Our themed funds provide the opportunity for you to give to a subject that you are passionate about. They also provide a platform that brings smaller individual gifts together to make a really big impact. 

The Suffolk Arts & Culture Fund has been created to support equality of access to all the benefits that arts, culture and music can provide to improve the lives of the people of Suffolk.   

It is widely recognised that the arts play an important role in: 

· Promoting health and wellbeing 

· Tackling disadvantage by offering access to services and opportunities 

· Promoting community cohesion by breaking down barriers and help develop sustainable and supportive communities, encouraging diversity and ensuring accessibility 

· Supporting local solutions to meet local needs   

Every penny we raise together for the Arts & Culture Fund will be used to support the work of charities and community groups in Suffolk – there are some 5,000 of them in total supported by over 60,000 local volunteers.    

Over half of our voluntary groups are entirely volunteer led and run at a local grassroots level. They provide essential support to individuals and communities and operate on tiny budgets of considerably less than £10,000 a year. Their inability to compete for funding with larger charities means that over 78% of the money we give each year reaches only the top 3% of charities; this means that a similar amount of our giving here in Suffolk leaves our county never to return.   

Our voluntary sector in Suffolk is empowered by local giving and they badly need us to do more to help them. It would be no exaggeration to say that Suffolk would come to a standstill without them.