## **The Magpie Project**
**Trustees Annual Report and Unaudited Financial Statements Year ended 31 August 2024**
Charity registration - 1176267
**Year ended 31 August 2024**
**The Magpie Project** Annual report and financial statements
## **Contents**
|**Contents**||
|---|---|
|Legal and administrative information|4|
|Trustees annual report|5|
|Objectives and activities|5|
|Achievements and performance in the year|6|
|Partnerships and collaborations|9|
|Organisational development|11|
|Plans for the future|13|
|Structure, governance & management|15|
|Financial review|17|
|Statement of Board of Trustees’ responsibilities|17|
|Independent examiner’s report|19|
|Statement of fnancial activities|21|
|Balance sheet|22|
|Notes to the fnancial statements|23|
Charity number 1176267
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**The Magpie Project** Annual report and financial statements
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## **Legal and administrative information**
## Charity name
The Magpie Project
## Charity registration no.
1176267
## Registered offce and contact details
Grassroots Centre Memorial Avenue London E15 3DB
## Trustees
Anubha Anand (resigned 15 March 2024) Sveta Alladi-Sekidde Therese Bynon Paula Reily Samantha Ward (Interim chair) Amy Ross (appointed 1 September 2024)
## Chief Executive Offcer
Jane Williams
## Chief Financial Offcer
Amy Ross (resigned 31 August 2024) Rosie Harries (appointed 24 July 2024)
## Independent examiner
Enaid Accountancy Ltd Units 24 & 25 Goodsheds Container Village Hood Road Barry CF62 5QU
## Bankers
HSBC Bank plc 15 The Mall Stratford E15 1XL
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**The Magpie Project** Annual report and financial statements
## **Trustees annual report**
The Board of Trustees submit their annual report and the financial statements of The Magpie Project for the year ended 31 August 2024.
The Board of Trustees confirms that the annual report and financial statements of the Charity comply with current statutory requirements, including the Charity Act 2011, as well as the requirements of the Society’s governing document and the provisions of the ‘Charities SORP (FRS 102) - Accounting and Reporting by Charities: Statement of Recommended Practice applicable to charities preparing their accounts in accordance with the Financial Reporting Standard applicable in the UK and Republic of Ireland (FRS 102) second edition (effective 1 January 2019)’, and the Financial Reporting Standard applicable in the UK and Republic of Ireland (FRS 102).
## Objectives and activities
## Objectives
The objects of the Charity are: The prevention and relief of poverty for families with young children living in temporary accommodation or at threat of homelessness in Newham and adjacent boroughs – in particular, providing a space to play and learn, and for parents to gain professional advice and form social networks in order to alleviate immediate difficulties, seek solutions to address their need and reintegrate into existing universal services.
We support insecurely or temporarily housed women with pre-school children living in Newham and surrounding boroughs. Our mission is to make life better – materially, socially, financially, and emotionally – for the families coming to the project and to ensure that pre-school children do not suffer long-term negative consequences of the poor housing and destitution they are experiencing. We know that we are not able to resolve the structural issues of housing, the hostile immigration environment, the cost of living, and entrenched poverty that form a complex web of barriers to our families’ wellbeing. Instead, we aim to reduce the risk to their immediate wellbeing and mitigate the long-term risks to their health and development that these interconnected issues pose. We do this by offering a continuum of care including practical and material help, peer to peer support, play, joy and celebration, belonging and reassurance – while our family support teams try to advocate and navigate the services to which our mums are entitled, and our voice team empowers mums to ask for change where they are not entitled to services that others would be.
Our vision is for happier, healthier children, being positively parented by well-supported and well-informed mums who feel more in control of their situation.
## Activities
Our activities include the provision of services from our building at the Grassroots Centre, E15 3DB, to families with pre-school children who are subject to the hostile immigration environment on entry. Our full timetable of regular events can be seen below (see Performance: Service Delivery). Alongside our regular sessions we are able to offer our mums and minis one-off events either in our workshop sessions or through outings with visiting organisations or similar. We also organize trips to local parks, Discover Story and Westfield’s Christmas grotto etc.
## Public Beneft Statement
The Trustees confirm that they have complied with the duty in section 4 of the Charities Act 2011 to have due regard to the Charity Commission’s general guidance on public benefit, ‘Charities and Public Benefit’.
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**The Magpie Project** Annual report and financial statements
**Year ended 31 August 2024**
Fig 1. The Magpie Project Intervention Pyramid
## Achievements and performance in the year
## Numbers supported
Over the past year we supported 541 mums and 557 pre-school children (2022-23: 495 and 537). We believe this increase is due to the continued placement of new families in the Home Office contingency hotels in Newham, delays in asylum and leave to remain decisions being made (meaning that families remain in limbo for a longer time) and the continuing struggles of those on international student visas. We have also seen an increase in those in the UK on care work visas who have not been offered work on arrival. These issues are exacerbated by deepening deprivation and poverty, which has continued to impact heavily on families with No Recourse to Public Funds (NRPF). We regularly welcome between ten and twenty new families seeking to register for support each week.
