploring the specific cohorts and key areas where individuals are at greater risk of housing injustice.

The full report can be found here

This Call exclusively focuses on injustices around the migration, asylum, and trafficking fields so they would be unable to consider any ideas outside this area.

How does it work?

• Step 1 - Your ideas
  • You, as a lone organisation or in partnership with another(s), come up with an idea for a way in which housing and support can help solve a social injustice.
• Step 2 – Submission
  • You submit your proposal using their Application Form and email it to apply@Commonweal.org.uk. The application window is Monday 7th October until 5pm Monday 4th November 2024.
• Step 3 – Review
  • Their expert selection panel will review your applications and select up-to three applicants to progress into the feasibility study phase.
• Step 4 – Feasibility Study
  • Successful applicants will use the grant funding to undertake a piece of research to assess the viability of the model financially, operationally, and in terms of the likelihood of addressing the social injustice.
• Step 5 – Property-based Pilot Project
  • If the model proves feasible, they will explore ways for them to work together to deliver a property-based pilot project. This will be done in unison with social investors with the intention for Commonweal to acquire property and deliver the project in partnership with you over a period of 5-10 years.

For full information on the process, please refer to their Information Sheet and FAQ Sheet by clicking here

What are they looking for?

All applications must require a property acquisition element, as the intention is for Commonweal to acquire property to deliver the project in partnership with you.

Applicants are not required to have experience in delivering projects involving housing. However, you must have the capacity to deliver your housing-based pilot project and applicants must outline in the Application Form how your project would operate, including the housing management element. If you are unable to take on the housing management role, you will need to identify a third party to undertake this role in the feasibility study stage.

Imaginative ideas:

• The idea should be new and imaginative – this could be due to i. the client group; ii. the model; iii. the support element; iv. the location; or a mix of any of the above.
• Crucially, they are looking for ideas with a unique element that can provide new learnings for the sector through Commonweal funded evaluations during the pilot phase.
• For the application stage, they are looking for original ideas. The inner workings of your model will be determined in the feasibility study stage.

A solid business case:

• All applications must outline the housing and support elements of the model. Your application must detail how your pilot could operate financially should it progress to pilot project stage.
• Your application must contain details around property-acquisition. This is important as Commonweal operates by purchasing properties and leasing it to their partners. As such, a financially prudent business case is an important part of the feasibility study.
• They do not have an unlimited budget, and therefore will have an eye on value for money projects.

A committed, qualified and enthusiastic partner organisation:

• Partners must be a not-for-profit, but this can include local or combined authorities and we welcome applications from across the UK.
• They want partners who are committed to evaluating the project, sharing the learning and, where possible, seeking replication, as Commonweal funds and commissions evaluations on all of our property-based pilot projects.
• Most importantly, they want partners who are enthusiastic about testing their housing solution as this will be your project.