Anti-racism charities you can donate to in the UK

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“In a racist society it is not enough to be non-racist, we must be anti-racist”, Angela Y. Davis. Today I want to signpost my white followers in particular to funds that they can donate to, email templates they can send to their MPs and some resources they can use to help in the ongoing fight to dismantle white supremacy. I hope you find this blog post of anti-racism charities in the UK helpful. Please donate if you can. Funds are in alphabetical order.

Anti-racism charities in the UK

Firstly, I know times are tight for many right now so if you are skint this YouTube video was created to offer people a way to donate and financially contribute to #blacklivesmatter without having any actual money or going out to protest themselves. Investing in our future can be difficult for young people, so 100% of the advertisement revenue this video makes through AdSense will be donated to the associations that offer protester bail funds, help pay for family funerals, and advocacy.

Black Lives Matter UK (BLMUK) is a coalition of black activists and organisers across the UK. They have been organising since 2016 for justice in communities.

Black Minds Matter aim to link as many black individuals and families in the UK with certified, professional, black practitioners for sessions as soon as possible. 

Black Protest Legal UK is a hub of Lawyers and legal advisors providing free legal advice and representation to UK Black Lives Matter activists and protesters.

The 4Front Project is a member-led youth organisation empowering young people and communities to fight for justice, peace and freedom. They support members with experiences of violence and the criminal justice system to create change; in their own lives, communities and society.

INQUEST is the only charity providing expertise on state related deaths and their investigation to bereaved people, lawyers, advice and support agencies, the media and parliamentarians. Their specialist casework includes deaths in police and prison custody, immigration detention, mental health settings and deaths involving multi-agency failings or where wider issues of state and corporate accountability are in question. This includes work around the Hillsborough football disaster and the Grenfell Tower fire.

Kick It Out is English football’s equality and inclusion organisation. Working throughout the football, educational and community sectors to challenge discrimination, encourage inclusive practices and campaign for positive change, Kick It Out is at the heart of the fight against discrimination for everyone who plays, watches or works in football.

Kwanda is a modern progressive virtual village for those who want to build reliable and empowering systems for black communities.

Liberty challenges injustice, defends freedom and campaigns to make sure everyone in the UK is treated fairly.

Operation Black Vote is the first initiative to focus exclusively on the Black democratic deficit in the UK and campaigns to ensure we have greater racial justice and equality throughout the UK.

Resourcing Racial Justice is raising £50,000 to provide financial investment for communities & organisations to redress the impact of COVID-19 & systemic racism on communities of colour.

Runnymede Trust is the UK’s leading independent race equality think tank. They generate intelligence to challenge race inequality in Britain through research, network building, leading debate, and policy engagement.

Show Racism the Red Card is the UK’s leading anti-racism educational charity. They provide educational workshops, training sessions, multimedia packages, and a whole host of other resources, all with the purpose of tackling racism in society. Established in January 1996, the organisation utilises the high-profile status of football and football players to publicise its message. Across Britain, Show Racism the Red Card delivers training to more than 50,000 individuals per year. 

Southall Black Sisters are a leading advocacy service working to highlight and challenge all forms of gender-related violence against women.

Stand Against Racism and Inequality (SARI) provides support for victims of any type of hate crime.

Stand Up to Racism is broad organisation that brings people together to build solidarity with refugees and confront racism, islamophobia and antisemitism. They have local groups in towns and cities around the country. 

The Stephen Lawrence Charitable Trust aims to be a fitting legacy to Stephen’s memory and to make a real impact by:

• Supporting young people to transform their lives by overcoming disadvantage and discrimination and moving into ambitious careers as professionals
• Ensuring businesses can benefit from and are more inclusive of diverse talent throughout their management structures
• Continuing to campaign for fairness and justice, ensuring the lessons learnt from Stephen’s murder are acted upon

Stop Hate UK is one of the leading national organisations working to challenge all forms of Hate Crime and discrimination, based on any aspect of an individual’s identity. Stop Hate UK provides independent, confidential and accessible reporting and support for victims, witnesses and third parties.

StopWatch UK is a coalition, which works to:

• Promote effective, accountable and fair policing
• Inform the public about the use of stop and search
• Develop and share research on stop and search and alternatives
• Organise awareness raising events and forums
• Provide legal support challenging stop and search

The Black Curriculum is an initiative that teaches Black history all year round in the school year, to 8-16 year olds. They deliver their content into schools, using a range of art modes such as drama and poetry. They also provide consultations and training for teachers across the country to teach Black history all year round.

The Free Black University is a hub for radical and transformative knowledge production. The fight to decolonise education has been going on for years and it has become ever clearer that more is required than what the current education system can offer. Universities hold a deep responsibility when it comes to racism, the knowledge that introduced the very ideology of racism into our society was born in British Universities. The Free Black University exists to re-distribute knowledge and act as a space of incubation for the creation of transformative knowledge in the Black community.

The National Memorial Family Fund is the first permanent national resource of its kind specifically for those that are affected by deaths in custody. They make small grants available for families and their campaign groups across the United Kingdom to provide practical domestic assistance, to further the work of their own campaigns or to assist them in engaging in a range of other local, regional or national campaigns, events and initiatives.

UK Black Pride promotes unity, solidarity and co-operation among all LGBTQ people of African, Asian, Caribbean, Middle Eastern and Latin American descent, as well as their friends and families.

Funds to the US

If you want to donate to the US to help those protesting right now then Progressives Everywhere have created a fund devoted to help low-income people, protestors and bystanders who have been unfairly arrested and must post high cash bails. This fund splits your donation between many bail funds.

Some anti-racism resources you can use in the UK

This post is predominately signposting to anti-racism charities in the UK that you can donate to but while I was on, I wanted to drop some other helpful resources I had come across as well.

Write to your MP

Write to your local MP:

• To demand the UK takes a stand against police brutality and racism, using this email template
• To demand the suspension of UK exportation of crowd control weapons to the US, using this email template
• To request further investigation into Belly Mujinga’s death, using this email template
• To demand the UK government publishes and delivers actionable results relating to the BAME COVID report
• Join the campaign being led by the Black Curriculum to change the UK national curriculum to include black lived experiences and contributions throughout history. I’ve just emailed the education secretary and my local MP using their template and it was really quick and easy so there is no excuse for not doing it!

You can find your local MP’s contact details here.

Anti-racism resource roundups

The following is a list of practical steps we can take to support the BLM movement, both here in the UK and abroad.

This Google docs document was compiled by Sarah Sophie Flicker and Alyssa Klein in May 2020 and has a ton of anti-racism resources.

Your Kids Aren’t Too Young to Talk About Race: Resource Roundup

Books to facilitate conversations around race by Dope Black Mums.

To celebrate diversity in children’s fiction, here are some of Seven Stories (The National Centre for Children’s Books) favourite books for children of all ages by black authors and illustrators and about incredible black people in history. 

Tinuke Bernard has done some fantastic work here pulling 250 black influencers into one directory.

Please note, if you follow a person of colour, please don’t message them to explain anything to you, that happens to them constantly and is exhausting. Just listen and if able pay them for their labour.

Follow up

I’ll also be adding more to this post as and when I find it. If there are any anti-racism charities in the UK that I have missed off this list or anything you think I should add then let me know in the comments and I’ll get those added too.

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