Frieda Scott Charitable Trust

The Frieda Scott Charitable Trust is an independent grantmaker rooted in a family legacy of compassion, established to strengthen community life by addressing pressing disadvantage, isolation, and exclusion among local residents. Core values emphasize arts, youth empowerment, support for those in hardship, mental wellbeing, inclusion, and resilience, with a philosophy of relational partnership, grassroots empowerment, and prudent stewardship ensuring sustainable impact. They believe change arises through community-led interventions that enhance quality of life, foster belonging, and adapt to evolving needs like economic pressures and rural challenges, prioritizing organizations with deep local ties and demonstrable benefits for the most vulnerable.

They fund mental health services including counselling, peer support groups, and therapeutic activities promoting positive wellbeing for individuals facing anxiety, depression, or isolation; rural isolation reduction through befriending schemes, community outreach, and social connection programs for elderly residents and isolated individuals; disability support encompassing accessible facilities, respite care, inclusive activities, and adaptations for people with physical disabilities, learning disabilities, or mobility needs; youth work such as after-school clubs, creative arts programs, playground developments, and skills training for children and young people at risk of exclusion; food security initiatives tackling hunger and cost-of-living crises via food distribution and community kitchens; elderly care addressing loneliness through day services and social enterprises; community infrastructure like village hall refurbishments enabling holistic, preventative activities; and capacity building for grassroots voluntary groups delivering person-centred, trauma-informed interventions that build resilience and prevent crisis in families, carers, and disadvantaged rural communities.

They exclude profit-making organizations and national entities lacking local roots, focusing instead on charitable, community-embedded groups serving children, young people, elderly people, people with disabilities, families in hardship, and isolated rural residents in Westmorland's villages and districts. Distinctive for proactive trustee engagement, site visits, and enduring place-based strategy honoring arts-youth-hardship ethos, they prioritize evidence of practical, sustainable improvements via community-led, inclusive approaches that safeguard vulnerable lives against social, economic, and environmental exclusion.