Who
Founded in 1976, The Lake District Calvert Trust is the inspiration of John Fryer-Spedding, whose vision was to enable people with disabilities to benefit from outdoor activities in the countryside. Today the Trust provides adventure breaks and holidays for people with disabilities. It helps children and adults with a range of disabilities overcome challenges and experience the benefit of the great outdoors. With a specialist residential centre on the outskirts of Keswick, Calvert Lakes offers individuals, families, and school groups the chance to experience everything the Lake District has to offer in a safe and supportive way. The Francis Scott Trust has supported Lake District Calvert Trust for over 28 years via grant funding of £300,000. This close partnership means that when a new capital project was under construction, the board of trustees approached us for support.
What The Calvert Trust said:
“The partnership between the FST and the Lake District Calvert Trust has been invaluable as we rebuild the Trust’s position following the impact of the pandemic years. The support we have received has made a major difference to our ability to continue to enable people with disabilities to enjoy outdoor activities in the countryside and share the wonderful opportunities the Lake District offers”.
What
The motivation for Lake District Calvert Trust was to allow trustees to focus on strategic issues as opposed to short-term operational concerns, affording them the confidence to make decisions to build long-term resilience at the organisation. From a Francis Scott Trust perspective the loan needed to reflect near-term liquidity constraints (so interest-only for the first five years), of sufficiently long duration (7.5 years) to allow for a recovery to full strength and offer flexibility (early repayment) should the outturn be better than expected. This illustrates the key pillars of the Trust’s approach to making social investments – genuinely patient, affordable capital with flexibility included to respond to situations as they evolve.
Why
Lake District Calvert Trust wanted to diversify income and reduce revenue seasonality. They built the 10-bed Calvert Reconnections facility, a neuro-rehabilitation centre for people with Acquired Brain Injury (ABI). Based in a specially adapted residential centre their expert clinical therapy team combines cognitive and physical rehabilitation with vocational and outdoor activities delivered within a unique non-clinical environment. Having completed construction the COVID pandemic struck. Not only did this prevent the facility from opening, but core Calvert Lakes operation also saw bookings cancelled as restrictions were imposed. With little scope to dramatically reduce costs the Trust saw large deficits erode unrestricted reserves. Despite an excellent reputation for fundraising and a local community willing to donate to emergency campaigns, the reserves base of the charity was severely depleted. The Francis Scott Trust were approached early in 2020, at the same time as Trustees were analysing the potential for social investment to allow the endowment to have greater impact over and above core grant giving activity. Although social investment has been prevalent in the UK since the early 2000s, experience to date has tended to focus on the South East and on large property transactions. Francis Scott Trustees view social investment as a tool to both increase impact and improve organisational resilience and sustainability, and being a trusted funder with long-term relationships in the region is well placed to partner organisations.
Where
Calvert Trust are based outside of Keswick and work both with local groups but also those coming from much further afield, and even nationally through their reconnections programme. Our social investment programme differs to our grant making in that the charitable purpose and geographic location are broader: the Trust can choose to invest in anything that provides a social return in England & Wales although deviating materially from both core priority group and place is unlikely.
When
Trustees agreed in April 2021 to carve out 5% of the endowment for social investment, and we started due diligence on the Lake District Calvert Trust request for a loan of £300,000 to support the balance sheet as the organisation emerged from COVID and Reconnections opened for the first time.
How
Lake District Calvert Trust has a strong board of trustees and as such the level of detail provided to the due diligence process didn’t require help from external sources. We recognise that this isn’t always the case and, as such, we offer two routes to help get ‘application ready’ (see here for details). As this was the Trust’s first social investment for some time (archives show social investments were made in the 1960s) we used both external legal and financial help and internal resources to ensure the structure was right, risks were managed and that the chances of success were maximised. In addition to agreeing the financial components we worked with Lake District Calvert Trust to ensure the best metrics were being used to measure impact both at core Calvert Lakes as well as emerging operations at Calvert Reconnections. Being able to estimate the social return element of an investment, both quantitatively and qualitatively, is key to securing a positive recommendation from our Investment Committee. Formal due diligence concluded late November 2021 and the Loan Agreement was signed in December.
What The Calvert Trust said
“The partnership between the FST and the Lake District Calvert Trust has been invaluable as we rebuild the Trust’s position following the impact of the pandemic years. The support we have received has made a major difference to our ability to continue to enable people with disabilities to enjoy outdoor activities in the countryside and share the wonderful opportunities the Lake District offers”.
Grants and Development
Supporting small to medium size organisations working with children and young people and based in Cumbria and/or Lancaster District.