## Service Delivery
This year we launched several new programmes and partnerships which help to ensure that our families are accessing the highest-quality support and advice. Our schedule continues to offer a range activities for mums and minis throughout the week during term-time:
|**MONDAY**|**TUESDAY**|**WEDNESDAY**|**THURSDAY**|**FRIDAY**|
|---|---|---|---|---|
|Drop-in stay-and-
play session with
breakfast, lunch,
play, baby bank,
and casework
Workshops on
accessing housing,
benefts, banking
services - NEW|Specialist advice
session in
partnership with
Shelter, Praxis, and
UCL Centre for
Access to Justice
- NEW|Drop-in stay-and-
play session with
breakfast, lunch,
play, baby bank,
and casework
Workshops on
specifc topics
such as potty
training, safe
sleeping, children’s
development|English language
sessions (ended
December 2023)
‘Pathways’ project
for children with
emerging SEN (AM)
– NEW
‘Music,
Motherhood, and
Me’ project (PM) –
NEW|Singing and music-
making (AM)
Steering committee
meetings (PM)|
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## Supported stay and play
Our stay-and-play sessions on Mondays and Wednesdays continue to be the key-stone in the week. New families come and register with us, and those who are already members of the project enjoy:
- Quality indoor and outdoor directed developmentally aware play
- Healthy breakfast and lunch
- Access our baby bank of nappies, clothes, buggies, and other essential items
- Casework and family support
- Dance and movement artists
- English conversation drop-in
- Togetherness and joy within a safe and familiar space
To make sure that we have understood and mitigated the barriers that families face trying to access help we:
- Run a strictly drop-in service with no appointments
- Give £3.50 towards the cost of travel
- Provide an interpretation service for all casework
- Create a safe and welcoming space which is trauma-informed, child-centred, and designed to offer
- a safety net for families during their time in crisis
## Taster and information workshops
We use the workshop sessions from 1pm to 2pm on Mondays and Wednesdays in three distinct ways. Firstly, to discuss internal organisation – we organize termly ‘mothers’ meetings’ to liaise on what mothers want from the project, we also discuss and update our shared behaviour agreements and values. Secondly, we use these sessions to introduce the offers from other local organisations in order to encourage mothers to access them in the community. These include Shelter, London Black Women’s Project, local forest schools, fitness offers, etc. Thirdly, we use the workshop sessions to discuss and address parenting concerns such as dental health, potty training, sleep and safety in the home.
## Family Support
This year has seen the recruitment and embedding of a family support worker to double the capacity in our family support team, which also welcomes two social work students a year to increase capacity on referrals and recording data. Every new mum is offered a welcome meeting with our casework team which is intended to make sure the family is plugged into the support services they need and to which they are entitled including; food banks, health GP, midwives, and other local charities.
## Specialist advice clinic
The team also find themselves untangling very complex situations around immigration, domestic abuse and housing which can take months of regular check-ins and many referrals to external organisations, legal support, and advocating charities. These referrals to outside organisations have been challenging as our families struggle to get to external appointments for legal, immigration, and housing advice due to childcare, travel or other issues. For this reason we have worked to create an internal advice clinic so that mums can access these professionals in a familiar, supported environment with travel paid, food available, childcare and interpreters on hand, as well as a familiar case worker doing a warm handover so that mum does not have to start from scratch telling her story over again.
Tuesdays see our visiting partners Praxis (immigration advice and case work), Shelter (housing advice
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## **The Magpie Project**
Annual report and financial statements
and case work) and UCL legal (legal advice and case work) working with families referred to them by our family support team. In addition to these internal referrals, our family support team refer externally to organisations such as Newham Nurture, Ashiana Network, Hestia, talking therapies, Project 17, The Unity Project, Together with Migrant Children, Maternity Action, London Black Women’s Project and others.
Our inbound referrals come from health visitors, midwives, social workers and organisations such as Hestia and Care4Calais, who work directly in local Home Office contingency hotels. We are proud to say personal recommendation from current and ex-Magpie mothers continues to be our largest single referral route.
## SEND pathways project
This year has also seen the commencement of our specialist SEND project which is aimed at supporting our families who have children with emerging needs at the same time as working alongside health, SEND, and early years professionals to unpick the barriers and facilitators to accessing help and support. This twoyear project is based around a specialist stay and play provision for families who are identified as having children with emerging needs. Led by our existing play lead and supported by specialist volunteers with SEND, Autism, and psychology training, the stay and play has also welcomed the Flying Seagull circus who used the sessions to create and test a ‘sensory suitcase’ show to meet the needs of children with emerging needs in their own national and international work.
