Marking 25 years of CDFI support with new £250,000 grants programme
Published: September 14, 2026
Building on 25 years of partnership with Community Development Finance Institutions (CDFIs), our CIT Grants programme will support innovation, transformation and growth across the responsible finance sector.
Since 2001, Unity has provided over £143 million of funding to 22 Community Development Finance Institutions (CDFIs), enabling them to provide much-needed capital to organisations where mainstream finance has not been available.
As part of our 25th anniversary, we’ve committed to award over £250,000 worth of grants to CDFIs by 2030. The CDFI Innovation & Transformation (CIT) Grants complement our wider support of the responsible finance sector, and have launched at a time when their role in supporting communities and the UK economy is growing from strength to strength.
Joshua Meek, Chief Customer & Impact Officer at Unity Trust Bank, said: “The Responsible Finance sector is directly aligned to our double bottom line mission. Unity’s CIT Grants programme aims to provide capacity for CDFIs to explore innovations and transformations that best service their customers. With over 25 years of experience working with CDFIs, we believe this support can deliver outsized impact where it matters.
“The recipients of these grants will be able to strengthen their organisations. It will help them provide more lending, and will also fund innovative and transformational ideas not supported through traditional CDFI financing.”
The grants at a glance
The 2026 CIT Grants programme launched on September 14th and eligible CDFIs are invited to apply for one of two grants:
£20,000 to a micro enterprise lender providing loans under £25,000. This is to support investment readiness, evidence-building, market insight and practical preparation for growth opportunities.
£40,000 for an established impact lender. This is to support a practical innovation, transformation project. It will also help service improvement or capability-building activity that helps deliver more impact for customers.
Working together to create impact
Chief Executive of Responsible Finance, Theodora Hadjimichael, said: “Banks like Unity are important for the sector because they’re mission aligned. What we’ve seen at Unity, which has been hugely transformational, is that they take time get to know CDFIs. They engage with Responsible Finance and they make sure the finance is flexible. Unity has been an incredible partner to work with. We are thrilled to see this grant programme launch. It is especially exciting to see this new funding for micro enterprise lending CDFIs.”
Gareth Thomas is the Labour (Co-op) MP for Harrow West and is also Chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on CDFIs that leads legislative efforts to tackle financial exclusion. Gareth said: “CDFIs play a vital role in getting finance to entrepreneurs and small businesses that too often struggle to access it through mainstream lenders. If we want growth to reach every part of the country, we need a much stronger community finance sector with the backing to match its ambitions. Unity Trust Bank has been supporting CDFIs for 25 years and its commitment shows what can be achieved when banks build long-term partnerships with community lenders. I welcome this new investment and hope it encourages more of the banking sector to step up and help CDFIs reach many more businesses and communities.”
25 years of partnership in practice
Unity’s first CDFI loan of £600,000 was awarded to Glasgow-based DSL Business Finance Ltd back in 2001. Iain Burnside, CEO at DSL, remembers: “We were established to address the financial difficulties faced by businesses and entrepreneurs in Glasgow. When the Glasgow Regeneration Funds were fully dispersed, we approached Unity Trust Bank. Over the past 25 years our relationship with Unity has been built on trust and it continues in that vein today.”
Our CIT grants are available to all providers in the sector, subject to eligibility criteria.