Press release

14 charities to receive Tampon Tax funding

Final round of the £11.25 million Tampon Tax Fund announced

• From: Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport
• Published: 16 November 2021

• Women in Sport, Tommy’s and Imkaan among those receiving grants
• Four heroes helping disadvantaged women receive Prime Minister’s Points of Light Award

Thousands of women and girls will benefit as 14 charities have been confirmed to receive a share of the final round of the Government’s £11.25 million Tampon Tax Fund.

Projects helping victims of domestic abuse, improving postpartum safety and empowering women through physical activity are among those chosen to benefit from the new grants.

The UK-wide grants generated from the VAT on period products, will be directly invested in vital projects tackling issues facing women and girls.

Over the last six years, the Tampon Tax Fund has awarded £75 million, with this final round bringing the total to £86.25 million.

In March last year, the Chancellor announced that following the UK’s departure from the EU on 1st January 2021, the EU 5% VAT charge on period products would be removed, permanently reducing associated costs for these products.

At the same time, the Prime Minister has announced the latest Points of Light awards are being awarded to four individuals who have made exceptional contributions towards helping disadvantaged women and girls, helping to reduce period poverty and improving gender equality.

Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, Nadine Dorries, said:

I’m delighted that these 14 organisations are receiving grants towards their exceptional projects helping disadvantaged women and girls.

Over the last six years, the UK Government’s Tampon Tax Fund has supported charities right across the UK, and I’m extremely pleased that we were able to use VAT on period products for these important causes.

I’d also like to congratulate Katrina, Molly, Laura and Julia on their very well deserved award, and thank them for their selfless hard work.

Laura Coryton said:

It’s amazing to receive this award as the Tampon Tax Fund comes to an end. The Fund gave a total of £90.25m to female-focused charities - a huge sum for many vital causes. I hope these charities will continue to be supported as they solve many crucial societal issues and I’m so proud to have been part of the Fund’s introduction.

Julia Coryton added:

It’s so brilliant to get this award and the recognition for our work at Sex Ed Matters. This award has inspired us to keep improving Relationships and Sex Education offered in schools.

The Points of Light award winners include Katrina McDonnell, who runs Homeless Period Belfast to alleviate period poverty in the city’s homeless community. Molly Fenton, who runs Love Your Period campaign to reduce stigma and period poverty in schools across Wales will also receive the Prime Minister’s award, while Laura and Julia Coryton, who led the original Stop Taxing Periods campaign and now run social enterprise Sex Ed Matters have all been recognised for their inspirational work through the Prime Minister’s prestigious award.

Laura Coryton’s campaign Stop Taxing Periods, which started as a petition in 2014 and attracted over 320,000 supporters and worldwide attention, led the government to end VAT on period products, and subsequently start the Tampon Tax Fund. Since the success of the campaign, she continues to campaign on gender equality issues, working with her twin sister Julia to improve relationships and sex education through their social enterprise ‘Sex Ed Matters’, which holds workshops in over 56 schools across the UK.

The 14 projects receiving grants through the Tampon Tax Fund are:

• The Big Give Trust’s ‘Women and Girls Match Fund’ - To raise £5m for the Women & Girls sector across England and Scotland through match funding campaigns whilst increasing the resilience, skills and profile of Women & Girls charities. The project will also help to create a long-term philanthropic legacy for giving to Women & Girls organisations.

• Tommy’s ‘Equality in miscarriage and pregnancy care’ - Tommy’s project aims to tackle the unjust miscarriage inequalities facing disadvantaged and underrepresented women across England. By supporting them with personalised advice and empowering them to advocate for their own care, Tommy’s will give these groups equity in access to care, otherwise unavailable, and reduce their risk of miscarriage.

• Women in Sport’s ‘Big Sister’ - To break down entrenched barriers to healthy, happy and active lives through a supportive ecosystem of ‘Big Sister’ peers and coaches mobilising participation in sport for young women and girls. Targeting those areas characterised by deprivation, Women in Sport aim to ensure no one is excluded from the lifelong empowerment of physical activity.