Alongside this stay and play, mums and professionals have attended eight workshops resulting in the identification of four themes that will go on to be explored in the coming year. The themes that have emerged through the process are: better provision of play for those waiting for a diagnosis or intervention, mapping of existing Newham services, prepared health professionals who are aware of the barriers facing our families, and finally suggestions for changes to service provision, policies or procedures.
We have been happy to work with consultants Just Ideas to facilitate these workshops. As with all our cocreation work, we are careful to create equity and a fair exchange for mothers who share their time and expertise with us – so we also provide one to one support and advocacy for participating mums in their individual journeys to find support for their children.
## Advocacy and Voice
Having set out to simply meet the basic needs of families experiencing homelessness or insecure housing, we quickly uncovered recurring and systemic issues faced by successive families which compelled us to address the wider environment in which our families were seeking and being blocked in accessing, or being denied, support.
Our advocacy work is grounded in the relationships of trust built through months and years of being alongside mums on each step of their journey through homelessness or the hostile environment. It is through these relationships that we earn our legitimacy to speak on the issues affecting mums’ lives and - where possible and safe to do so – to support them to tell their stories in spaces where decisions about issues affecting their lives are made.
This year, we consolidated our external advocacy work by employing a Magpie Mum to lead our Rights, Experience, Advocacy, Change (REACH) team. Our REACH Co-ordinator is co-chair of the Newham Temporary Accommodation Action Group (TAAG) and participates in the steering group for all London TAAGs. We are also invited to share best practice and influence ways of working across a multitude of organisations and sectors including:
- Feeding into Trust for London guidance on working with people with lived experience
- Advising the Refugee Council on working with families
- Contributing to a report by Morris and Co on emergency accommodation planning, funding and
- regulations
- We have also contributed to reports by UNICEF, Citizens UK, Amnesty, UN Special Envoy on poverty,
- European Human Rights Commission, and have been part of the Royal Foundation for Early Years conference
Our REACH team also decided to run their own campaign on an issue facing many of our families. ‘No Child In a Home Without a Kitchen’, aims to end the use of hotels without kitchens to house families with 8
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children under five. This campaign has:
- Been presented to London Funders, Directors of Public Health and Right to Remain network in
- Birmingham
- Been shared with the Health Foundation in Manchester and an online conference attended by 70
- people from many organisations
- Been championed by 4 in 10 child poverty network who has convened a monthly task and finish
- group to support our campaign
- Attracted more than 3,000 signatures through our online petition
- Taken us to meet with the GLA, the Mayor of Newham, Sir Stephen Timms MP, and many others to
- make our case
Despite these achievements there have been challenges with our steering group and advocacy work. We are permanently recruiting for both teams as the nature of our mums’ lives means that their capacity to contribute can come and go, and the blight of out-of-borough placements means that key members can be moved away with 24 hours’ notice.
## Graduation pathways
Our graduation pathways for mothers who get their refugee status or leave to remain are continuing to evolve. We were running eight-week courses three times a year including workshops on banking, housing entitlement, benefits, budgeting and computer literacy, however, we have found that the extremely difficult housing situation means that mothers are moved out of borough within 28 days of gaining their status, making it impossible for them to undertake the pathway in its original form.
We moved to regular drop-in workshops covering the same issues open to all – although it is difficult for mothers who have not yet gained their status to think ahead in detail about what happens next – as there is usually no timescale for their home office decisions. Despite this, we have worked with the FCA to create workshops around banking, budgeting, and avoiding scams, which four of our Magpie Mums have learned to deliver to our families. They are paid for taking this training and we hope that they will be able to continue to deliver these workshops to future cohorts of graduating mums. Our graduation pathway is intricately linked with our form-filling session.
## Partnerships and collaborations
## Form flling partnerships
At the point of gaining their immigration status we were seeing immense need for navigation, support and form filling for mums who suddenly needed to apply for housing, benefits etc. We advocated with Newham Housing to streamline homelessness applications, for more notice of where emergency accommodation would be, and for more face-to-face services. They have now created specific pathways for those gaining their status and opened face-to-face housing hubs to help those who need extra help with applications.
Despite these, we found that help with letter-reading and form filling for those with limited digital access or written English was still a crunch point for our mums. This year we extended our Tuesday volunteer form filling sessions through a partnership with UCL legal, and Clyde & Co city law firm. We have trained more than 35 Clyde & Co employees to volunteer to help our mums complete Homelessness applications, Universal Credit claims and Child Benefit forms – families are referred internally to this service which is now held on a Thursday at UCL legal’s offices in Stratford.
