Nobody quite expected the results to be quite as dramatic, but they are what they are. The Conservative Party has a Commons majority of 78 – the largest since the 1980s, giving Boris Johnson a commanding position.
For the charity sector, Boris Johnson’s new cabinet has not yet been announced and it is unknown whether a new charities minister will be elected, replacing existing minister, Baroness Barran.
The Conservatives' key benefit for charities is its pledge to drive £500m towards disadvantaged people using the UK Shared Prosperity Fund. The party has also committed to ensuring local councils deliver more services.
In its manifesto, the party has said museums, libraries, cinemas and other cultural infrastructure will receive funding worth £250 million as part of what it claims is the “largest cultural capital programme in a century”.
Proposals include a Community Ownership Fund, which would create £150 million for communities to run civic organisations themselves. It claims £500 million would be made available to new youth clubs and to the maintenance of existing international aid spending.
The Conservative manifesto explains that the funding towards international aid will focus on two key areas: terrorism and climate change. “We will proudly maintain our commitment to spend 0.7 per cent of GNI on development and do more to help countries receiving aid become self-sufficient,” it said.
“We have doubled International Climate Finance. And we will use our position hosting the UN Climate Change Summit in Glasgow in 2020 to ask our global partners to match our ambition,” it said.
More information to follow in due course.