• St Giles Trust’s ‘Women Rising, Enabling Neighbourhoods’ - To enable disadvantaged women to create positive change for themselves and other women in their communities. St Giles Trust will work with local women’s organisations in priority areas to test if a lived experience, Community Champions model at grassroots level has an impact and provides solutions to social, economic, and digital exclusion.

• The Central British Fund for World Jewish Relief’s ‘STEP forward’ - Step Forward will address key barriers to integration specific to women refugees in line with the Home Office’s Integration Framework. Through this holistic, tailored programme, women refugees will be empowered to gain independence, make informed decisions, improve health outcomes, and move towards employment, and a fully integrated life in Britain.

• National Literacy Trust’s ‘Game Changers: Trailblazing Women’ - This project will use the excitement and passion of sport to inspire and motivate excluded girls who have experienced violence and trauma, to develop their communication skills, improve their confidence and resilience, enabling them to make better choices with stronger relationships for safer futures.

• Best Beginnings and White Ribbon Alliance UK’s ‘Safer Beginners’ - Safer Beginnings aims to improve maternity outcomes and the postpartum safety of 70,950 women of whom 13,350 are women from ethnic minority communities in England, Wales and Scotland by 2023, by developing specialist information, services and interventions that enable self-advocacy in maternal safety from obstetric and domestic abuse/violence and FGM/FGC.

• Imkaan’s ‘Margin to Centre’- To deliver onward grants to specialist Black minoritised women’s organisations working to end violence against women and girls. To support their frontline operational and long-term sustainability work in ways that elevates and empowers them through social value-based grant making, considering intersectional needs and social justice aims.

• Trevi ‘South West Women’s Spark Project’ - Prevent women with multiple disadvantages being affected by violence and abuse; ultimately achieving a better-quality life. This will be accomplished through 24/7 support via a wrap-around outreach programme incorporating trauma-informed Assertive Outreach Practitioners, fast-track access to women-only supported accommodation, practical and therapeutic support, and a violence prevention programme in schools.

• AVA (Against Violence and Abuse)’s ‘In Safe Hands’ - The project will ensure that VAWG survivors have access to high quality trauma informed support to help them rebuild their lives after abuse, through supporting specialist women’s organisations to build and demonstrate a consistent, survivor led, holistic trauma informed approach.

• South West Grid for Learning Trust’s ‘Minerva’ - Create a ground-breaking UK wide AI tool for women suffering online abuse, including harmful content and intimate image abuse. Saving lives through linking patterns of online/offline abuse to alert women to imminent danger. Empowering women to seize control, report crimes, have intimate images removed, and access support to rebuild lives.

• Edinburgh Rape Crisis Centre’s ‘The FEM Project’ - To pilot an innovative, cross-region approach to increasing accessibility and inclusivity of rape crisis support for 75 women survivors of sexual violence with learning difficulties and/or from BME communities across 7 local authority areas ranging from Central to North East Scotland, with the aim of mainstreaming into core service delivery.

• Welsh Women’s Aid’s ‘Sector Strength Cymru’ - To provide targeted support and open grant giving opportunities for Women’s Aid members across Wales that enable the development, testing and delivery of new high-quality services, activities, approaches, research, or technologies that have the overarching aim of improving the quality of life for women and girls impacted by violence against women.

• Training for Women Network’s ‘The Improve Project’- The project aims to improve the lives of vulnerable, disadvantaged and under-represented women and girls in areas of multiple deprivation across Northern Ireland, through education and skills programmes to improve their capacities and create a sense of safety and belonging.

ENDS

Notes to Editors

Quotes from organisations:

Alex Day, Director, The Big Give Trust:

We are delighted to have been awarded the Tampon Tax funding to launch the Women & Girls Match Fund campaign in 2022. Through the project, we aim to support the women & girls sector in England and Scotland through two match funding campaigns whilst increasing the resilience, skills, and profile of these charities.