## Professional support to deliver our activities
As described above, wherever possible we partner with existing services and bring professionals into our sessions where they can meet and support families in a safe and familiar space, rather than families having
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to attend external appointments at a financial and emotional cost. Over the past year we have partnered with the following organisations:
- Specialist advice has been provided by Shelter, Praxis and UCL Law who attend our weekly advice
- sessions.
- Local health visitors attend our drop-in sessions once a fortnight to meet families, answer questions,
- and identify children who may need additional support.
**•** 35 volunteers from Clyde & Co law firm have been trained to attend sessions to support with formfilling, applications, and to provide advice.
**•** Social-work students from the University of East London carry out placements within our services over a period of five months, during which they support with casework and learn from the way we deliver our work.
- The Financial Conduct Authority, Shelter and others help to deliver our graduation workshops.
The Praxis worker’s time is covered by funding secured in a joint bid with Praxis, which is held by Praxis. Other than that, this professional support was all given freely, with an estimated value of over £10,000.
## Creative collaborations
We find the very best artists, musicians and other professionals to work with our families to improve their resilience, confidence, and sense of community through creativity, as well as providing positive and empowering opportunities for voice and storytelling. This year we have worked with the following creative partners:
- London Rhymes musicians have delivered weekly singing and music-making sessions with our
- families, including writing, performing, and recording several new songs which are available on YouTube.
- Louise Klarnett has continued to bring her therapeutic dance and movement practice into our
- weekly sessions to work with mums and children whose bodies are impacted by trauma, stress, and housing.
- Breakfast Club Quartet have come to perform for our families.
- Flying Seagull Circus created and tested a ‘sensory suitcase’ with our minis which they intend to
- use nationally.
**•** Tindersticks has delivered outdoor craft and forest school activities with mums and children, supporting them to safely explore and discover ways to engage with nature in a creative and therapeutic way.
- The Discover Centre has delivered story time sessions within our play sessions throughout the year,
- as a taster for families to encourage them to take up the free spaces we have on offer.
Some of these partnerships were grant-funded, however we are very grateful to those collaborators who gave their time for free, at an estimated value of over £8,000.
## Donated items and experiences
Over the past year we have received donations from local businesses and community members which have helped us meet families’ basic needs for food, clothes, toiletries, baby equipment, and other essentials:
- **Food** : We receive twice-weekly deliveries of surplus food from City Harvest that we turn into
- delicious, freshly prepared breakfasts and lunches for our families.
- **Clothes** : Donations of new clothes came from Westfield London, Knit for Peace, and Children’s
- Salon, Phase Eight, 52 Lives and high quality pre-loved clothes from Little Village, Care4Calais, and countless community members, that we distributed to families at our regular ‘Clothes Clubs’. We also received shopping vouchers from organisations including 52 Lives and AHMM.
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- **Baby and child essentials** : Raincovers, foot muffs, buggies, slings, moses baskets, quilts, and other
- essentials came from 52 Lives, Gainsborough Quilters, and local community members.
- **Household** : Christmas gifts and hampers for 250 families were donated by local community members.
**• Toiletries** : Basics and luxury toiletries came from Waitrose, Marks & Spencer, Bancroft Rugby Club, West Ham Supporters Foodbank, Clapton Community football club, Hygiene Bank, local schools, and community members.
- **Toys and books** : Donations came from Westfield Stratford London, AAA, Hasbro, Newham Bookstore,
- local mosques, and community members.
**• Experiences** : We were provided with 15 weekly tickets for Magpie families to attend a ‘Story Sandwich’ at Discover Centre Stratford, 50 free tickets for Westfield Stratford’s ‘Breakfast with Santa’ event and tickets for 20 families to see the Christmas pantomime at Stratford Theatre Royal.
The estimated value of these items (even if bought second-hand) exceeds £90,000.
## Equipping our new home
We are very grateful to Westfield Stratford London, MUF architecture, local businesses, and a local nursery for donating office equipment, cafe equipment, play equipment, to furnish our new building.
The estimated value of these items is £11,750.
## Partners and supporters
We would like to thank the organisations who have helped us with fundraising, volunteering, events, mentoring, trustee recruitment, connections, and more: Clapton Community Football Club, West Ham Supporters Foodbank, Bancroft Rugby Club, Enabled Living, Black Swan, Financial Conduct Authority, Newham Nurture, Westfield Stratford London, Active Newham, Wanstead and Forest Gate WIs, Number 8 Emporium, Newham Bookstore, Lush, Morris & Company Architects, Laura Jackson, Newham Food Alliance, Maternity Action, Bonny Downs Community Centre, Alternatives Trust, Salvation Army, Museum of Homelessness, Ashiana Network, Care4Calais, The Unity Project, Tower Hamlets Law Centre, Just Life, Papier, London School of Paediatrics, Right to Remain, 4 in 10, Hadley, Little Village, Stephen Timms MP and Mayor of Newham Rukshana Fiaz, Trust for London funder plus, City Bridge funder plus, Lloyds funder plus. We have also received valuable pro bono support from MUF Architects and Norton Rose Fulbright who are supporting us with our move to the new building.
