The City Bridge Foundation has announced a new 10-year funding policy that will offer long-term core funding as a default, with £15m allocated for the first year.

Under the policy the foundation, a 900-year-old charity that also looks after Tower Bridge and four other Thames crossings, will position itself as a social justice funder.

It comes after the foundation closed its rolling grants programmes to new applications in October to clear a backlog and tighten the focus of its funding strategy.

The “unprecedented surge in demand” occurred after the grantmaker’s rolling grants programmes benefitted from a £200m uplift five years ago, which is coming to an end.

With its new Standing With Londoners funding policy, the grantmaker – which formerly held a more broad focus on helping communities across London – said it would operate with a sharper focus on tackling the root causes of inequality in the capital.

The foundation will look to support organisations in four key areas: delivering climate justice; access to justice (including supporting people to access their rights); tackling racial injustice; and addressing economic inequality.

The grantmaker said it would prioritise funding for community-led organisations and would offer long-term, core funding as a default, with unrestricted funding given where possible.

The policy also includes other innovations to support grant applicants, such as pre-application phone calls to simplify the process.

The foundation has already allocated a total of £48m for the coming year, £15m of which will go towards the new funding policy.

Of this £15m, up to £6m will be allocated to grants under the first of the foundation’s new funding programmes, Access to Justice – which will be designed alongside sector partners and is expected to launch in the autumn.

Up to £8m will be used for the remainder of the grantmaker’s Funder Plus programme, which offers non-financial support to funded organisations, and for legacy and transition funding, which will help identify the impact of the grantmaker’s narrowed focus on the sector.

A spokesperson for City Bridge Foundation said: “In the months ahead we will identify the areas of the sector likely to be most impacted, and allocate funding to support organisations working in those areas, to reduce the impact on them.”

The grantmaker’s funding policy will launch in the autumn, with the foundation continuing to assess and award grants under the old funding policy until the summer.

Sacha Rose-Smith, chief funding director at the City Bridge Foundation, said: “Our funding has had a huge impact in meeting the needs of Londoners for 30 years, but the changes the capital has seen, and the fact our extra £200m uplift is coming to an end, means we need to focus our resources to deliver maximum impact. 

“While we will continue to fund some work which address the immediate needs of Londoners, there will be a much greater emphasis – in response to a long-standing call from the sector – on tackling the root causes and systemic factors which enable inequality and injustice to prevail.

“Our ambitious 10-year policy marks an exciting new chapter in our journey as a social justice funder, working collaboratively with our partners to leverage change and standing shoulder to shoulder with Londoners to make the capital a fairer place.”