Our experience tells us that more people give, and people give more when their donations are matched. We are excited to give hundreds of charities working with women & girls the opportunity to benefit from this extraordinary fundraising approach.

We look forward to sharing more details with charities on how they can apply to the campaign in the coming weeks. We would encourage interested charities to register on the Big Give platform to receive updates about the campaign.

Baljit Banga, Executive Director, Imkaan:

Imkaan is grateful for the award of funding from the Tampon Tax Fund. This funding will go towards onward sustainability grants to the specialist by and for Black and minoritised women and girls’ sector. Beyond the allocation, the award recognises the social value of this sector in providing services addressing VAWG and structural inequality through intersectionality. We consider this award to be vital to recovery enabling organisations who have worked around the clock during the global health pandemic to delivery rights-based support.

Alison Baum OBE, CEO and Founder, Best Beginnings:

All of us at Best Beginnings are thrilled that the urgently needed “Safer Beginnings” programme of work has been funded by the Department of Culture, Media and Sport, through the Tampon Tax Fund. The “Safer Beginnings” programme is profoundly collaborative with equity at its core. We look forward to working with the White Ribbon Alliance and the many awesome and diverse grassroots organisations and charities we are partnering with to drive positive change for families now and for future generations.

Kay King, Executive Director, White Ribbon Alliance UK:

White Ribbon Alliance UK welcomes and celebrates this successful outcome. The ‘Safer Beginnings’ programme comes at a time when women and families need services and support in maternity more than ever. We are delighted by the recognition of our strong cohort of delivery partners and excited to begin to deliver work that enables equity, safety and respectful care in ever improving ways.

Paul Anticoni, Chief Executive, The Central British Fund for World Jewish Relief:

World Jewish Relief is absolutely thrilled to have been successful in our application for funding from the Tampon Tax Fund. This critical funding will enable us to address the challenges that refugee women face in their integration journey in the UK. The partnership between World Jewish Relief and DCMS will bring our collective expertise to the benefit of this welcome yet vulnerable client group.

The FEM partnership, Edinburgh Rape Crisis Centre:

This partnership pilot project between Moray, Forth Valley and Edinburgh Rape Crisis Centres provides us with a unique opportunity to collaborate together to reduce the barriers that sexual violence survivors from some marginalised communities face in using rape crisis services. Our hope is that the learning from this pilot will help us in our work to be inclusive of all survivors of sexual violence and play our part in eliminating systemic discrimination and inequality.

Hannah Shead, CEO, Trevi:

We are thrilled to be awarded this funding. There have been some high-profile tragedies over the last 12 months that have shone a light on the reality of violence against women and girls. Those of us working in the sector recognise that this is not a new phenomenon. There are no quick fixes or easy answers, but I am delighted to know that this funding will make a difference for women and girls in the South West.

I believe that the impact of this funding will be significantly enhanced by the strength of our partnerships. During the application process, we were able to harness our shared passion and determination to improve outcomes for women and girls. I am so pleased that we can now make our vision a reality.

Rob Owen, CEO, St Giles Trust

We are delighted that the TTF are, once again, supporting St Giles’s work with women, enabling us to use our approach of supporting and training individuals who have been there themselves to offer services reaching those who need them most. Throughout the pandemic, we have seen a sharp rise in the number of women who need support from St Giles to address issues such as poverty, abuse, mental health issues and unemployment. This funding means we can work with women to help them gain the skills and confidence to create positive change for themselves and others.

Ian Daniells, CEO, South West Grid for Learning

The support from the Tampon Tax Fund helps in our mission to ensure that ‘everyone benefits from technology free from harm’. SWGfL enjoys global acclaim in online safety and we want to thank DCMS for acknowledging our expertise and recognising our proposal as innovative and advanced. At a time when we see incidents of harassment and abuse of women online rising, we look forward to building on our existing knowledge to research, test and progress our ability to better protect women from harm online.