The total value of in-kind support we received is estimated to be approximately £108,000.
## Organisational development
## Co-creation and mums’ voice
The project was built through co-production, and we continue to do this through daily, weekly and termly conversations with mums and minis using the service. We have also formalised this process through the creation of a steering committee of mums who work with our CEO to make key decisions around internal governance. Committee members are offered re-imbursement for their time, and all meetings offer lunch and creche to enable access.
This year our steering committee have made decisions around their own terms of reference, vision, mission and values as well as liaising on our new building move, an increase in our travel allowance, a review of our behaviour agreement, and consultation on our plans for our new kitchen. On top of this, members of this team were given decisions on how to spend a grant given to mums for our ‘Mums’ Takeover’ during the summer holidays which involved budgeting for, organizing, carrying out and reporting on weekly park meetups with mums and minis in parks around Newham while the project took its August break.
Difficulties in training, deepening the skills, and maintaining the numbers in the steering committee arise from the fact that both the home office and housing department frequently place families out of borough
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Annual report and financial statements
with little to no notice. This means that we are constantly having to recruit, inform and train this committee.
## Team updates
In the previous year we significantly increased our staff team, and we have felt the benefits of that this year with much greater capacity to deliver our frontline work, thanks to a bigger casework team, and organizational resilience, thanks to more support staff in key roles.
This year we recruited a new Donations Manager to lead and coordinate our baby bank function, ensuring that families can access the clothes, buggies, and other equipment they need and to develop relationships with organisations and community groups who can help us to source the right items when we need them.
In August we said goodbye to our Chief Financial Officer and welcomed a new Finance & Operations Manager who, alongside financial management, will oversee the lease and management of our new premises. We are in the process of recruiting a part-time fundraiser.
We are also supported by our dance artist in residence who is helping us develop a somatically informed practice focusing on regulating our nervous systems and developing internal coping strategies to deal with the stresses of running our stay-and-play sessions. We also continue to prioritise our reflective practice at the end of each drop-in session, where staff and volunteers are supported to process anything particularly challenging that has happened that day to minimise the build-up of residual stress.
This year our staff wellbeing has been supported by a specific ‘staff wellbeing grant’ from the Tudor Trust which we were able to use to create social events as well as pay for furniture and adaptations for those who were hybrid working, to make sure they had comfortable home-offices.
## Building
After several years of discussions with Newham council, we have finally moved to a new and bigger building this year, solving our long-standing issues around space, capacity, and the challenges of co-habiting with other building users.
This move will enable us to expand our service and develop our offer to families including; providing a community kitchen, community laundry, extended play sessions, extended form-filling support, and the option to co-habit with some of our closest partners to improve collaboration on behalf of our families. This is also an opportunity to build new partnerships with local children’s centres, health visiting teams, volunteers, and donors.
## Challenges
The greatest challenge we experienced this year was the continued rise in the number of families coming to us for support. The high numbers were matched by the depth and complexity of their needs, which included basic needs such as clothes, shoes, food, translation support, access to schools and healthcare, families living on £9 per person per week and health issues resulting from the poor food provision in catered hotels.
The decrease in accessible face-to-face services from children’s social care, children’s centres, housing, domestic violence services, and problems accessing GP and health visiting services, created a significant amount of additional work for our casework staff. The need for face-to-face support has seen, on our busiest day, up to 92 families accessing our services over the course of a single four-hour drop-in stayand-play and support session. The average attendance at one of our drop-ins rose from 40-50 to 55-65 in the past year.
We have also continued to be affected by reduced capacity among some of our key referral partners, especially immigration services, housing solicitors and children’s centre family support workers. The impact of this is that families end up stuck in crisis for longer, as there is not the capacity in the wider system to take on their casework. We have been working on a panel with Sir Stephen Timms MP and others to address the lack of legal advice in Newham.
To mitigate the lack of immigration advice we worked with Praxis to secure funding for a dedicated immigration advisor to support our families. They have worked well with us since September 2023, seeing an average of three families a week and unlocking complex cases to the benefit of many families. We are concerned that this Access to Justice funding from the Ministry of Justice will end in March 2025, and we are actively searching for continuation funding.
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## Plans for the future
We continue to be guided by the following strategic priorities for the year ahead:
**FOCUS ON UNDER FIVES** : Avoid ‘mission creep’ by making sure the day-to-day lived experience of our children is considered first in any undertaking.
