The Heritage Lottery Fund has issued a statement following the failure of the 2014 Real Poppy Campaign’s application for financial support to plant millions of poppies in time for the Centenary.
Heritage Lottery Fund statement
“Heritage Lottery Fund assessed a £92,900 grant application from the Greenhithe and Swanscombe Branch of the Royal British Legion (RBL) for its Kent-based 2014 Real Poppy Campaign.
It was decided that unfortunately the Fund could not support this application in a highly competitive funding round.
A Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) spokesperson said:
“Heritage Lottery Fund has been unable to support a grant application from the Greenhithe and Swanscombe Branch of the Royal British Legion for a Kent-based project to sow poppies across the county, not to be confused with the Legion’s proposed UK-wide Centenary Poppy Campaign. Demand for our funds is high and we are unfortunately unable to support every application. We remain deeply committed to helping people to learn about and tell the stories of the First World War, and have already invested more than £28million into projects marking the Centenary. We are in discussion with the Royal British Legion at national level and will be meeting with representatives from the Greenhithe and Swanscombe Branch of the RBL next week”.”
Source: Heritage Lottery Fund
Date of statement: 11/09/2013
Posted by: Daniel Barry, Centenary News