The LEP Prize Challenge has already supported seven schemes, one year on the best three are set to receive an extra £50,000 to scale up their projects.
In total, the LEP Prize Challenge Fund has invested £360,000 into the local community; creating around 110 paid jobs and supporting almost 300 people to become work-ready.
The three organisations who will receive additional funding are:
- Wintercomfort for the Homeless ‘Overstream Clean’ – Based in Cambridge, Overstream Clean is a cleaning social enterprise that uses cargo bikes to transport its workers and their equipment around the city. All employees have experienced homelessness, and have been given the opportunity to learn new skills and get back into work.
- Cross Keys Homes ‘Moving 4ward into work’ – Based in Peterborough, Cross Keys Homes’ ‘Moving 4ward into work’ programme supports young people aged 16 to 24 to get into work through six-month pre-apprentice placements within Tackling Worklessness in Peterborough (TWIP) organisations.
- CHS Group ‘Enterprising Communities’– Based in Histon, CHS Group is a social enterprise and charitable housing association that helps to unlock communities’ assets using Timebanking, which enables disadvantaged people to secure jobs, create their own micro-businesses and practice their skills.
Claire Higgins, VSE Board Member of the Greater Cambridge Greater Peterborough LEP, said: “In 2014, the LEP Prize Challenge helped around 110 people into work and nearly 300 to become work ready. We were greatly impressed by all the projects we funded, but after careful consideration the panel agreed that Wintercomfort for the Homeless, Cross Keys Homes and CHS Group were the most deserving organisations to receive an extra £50,000 to continue their work.
“All three have helped to get the most people job-ready and into employment, delivered a great service that best fits the needs of their community and we believe they will continue to make a significant difference to people’s lives. We look forward to seeing these projects go from strength to strength in the future.”
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Image left: CHS Group with Louise from the LEP (front) celebrate their additional £50,000 LEP funding
Rachel Newell, Social Enterprise manager of Wintercomfort, said:“We are overjoyed at the news of being selected for a further £50,000 funding from the LEP. Last year we worked with 16 people and employed five people. This year we hope to expand our operations and work with 30 people and get 12 people into employment. The LEP Prize Challenge has really focussed us into researching and designing a prize winning enterprise, with clear social outcomes based on a solid business plan.”
Christina Malle, Community Investment Manager of Cross Keys Homes, said:“We are really thrilled to have secured the LEP Prize Challenge funding for our Moving 4ward into work pre-apprentice scheme with the Tackling Worklessness in Peterborough Consortium (TWIP). It means that we will be able to help many more disadvantaged young people to gain employment extending the scheme across Peterborough. The Prize Challenge fund is a great opportunity for us to scale up our activities and support more and more young people into work.”
Andrew Church, Head of Community Investment at CHS group, said: "We are delighted to be able to continue to partner with GCGP LEP on the Enterprising Communities project. Over the last year, we’ve used our creativity and connections to enable more than 30 people to get into work and more than 60 people to become job ready. We’ve done that by working together with a range of talented people from the business world, the charitable and statutory sectors, and of course the people who live in the communities in which we work.
“This extra investment will enable us to more than double our impact in 2015, reaching more disadvantaged people across a bigger geographical area”.
Jane Darlington, LEP Prize Challenge Panel member and Chief Executive of Cambridgeshire Community Foundation who administer the scheme, said:
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Image left: Cross Keys Homes’ ‘Moving 4ward in to work’ pre-apprentices
“The progress after 12 months was interesting to review. Some projects had delivered way ahead of their own expectations and others had faced issues and challenges they had not perhaps anticipated. The three projects that have been selected to receive further funding in 2015 all showed themselves to be ambitious, have a strong track record of delivering to target in 2014, and offered, over the next 12 months, innovative and significant interventions to make their beneficiaries job ready or employed.”
“Whilst there was discussion and debate at the selection meeting, the panel were unanimous in their desire to focus support to where it was felt the legacy would be a long lasting positive impact on people’s employment options and prospects.”
The Greater Cambridge Greater Peterborough Enterprise Partnership (LEP) launched the LEP Prize Challenge in May 2013, committing £1 million to support local Voluntary and Social Enterprise projects that aim to get people furthest from the jobs marks work ready and back into paid employment.
You can find out more about the LEP Prize Challenge, click here.
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