**How** : Developmentally-led and trauma-informed play sessions; serving healthy nutritious food; providing essentials via our baby bank and vouchers; offering creche, or play alongside any workshops, form filling or family support, ensuring our casework informs and resources women to thrive as parents; and bringing a sense of joy, celebration and belonging.
**BUILDING A BASE** : Co-create a space alongside the mums, minis, volunteers and staff which works, is welcoming, accessible and promotes shared power and safety.
**How** : We will work on the decoration and flow between areas to make sure mums and minis are comfortable, we will also allow the building to inform new timetables, working patterns and the possibility for deeper partnerships with external partners, or mums.
**COMMUNITY, TRANSPARENCY AND CO-CREATION** : Build the Magpie Project as a co-produced, transparent, sustainable, well-governed, organisation with confident staff alive to the changing needs of the mothers and minis whose needs we are meeting.
**How** : Our new Finance & Operations Manager will work on policies, procedures, support and supervision, continued reflective practice, training and specialisation and progression, volunteer support and training, and embed our aspirations around pathways from mum, through volunteering to employment at the project.
**ADVOCATING FOR ACCESS** : Work to bring families into discussion with local authority and health partners to identify and remove structural barriers to accessing and navigating statutory and specialist services. **How** : We will do this by sitting on working groups such as Temporary accommodation Action Group and the Anti-poverty Alliance, through our own projects such as Pre-school pathways which enable conversations between parents and professionals, and by offering training to frontline workers from other areas (London School of Paediatricians, Newham Early Years practitioners).
**POLICY** : Ensure mum’s voices, and experiences are heard in spaces where decisions are being made about their lives.
**How** : We will do this through the REACH team campaigns, by supporting other organisations’ campaigns - where relevant - and by providing evidence to national reports (Amnesty etc).
**LEARNING** : Work as a test bed for radical and imaginative practice around working with our community and share this with others.
**How** : We will do this by recording and codifying our learning around trauma, safety, psychologically informed work, and somatically informed organisations, inviting researchers and external professionals to observe and research our ways of working.
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**The Magpie Project** Annual report and financial statements
**Year ended 31 August 2024**
SWOT Analysis
## Strengths
**•** Experienced and growing staff team
- Positive funding and financial position
**•** Strong community engagement (Magpie mum community and wider community)
- Good press and media profile
- Growing policy work
- Strong professional partnerships
- Skilled board members
- Best practice safeguarding approach
**•** Partnerships with UCL Access to Justice, Shelter, and Praxis have increased housing, immigration and legal advice.
## Weaknesses
**•** Succession planning (mitigation: newly appointed Finance and Operations Manager to codify and regularize processes and policies, training and support of mums’ Leadership Team)
**•** Data and impact measurement through Salesforce (mitigation: internal training with external support)
**•** Loss of volunteers (mitigation: recruitment, and training and support of Magpie mum volunteers, increased relationships with corporate supporters to include volunteer days)
**•** Vacancy for Chair of Trustees (mitigation: working with Reach Volunteering)
**•** Increasing requests for collaboration and sharing learning is a strain resources (mitigation: codify learning in shareable format)
- Form-filling partnership with Clyde and Co
**•** Increasing requests for collaboration and sharing learning around temporary accommodation
**•** REACH team campaign gaining support across London and nationally
Opportunities
**•** New building
**•** Increasing requests for Corporate partnerships
**•** Consolidating lived-experience in policy area through Trust for London funding and our REACH team
**•** Offering space and ‘hot-desking’ opportunities to other organisations in exchange for engagement with our families
**•** New Pre-School Pathways Project supporting children with SEN and developmental delays
## Threats
**•** Increasing demand and complexity of need (mitigation: understanding of the remit of our work. Continued mapping of the support network of organisations to be referred on to. Training on housing law, immigration law etc. for our family support workers)
**•** Deepening poverty caused by cost-ofliving crisis (mitigation: continued search for support grants, donations and other charities to refer to)
**•** Movement of families out of borough (mitigation: continue to work with Newham Housing, and the Better TA initiative from Trust for London to raise the issue of out of borough placements)
**•** Impact of moral injury and vicarious trauma on staff working with and supporting families in crisis (mitigation: staff wellbeing, mental health days, support and supervision, psychologist on call)
**•** High numbers of children with SEN (mitigation: Pre-school pathways project supporting those with emerging needs through specialized play and advocacy)
**•** Rise in anti-immigration rhetoric (mitigation: concentrating on countering with love, play, moments of joy, belonging and safety)
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**The Magpie Project** Annual report and financial statements
## Structure, governance & management
The Magpie Project (the “Charity”) was constituted as a Charitable Incorporated Organisation on 13 December 2017, when it was registered with the Charity Commissioners for England and Wales as Charity No. 1176267.
