Lankelly were looking for rough diamonds to polish

Lankelly Chase’s closure is bold and necessary, but will it be a beacon to the rest of the philanthropic sector?

 

 

A Lankelly Legacy Interview. Hosted by Generative Journalism Alliance

 

Yvonne, what was made possible through your work with Lankelly that wouldn’t have been possible otherwise?

 

We received core funding. First of all, Lankelly Chase provided us with emergency funding, which really helped us step up and step in to support Black and racially minoritised communities at a time when there was a crisis.

That was really, really important, because we were pretty new in the sector. We’ve been around for 10 years, but our work has come to the fore in the last five years since COVID. That emergency support helped us build some infrastructure and support systems so that we could do the work with the communities that were under real threat during COVID-19.

 

From that, they funded the systems change work which we did with Black leaders in Manchester, and then they also started giving us core costs for about three years. So again, that helped us support the backbone of the organisations, which wouldn’t have happened had we not got that funding from them. They were very flexible with that. We could use it exactly as we needed it, which is what we needed from a funder.

 

What would you say some of the social shifts you witnessed since that work?

 

Communities have been introduced to new processes. For example, the notion of systems thinking—is an approach that helps enable them to think and see more clearly what systemic barriers and challenges exist in our communities, rather than just addressing the symptoms. It’s about going deeper, seeing things from the root cause rather than simply treating the symptoms. Systems change work is really, really tough work. It’s not for the faint-hearted. But by giving them a new lens as well as tools and methodologies they can use to intervene more effectively—that’s been more of an organisational impact than a wider systemic one.

 

I suppose it does have a ripple effect, because it means that those people can go on to challenge some of the systemic injustices they see and come up with ideas on how to tackle them. 

 

In terms of the core funding that we received, I think the societal impact has been significant. Certainly, now that we don’t have any more core funding—because, of course, Lankelly Chase has stopped funding whilst they go through this process—it enabled us to have more agency and voice within the sector, because we had that core funding, which meant that we could employ staff to provide backbone support.

 

What meaning was made for you through that experience? Was there anything that surprised you? 

 

What surprised me was that actually there was a level of trust in us and an appreciation of the work we were doing. It was very relational. It felt like they were walking beside you and rooting for you. It didn’t feel adversarial, or like the power was unbalanced. I felt that we were coming into the relationship as partners. Of course, they’ve got money, but we were bringing experience and expertise, so there was a recognition and an appreciation of what we were adding—not just adding value, but the expertise that was needed, and that they could support that being brought into the system. 

 

There are different ways that Lankelly Chase have come in to support the work, but I reckon what’s been a theme is that we’ve been seen. What we’ve done and are doing is recognised as having worth, appreciated, and very practically supported by funds. We’re seen to be making a major contribution to systemic change in this country, and for Black and racially minoritised, global majority communities.

 

What was your sense of what Lankelly was trying to do? How would you describe that? 

 

That’s an interesting one, because I think it’s a bit of a mysterious organisation. My sense is that they were trying to invest in innovation—things that didn’t seem to be particularly sexy or that didn’t fit within a neat box of priorities. They were quite spacious in their approach to what they would fund, but it had to be slightly ‘different’. 

 

It felt like they had a much bigger, more systemic change agenda—about intervening and seeing what happens when you support people to take risks. I think they were about risk-taking, much more than other foundations that supported projects with clear outcomes. I think they allowed you to go on a journey of discovery. There’s something about the process of discovery in their work that was really refreshing.

 

They appeared to be looking for rough diamonds. Not diamonds in the rough, but rather rough diamonds. They were looking for things that didn’t look polished, but with a bit of polishing (and TLC), they would shine and illuminate something that wasn’t seen by others. 

 

I think the kind of work they did was finding these rough diamonds and helping to polish them, bringing them to light and recognising that we needed them. We need them, because they wouldn’t fit within a neat, diamond-shaped mould, but actually they are highly valuable to the system. 

 

I think they really looked for things like that.

 

What if anything, would you have liked to have been different?

