The Big Lottery Fund will support around five social investment projects with a £5m pot of dormant account fund money while the Big Society Bank awaits approval from the European Commission. It will make the first investment as early as July this year.
It was announced last week that the Big Society Bank, which will be partly-funded with dormant account money, looks set to be delayed till next year while the government tries to get state aid approval from the European Commission to set it up. A BIG spokeswoman also said the government was also still seeking Financial Services Authority authorisation.
In the Big Society Bank’s place, the Big Lottery Fund has been asked to distribute £5m raised from dormant bank accounts to social investment intermediary organisations based in the UK that will provide social investment products or services for social sector organisations that primarily benefit people in England. A BIG spokesman said it will not consider proposals from frontline social sector organisations or individual projects.
BIG has set up an Investment Committee (IC) as an interim body to manage the £5m through the Big Society Social Investment Fund.
The Investment Committee will be chaired by John Kingston of CAF Venturesome and comprises Sir Ronald Cohen and Nick O’Donohue, independent advisers to government on the Big Society Bank, Nat Sloane and Anna Southall of BIG and Dawn Austwick of the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation.
A BIG spokesman said: “We are keen to identify some early investments that we can take forward very quickly, to increase our learning and build momentum.”
Organisations, which fit the criteria, must apply for a minimum of £500,000. The first deadline for proposals is 4 July, with the IC expecting to announce one or two in-principle early investments by the end of July 2011.
The IC will make further decisions on investments in September and December 2011 – the final deadline for proposals is September 2011.
The IC is particularly interested in proposals which develop outcome measurement tools and tackle gaps in the supply of capital to the social sector.
The IC will be wound up once the Big Society Bank has been fully established and is in a position to start using dormant account money. The IC investment portfolio will be transferred to the Big Society Bank at that point.
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