## Organisational Structure
Trustees day-to-day running of the Charity is delegated to the Chief Executive Officer (“CEO”). The operational structure consists of a Founder/CEO, Finance & Operations Manager, Family Support Manager, Family Support Worker, Play Lead, Graduation Manager, REACH Coordinator, Administrative Assistant, Kitchen Manager, Donations Manager, and Donations Assistant. A steering committee of women who use or have used the charity actively participates in discussions and decision-making around internal governance and external advocacy, alongside the CEO.
## Selection and appointment of Trustees
Trustee recruitment is an open process conducted by existing charity trustees through public advertising. Apart from the first charity trustees, each trustee is appointed for a term of three years by a resolution passed at a properly convened meeting of the Trustees. In selecting individuals for appointment as charity trustees, the Trustees must have regard to the skills, knowledge and experience needed for the effective administration of the Charity. The Charity has been working with Reach Volunteering to recruit a permanent Chair.
## Trustee Induction and Training
The Trustees make available to each new charity trustee, on or before his or her first appointment: a) a copy of the current version of the constitution, b) a copy of the Charity’s latest Annual Report and statement of accounts, and c) a copy of the Charity Commission’s trustee welcome pack and guidance (CC3) on the responsibilities of a charity trustee.
## Risk management
The Trustees regularly review the key financial, operational, strategic, reputational, and safeguarding risks facing the Charity. A risk register is maintained and updated annually. Over the course of the reporting year, trustees considered the key risks to be those relating to staff workload and wellbeing in the face of increasing demand on our services, and overcrowding of play sessions due to the space limitations in our current building. The trustees worked with the CEO to put in place plans to address these risks.
Charity number 1176267
15
The Magpie Project
Annual report and financial Statements
Year ended 31 August 2024
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16
Charity nurnber 1176267
**Year ended 31 August 2024**
**The Magpie Project** Annual report and financial statements
## Financial review
## Investment and Reserves policy
The trustees aim to maintain free reserves in unrestricted funds of between three and six months of total expenditure. The trustees consider that this level of reserves will provide sufficient funds to continue delivering the core work of the charity in the case of declining income or increasing expenditure, while alternative funds are sought. The level of reserves held throughout the year is monitored termly, and the level of free reserves to be held will be reviewed on an annual basis.
## Financial position
Our accounts for the year ending 31 August 2024 show unrestricted funds of £118,256 at the year-end. This is just below our target of between three and six months of total expenditure. This is due to a combination of factors, including a drop in income from community fundraising which came in below our target. This mirrors trends across the wider sector, although we recognise we have not prioritised this area of fundraising in recent years. The proportion of our funding (in £ value) which is unrestricted dropped to 50% of total income, from 70% in 2022-23. This was driven by a large swing from unrestricted to restricted funding from trusts and foundations. Based on our secured income for the current financial year, that figure has dropped again to 45% of total £ value. Once again, this mirrors trends in the wider sector regarding the challenging and competitive nature of securing unrestricted funds. We are addressing this in the coming year by focusing on developing new corporate partnerships and a renewed push on individual giving, which we hope will generate unrestricted income, and continuing to ensure that our project funding budgets recover the full cost of delivery.
We saw a 23% increase in total income in the last financial year compared to 2022-23, with the biggest increase in restricted trusts & foundations funding. While our community income continued to decline in value and as a percentage of our overall income over the last year, our income from corporate donors increased by nearly 300%. We saw a 19% increase in expenditure, driven by significantly growing our staff team. While we have supported a record number of families during the last year, some of the costs of this have been offset by having staff in roles where they can more effectively leverage free resources such as donations of food, toiletries, clothes, and other items that we might previously have purchased. Higher numbers of families coming to the project and an increase in the travel money given to each family from £3 to £3.50 meant an increase of 25% in this expense compared to the previous year. We continue to receive a small amount of income for advisory services by our CEO feeding into reports, research, and roundtables.
As we settle into the Grassroots Resource Centre over the coming months, the cost of delivering our services from there will become clearer. We anticipate higher costs for utilities and services than we were previously paying, in line with working in a much larger space, and intend to review our staff roles and team structure after an initial settling in period, to ensure we are fit for purpose and meeting safety and safeguarding requirements in a bigger space. Over the next year we will also review our session timetable with a view to offering families a maximum amount of time to use the space, which may also come with cost implications in terms of staff and running costs.
## Funders
Over the past year we have been supported by grants from National Lottery Community Foundation, BBC Children in Need, Tudor Trust, Trust for London, Lloyds Bank Foundation, City Bridge Foundation, Smallwood Trust, The Blue Thread, Treebeard Trust, London Catalyst/Saturday Hospital Fund, Natwest Circle Fund, MOPAC VAWG Grassroots Fund, The Lewin Trust, Angus Lawson Memorial Trust, Westfield Stratford London, and Forest Gate Community Assembly. We also distributed emergency and benevolent grants from South West Ham Child Welfare Society, London Catalyst Samaritan Grants, MOPAC VAWG Emergency Grants, and Newham Household Support Fund distributed directly to families.
