Customer & Community Investment Fund

Smart Works Leeds supports women into employment by matching them with job opportunities, providing coaching, and offering confidence‑boosting interview outfits.

LNER funding helps the charity deliver this life‑changing service, with most clients finding work within a month. Growing demand means the team is moving to larger premises in Leeds, including an LNER‑sponsored dressing room.

A Bradford-based charity which equips young people with the skills to build positive mental health has received vital funding from LNER.

Non-profit organisation Step2 works with local secondary schools, delivering pupil-focused workshop sessions which strengthen mental and emotional resilience. Young people learn healthy emotional communication skills and positive coping mechanisms which can be used throughout life. Step2 also supports teachers, parents, school staff, and the local community to work together, building a wider culture of positive mental health.

Thanks to funding from the LNER Customer and Community Investment Fund (CCIF), Yorkshire Wildlife Trust has been able to introduce 650 metres of hedgerow and establish a new wildlife corridor which will support insects, birds and animals like dragonflies, marsh harriers and brown hares. Three new ponds have also been created, along with new grassland and crops, which will support birds such as turtle doves, yellowhammers, and grey partridges.

Durham Wildlife Trust used LNER funding to restore farmland and create the Great North Fen Habitat, including new grassland, wetlands, hedgerows, and ponds to attract birds, otters, and water voles.

Wag & Company combats loneliness in older dog-lovers through volunteer dog visits. With new funding from LNER, they can recruit 40 more volunteers, bringing companionship to even more people at home, in care homes, and hospitals.

LifeCare Edinburgh provides vital support to older people who are living with dementia, poor health or mobility issues, and those who care for them.

Thanks to funding from the LNER CCIF, the charity has been able to deliver its ‘Caring Connections’ project, benefiting around 180 local people over a twelve-month period. LifeCare’s activities provide much needed respite and support for unpaid carers too, many of whom are often older themselves.

The Findhorn Watershed Initiative was launched by the Findhorn, Nairn and Lossie Rivers Trust as an accelerated, collaborative landscape-scale programme of habitat restoration, carbon sequestration, and river stewardship.

The programme is a multi-generational vision to restore a mosaic of nature rich habitats, foster a local culture of nature connection, and enable a thriving nature-positive economy across the River Findhorn catchment area.

A charity which empowers people living with sight loss and a range of disabilities has opened a dedicated multi-sensory room with funding from LNER’s Customer & Community Investment Fund (CCIF).

The new multi-sensory room includes a craft zone, comfy seating, colour-changing mood lighting, bubble machines and more, providing immersive experiences where people can relax or enjoy arts and crafts and the surroundings.

With support from the Customer & Community Investment Fund, Next Door But One is delivering bespoke workshops of Forum Theatre; an arts intervention tool providing a `rehearsal for life’. Which provides important life lessons for young adults who are neurodiverse or have learning difficulties in conjunction with staff and members of The Snappy Trust.

The ‘Let’s Get Living’ project, funded by LNER's Customer & Community Investment Fund, has enabled Methodist Homes Association (MHA) to organise almost a hundred daytrips for older people in West Yorkshire and the Northeast Region.

We are excited to be working with The Launchpad Collective to help deliver a programme that focuses on providing tailored work-readiness training, digital skills development, and vocational opportunities to marginalised refugees and asylum seekers with the right to work.

The project aims to foster integration into local communities and contribute to economic growth by creating a skilled, inclusive workforce.