New Brexit Stakeholder Engagement Fund Announced

On Europe Day 9 May 2018 The Minister for UK Negotiations on Scotland's Place in Europe, Michael Russell MSP, announced a new £150,000 Brexit Stakeholder Engagement Fund. The fund will help ensure that a range of voices can be heard to inform the Scottish Government's position in relation to EU exit.

The Scottish Government will be carefully targeting key partners, listening to new ideas and offering grants from the fund to carry out specific pieces of work. Community, third sector and other smaller organisations, particularly those without specific resources to otherwise develop Brexit positions or consider the consequences of Brexit, are invited to apply.

Purpose

The fund will be used to support a broad range of projects and activities that support local community based organisations across Scotland to plan ahead, facilitate dialogue and inform policy development on the impacts of the UK's exit from the EU. It will focus particularly but not exclusively on enabling community and third sector organisations to listen, think, plan and highlight any concerns about leaving the EU, and provide a platform for them to be heard on the wider national and international stage.

Objectives

As communities and organisations face the consequences of Brexit, the Scottish Government will use the fund to:

• support organisations to facilitate constructive dialogue and action planning in order to ensure that communities are able to have a voice in regard to Brexit;
• help organisations who are themselves thinking about how Brexit affects their own future to plan ahead and prepare;
• link together and convene conversations between different communities and organisations who are exploring the consequences of Brexit, and facilitate the sharing of information and publication of evidence; and
• inform an evaluation report for the Minister for UK Negotiations on Scotland's Place in Europe, building the evidence base to feed directly into the UK-EU negotiations

Timings and Governance

Spend will be focussed between June-December 2018, the key remaining window of opportunity to influence the UK-EU negotiations, and subject to approval, review and evaluation by the Scottish Government.

Guidance Notes and Fund Criteria

The fund will support:

• Organisations who can mobilise / connect with local community groups, businesses and individuals impacted by Brexit;
• Organisations with an income over £250k will particularly need to show how local community leadership is driving their discussion;
• Organisations who can show how they will connect local people to the broader understanding of the impacts of Brexit; and
• Organisations who will ensure inclusion of groups who are on the margins of this conversation.

The fund will not support:

• Trips outside of Scotland
• Individual applications and/or applications pursuing private economic interest
• General capital costs
• General running costs
• Activities that duplicate existing services
• Retrospective funding
• Promotion of religion
• Fund-raising promotions
• Party political activity
• Substitution for statutory funding
• Organisations that did not comply with reporting requirements of previous grant aid