The Barrow Cadbury Trust is very pleased to announce that we have been selected to run the Access Social Investment Infrastructure Fund.  Access – The Foundation for Social Investment – was set up by Big Society Capital, the Cabinet Office and the Big Lottery Fund in 2014 to provide a mix of grants and loans to develop the social investment market, making it easier for charities and social enterprises to access the capital needed to grow and increase their impact, by increasing the supply of smaller, unsecured, affordable loans and providing support to help organisations take on investment.

The Access Social Investment Infrastructure Fund is one of three major initiatives funded through Access’ Capacity Building programme, along with the Reach Fund and the Impact Management Programme.

The idea of the new Social Investment Infrastructure Fund is to strengthen social investment infrastructure both in existing social investment intermediary organisations and also in more generic and traditional infrastructure bodies.  This Fund looks like it will have a significant impact on existing infrastructure bodies such as CVSs which have not so far been confident or ‘upskilled’ enough to advise their stakeholders on social investment or give them investment readiness support.  Our hope is that it will also be used to improve tools and data capture mechanisms for use across the social investment field.

As a social justice foundation with an interest in social investment, Barrow Cadbury Trust has long had concerns that the investment products on offer do not always serve large sections of the social sector. Blended finance and better shared tools should have a transforming effect on new entrants and existing investees alike.

What next?

We will be advertising for a fund manager in the New Year so please keep an eye on this website, on our fortnightly enews, and on Twitter, for further information if you are interested.  Materials and relationships will be developed over the next few months and we will put out a call for expressions of interest later in the year.