Stephanie Hilborne OBE, Chief Executive, Women in Sport

We know that sports can transform lives. Yet for far too many teenage girls sport is missing. Society may not recognise the value of sport to girls but we do. We know it builds resilience and leadership skills as well as physical literacy and happiness.

So we are delighted to be bringing together an incredible consortium of partners to help ensure that girls and young women are no longer excluded from physical activity and sport.

Working alongside Places Leisure/Places Foundation and Hey Girls we will break down the entrenched barriers to healthy, happy and active lives through a supportive ecosystem of ‘Big Sister’ peers and coaches. We will get more young women active in their own community enabling girls to support other girls at a key time in their lives.

Our work will focus on those most in need, whether this be down to low self-esteem and anxiety or financial exclusion. We want every girl to have access to the joy and freedom that exercise brings.

Norma Shearer MBE, Chief Executive, Training for Women Network

Training for Women Network are absolutely delighted to receive £368,750 from the Tampon Tax Fund for ‘The Improve Project’. This project will allow many women to gain leadership skills, improve their confidence, enhancing their communication skills and ultimately providing them with the transferable skills to go on to further or higher education or gain employment whilst taking their rightful place in their communities and in society and contributing to the economic renewal of Northern Ireland.

Sara Kirkpatrick, Chief Executive, Welsh Women’s Aid

We are delighted to be receiving funding from the Tampon Tax Fund. The Sector Strength Cymru project will enable our specialist member services to respond to the needs of survivors, and develop or deliver new high-quality activities and approaches that will improve the quality of life for women and girls impacted by violence against women in Wales.

Jane Brewin, CEO, Tommy’s

Right now, women who come from minority ethnic backgrounds or live in economically deprived areas are more likely to experience a miscarriage – and yet they also face more barriers to access the care that could prevent such a loss, or the support they may need if it happens. These inequalities are unacceptable. We’re absolutely delighted to receive a grant from the Tampon Tax Fund for our ‘Equality in Miscarriage and Pregnancy Care’ project, which aims to tackle this disparity, supporting and empowering some of the most vulnerable women. Like many charities, our fundraising has been hit hard by the Covid-19 pandemic, so we’re hugely grateful for this support enabling us to continue our vital work.

Donna Covey CBE, Chief Executive, AVA (Against Violence and Abuse):

This welcome funding will support the development of a trauma-informed model for the specialist women’s sector improving the lives of survivors of violence against women and girls. We know the emotional scars remain after the abuse has stopped. Survivors have also told us that trauma-informed support is the best way to help their recovery. This grant will allow AVA to work with a range of specialist partners to support women to rebuild their lives after violence and abuse. It also means women using life-saving and life-changing services will receive enhanced support that recognises the impact of trauma on their recovery. This project will build on the innovative work already being carried out across the specialist women’s sector, leading to the development of a clear sector-wide understanding of what trauma-informed specialist services and support look and feel like.

Jonathan Douglas, Chief Executive, National Literacy Trust

We’re pleased and delighted that the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport (DCMS) has chosen to support our Game Changers: Trailblazing Women programme. This initiative seeks to engage young women who have been excluded from school to develop their communication skills and to improve their confidence and resilience. Through sporting and cultural role models this programme aims to inspire these young people to improve their literacy skills, which in turn, can help build their confidence and self-worth to enable them to have better outcomes.

Points of Light awards

1. The Points of Light awards recognise outstanding individual volunteers, people who are making a change in their community and inspiring others.
2. The Prime Minister makes daily announcements of the winners to celebrate, encourage and promote volunteering and the value that it brings to the country.
3. If people know someone who could be a Point of Light they should write to the Prime Minister at 10 Downing Street.
4. For more information, visit the website: www.pointsoflight.gov.uk

Published 16 November 2021