Nuffield Foundation commits £150mn over five years to tackle UK’s biggest social challenges
Howard Lake | 24 July 2025 | News
The Nuffield Foundation has launched a Strategic Review in order to fund research and innovation that addresses some of the UK’s most urgent social and economic challenges. It is backed by a £150 million spending commitment.
For each of the next five years the Foundation will grant £30 million annually “to generate rigorous evidence on, and shape solutions to”, intersecting problems that impact UK society which are holding back the country’s future prosperity and wellbeing.
The Foundation acknowledges that this review is in response to current global and domestic pressures that are reshaping UK policy and politics.
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Key themes for the review
Areas of interest for the Foundation’s investments include:
- the social foundations of future economic success
- the effect of shifting demographics on communities, public services and finances
- the societal and economic impact of the climate transition
- the rapid acceleration of science and technological developments on society
- and the challenge of nurturing trust in institutions in polarised times.
It has also decided to focus on funding “innovative interventions and backing groundbreaking institutions” that use evidence to improve lives.
Alongside the review and its themes, the Foundation work’s will continue to be anchored in its long-established commitment to enhancing opportunity, tackling disadvantage and inequality, creating a fairer and more inclusive society for all, and building on its established expertise in the areas of education, justice, and the economy, work and welfare.
What will the new £150 million fund?
The Foundation’s new £150 million spending commitment will fund social and economic policy research grants, with ringfenced support for work on the future of racial diversity, and ill-health and disability research.
It will also continue to back innovative practice, and the three expert research Centres it founded: the Nuffield Council on Bioethics, the Ada Lovelace Institute, and the Nuffield Family Justice Observatory.
Reopening of Strategic Fund
This new phase in the Foundation’s 80-year history also includes the reopening of the Strategic Fund, with £15 million in funding reserved for supporting ambitious and transformational research proposals that target the most significant developments shaping the UK public policy agenda.
Gavin Kelly, Chief Executive of the Nuffield Foundation, said:
“As one of the foremost funders of UK social policy research, it is incumbent upon us to harness our resources and deploy them towards generating viable solutions to the key social questions facing the country. Our new Strategic Review commits us to an ambitious agenda that seeks to use sound evidence to improve people’s lives and create a fairer future.”
Find all funding opportunities from the Nuffield Foundation, together with details of the Strategic Review.
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.