 

There’s always this element of them being slightly ‘out there’. I suppose I would have liked more clarity about what they were about, what they were looking for, what they were doing. 

 

There was just no clarity; I just didn’t know. It wasn’t clear how they made decisions to fund. They talk about their board and so on, but it all felt a bit opaque.

 

I think when they announced they were closing, it came as a shock to the whole system. I’m not sure if I missed an email somewhere where they told their grantees first. When it came, it was like, ‘Oh my god.’ I mean, it was welcome—it was brave, bold and needed—but it also made me think, ‘Where did that come from?’

 

It feels like maybe there could be a better feedback loop. Having been funded by them since 2020 and really appreciating the work they’re doing, the communications are a bit thin. 

 

You said Lankelly’s decision to close is ‘bold’: did you have anything more you would have liked to add to that?

 

I had hoped that it would have acted as a beacon to the rest of the sector; that this is something that can be done. You might be incredibly fearful, it might cause a lot of angst and potential conflict within the organisation, but it’s a way to go. 

 

I was hoping that it might have a knock-on effect. I think what we’ve seen is some trusts, like Tudor Trust, who now focus on racial justice as their main strategic objective for their funding priorities. I’d hoped that it would have acted almost like the falling of a pack of cards, that it would have had that knock-on effect. Unfortunately, it has not. Perhaps it has engendered more fear in funders.

 

I suppose we’re waiting to see how this is going to play out. But again, as I said, I think it’s really bold. I think it’s really necessary. I think it’s really holding your hands up at long last and saying, “This money is actually from ill-gotten gains – we’re going to get rid of it.” It is needed. Only history will tell, but the fact that they’ve done this and made this decision, I think, will, for future generations, be seen as the right thing to do.

 

With that view of the wider philanthropic field, what are you already seeing that is working?

 

Barrow Cadbury Trust has a CEO of colour. That’s a first, I think, in this country, to have the senior leadership be People of Colour in a foundation. There’s people of colour stepping into the leadership of these foundations, which is great to see. That will only be positive for philanthropy as a whole.

 

Discussions around reparatory justice are bubbling up and over. So there’s all those conversations with foundations and with the Church of England and with the government, with African governments and so on—even though the UK does not want to acknowledge the role they played in the enslavement of Africans and the huge profits made which were used to build the UK. I think in the end they’re probably going to be dragged to the table. I think that they can only keep their head in the sand for so long. The movement, I think, is what it is. It’s bigger than the UK government in that sense. It’s beyond them now, so I feel that that will have an impact on philanthropy going forward.

 

Thinking specifically about your field as Ubele, what do you need to shift in philanthropy for you to flourish?

 

Long term funding. 10-year, 15-year core funding. I think that’s the main one. Because if you talk about three-year funding, by the time you get to 18 months, you start thinking about the next 18 months. If you have five years, you get to three years and you start panicking.

 

I think there’s also a need for good people around the organisation to support it in its journey. You need good advice, you need good professionals—solid, good professionals who can walk beside you. Finding those kinds of people is really needed.

 

What’s the best thing that could happen? 

 

One of the best things that happened is Lankelly Chase giving us some of their endowment they will need to divest and distribute across the sector prior to closing down. I hope they are really creative about how they do this. It’s not within our gift. 

 

What’s the best thing that could happen? We’ve got a three-and-a-half-acre food growing space in North London. We provide infrastructure support regionally and nationally but we are also rooted in communities. We’ve just built three eco-buildings at Wolves Lane in the London Borough of Haringey, so we’ve got a community hub, two offices for Ubele and Wolves Lane staff, an outside kitchen, a classroom, and then a huge barn. It’s beautiful – what we’ve got and what we’ve done. The best thing that could happen around that is for us to receive investment to finish off the outside canopy and landscaping, but also to be able to run that centre and actually have time and space supported for us to learn from what we’re doing, because that’s where we’re going to develop our model of community development.

 

 

Hosted by Tchiyiwe Chihana. Edited by Sam Walby

 

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