We believe that:

• Diversity of people brings diversity of perspective, skills and experience, which in turn can deliver richer creativity, better problem solving and greater impact for ourselves and our grantholders.
• Everyone, no matter their background, should be able to access opportunities to fulfil their potential on a fair and equitable basis.
• Our grantmaking will be strengthened if our trustees and employees have a broad range of experience, and both lived and learned expertise.

We will promote diversity, equity and inclusion through:

Our recruitment, training and development practices

We will:

1. Write role descriptions and person specifications that are inclusive.
2. Clearly state the salary, benefits, and other relevant information (e.g. hybrid working) on all adverts.
3. Openly advertise paid and voluntary roles, including using media to reach under-represented communities.
4. Reference wanting to encourage applications from people with diverse backgrounds to paid and voluntary roles in our recruitment materials.
5. Remove candidates’ names and other identifying factors from applications to reduce the risk of bias and ensure objective decisions about a person’s skills, experience and suitability for a role.
6. Ensure that all those involved in recruitment have received appropriate training.
7. Offer reasonable adjustments to accommodate interviews and future working needs.
8. Offer to pay expenses for travelling to and from an interview.
9. Make opportunities for training, development, and progress available to all employees and trustees.
10. Collect diversity data for employees and trustees, and where appropriate use this information when recruiting to vacant positions.
11. Review recruitment, selection and employment practices and procedures when necessary to ensure fairness, and update them and this policy to take account of changes in the law.

Creating a positive working environment

We will:

1. Create a working environment free of bullying, harassment, victimisation, and unlawful discrimination.
2. Promote dignity and respect for all, where individual differences and the contributions of all employees and trustees are recognised and valued.
3. Take seriously complaints of bullying, harassment, victimisation, and unlawful discrimination by employees, trustees, grantholders, suppliers, visitors, the public and any others in the course of the Foundation’s work.
4. Provide DEI training for employees and trustees.

Open and trusting grantmaking

We will:

1. Be transparent about what and how we fund.
2. Provide unconscious bias training to employees and trustees every three years to help remove bias from our grantmaking.
3. Scan the field, conduct outreach, and solicit funding proposals.
4. Work with invited applicants to help them build strong funding proposals where any grant will meet their organisational needs.
5. Where appropriate, consider how representative an applicant’s operational, governance and leadership structures are of the populations most impacted by their work.
6. Seek to collect and track DEI data on how funding is allocated by organisation.
7. Consider each funding request on its own merits.
8. Provide feedback to all applicants who have been invited to submit a proposal should they be unsuccessful.
9. Build open and trusting relationships with grantholders to understand them and their effectiveness, learning from them throughout the life of our grant.
10. Bring an end to our funding relationships in a positive way.

In order to ensure the effective implementation of this policy the Foundation will:

• Communicate this policy to those who work with and for the Foundation.
• Provide training and guidance for employees and trustees.
• Review the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Policy on a regular basis.
• Publish the Policy on the Foundation’s website.
• Consider publicly publishing diversity data on employees and trustees in our annual accounts, recognising that as a small team we must take steps to ensure adequate anonymity for individuals.

Allegations regarding potential breaches of this policy will be treated in confidence and investigated in accordance with the relevant procedure. Employees who make such allegations in good faith will not be victimised or treated less favourably as a result. False allegations which are found to have been made in bad faith will, however, be dealt with under the Foundation’s Disciplinary Policy.

Any employee who fails to observe the principles of this policy will be subject to the Foundation’s Disciplinary policy. Breach of this policy may result in disciplinary action being taken up to and including dismissal.

Anyone with a complaint of discrimination is encouraged to raise the matter through the Foundation’s Grievance Procedure.

Anyone with a complaint of harassment is encouraged to raise the matter through the Foundation’s Bullying and Harassment Policy.

Any organisation with a complaint about the Foundation should raise the issue through our Complaints Policy.