Who we are

Tudor is a grant-making organisation with a long-standing history of funding voluntary organisations and community groups working for positive social change in the UK. It has assets of £250m and has committed more than £20m in grants in the financial year 2022/2023. The trust’s assets are held in a wide range of funds managed in a responsible way.

In 1955 Sir Godfrey Mitchell, owner of the construction business George Wimpey Ltd, established the charitable trust. In 1979 the trust was named The Tudor Trust.

Governance of the trust

The wider social context in which Tudor has been operating has changed dramatically over the last decade. For most of the trust’s existence the members of the Board of Trustees have been descendants of the original founder. Increasingly those trustees recognised that we live in a society that is shaped by inequity and that changes at Board level were needed to ensure the delivery of the changing purpose of the trust.

In 2024 the membership of the Board of Trustees has moved from being rooted in family to being governed by trustees with a wider and more diverse range of experience, perspectives and leadership, closer to the social change we want to achieve.

Evolution of our grant-making

Changing our governance model is the first step of a transformation process to enable the trust to be more proactive in all its strategic planning. We believe that all communities will benefit, when we help to build leadership, power and strong networks in disproportionately disadvantaged communities.

For this reason, we are working towards directing our funding to communities that have been systematically under-resourced and impacted by racism and other forms of discrimination.

We are winding down our current grant-making programme and developing a new grant-making strategy, putting Justice, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion at the heart of our principles. Our principles guide the way we work with our staff, grant partners and all our stakeholders.

As we work towards a total organisational transformation, we will build on Tudor’s commitment to strengthen community groups, small charities and the grassroots. At this critical moment in our history, we hope to maximise our contribution to the shared responsibilities of UK philanthropy to build the power and strength of civil society.

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