## Statement of Board of Trustees’ responsibilities
The Trustees are responsible for preparing the Trustees’ Annual Report and the financial statements in accordance with applicable law and regulations. Charity law requires the Trustees to prepare financial statements for each financial year. Under that law they are required to prepare the financial statements in accordance with UK Accounting Standards and applicable law (UK Generally Accepted Accounting Practice),
Charity number 1176267
17
**The Magpie Project**
**Year ended 31 August 2024**
Annual report and financial statements
including FRS 102 The Financial Reporting Standard applicable in the UK and Republic of Ireland.
Under charity law the Trustees must not approve the financial statements unless they are satisfied that they give a true and fair view of the state of affairs of the Charity and of the excess of income over expenditure for that year. In preparing these financial statements, the Trustees are required to:
- select suitable accounting policies and then apply them consistently;
- make judgements and estimates that are reasonable and prudent;
- state whether applicable UK Accounting Standards have been followed, subject to any material
- departures disclosed and explained in the financial statements; and,
- prepare the financial statements on the going concern basis unless it is inappropriate to presume
- that the Charity will continue its activities.
The Trustees are responsible for keeping adequate accounting records that are sufficient to show and explain the Charity’s transactions and disclose with reasonable accuracy at any time the financial position of the Charity and enable them to ensure that the financial statements comply with the Charities Act 2011. They have general responsibility for taking such steps as are reasonably open to them to safeguard the assets of the Charity and to prevent and detect fraud and other irregularities.
The Trustees are responsible for the maintenance and integrity of the corporate and financial information included on the Charity’s website. Legislation in the UK governing the preparation and dissemination of financial statements may differ from legislation in other jurisdictions. In addition, the Trustees confirm that they are happy that content of the annual review in pages 5 to 18 of this document meet the requirements of the Trustees’ Annual Report under charity law.
They also confirm that the financial statements have been prepared in accordance with the accounting policies set out in the notes to the accounts and comply with the Charity’s governing document, the Charities Act 2011 and Accounting and Reporting by Charities: Statement of Recommended Practice applicable to charities preparing their accounts in accordance with FRS 102, The Financial Reporting Standard applicable in the UK and Republic of Ireland published on 16 July 2014.
This report was approved and authorised for issue by the Board of Trustees on 6 June 2025 and signed on its behalf by:
## Sam Ward
## **SAMANTHA WARD INTERIM CHAIR OF TRUSTEES**
Charity number 1176267
18
**Year ended 31 August 2024**
**The Magpie Project** Annual report and financial statements
## **Independent examiner’s report**
I report to the Trustees on my examination of the accounts of The Magpie Project (Charity number 1176267) for the period ended 31 August 2024 which are set out on pages 21 to 34.
## Respective responsibilities of trustees and examiner
The Charity’s Trustees are responsible for the preparation of the accounts in accordance with the requirements of the Charities Act 2011 (the Charities Act). The Charity’s Trustees consider that an audit is not required for this year under section 144 of the Charities Act and that an independent examination is needed.
It is my responsibility to:
- examine the accounts under section 145 of the Charities Act;
- to follow the procedures laid down in the general Directions given by the Charity Commission under
- section 145(5)(b) of the Charities Act; and,
- to state whether particular matters have come to my attention.
This report, including my statement, has been prepared for and only for the Charity’s Trustees as a body. My work has been undertaken so that I might state to the Charity’s Trustees those matters I am required to state to them in an independent examiner’s report and for no other purpose. To the fullest extent permitted by law, I do not accept or assume responsibility to anyone other than the Charity and the Charity’s Trustees as a body for my examination work, for this report, or for the statements I have made.
## Basis of independent examiner’s statement
My examination was carried out in accordance with general directions given by the Charity Commission. An examination includes a review of the accounting records kept by the Charity and a comparison of the accounts presented with those records. It also includes consideration of any unusual items or disclosures in the accounts, and seeking explanations from the Trustees concerning any such matters.
The procedures undertaken do not provide all the evidence that would be required in an audit, and consequently no opinion is given as to whether the accounts present a ‘true and fair’ view and the report is limited to those matters set out in the statement below.
## Independent examiner’s statement
I have completed my examination. I confirm that no material matters have come to my attention in connection with the examination giving me cause to believe that in any material respect:
- accounting records were not kept in respect of the Charity as required by section 130 of the Act; or
- the accounts do not accord with those records; or
**•** the accounts do not comply with the applicable requirements concerning the form and content of accounts set out in the Charities (Accounts and Reports) Regulations 2008 other than any requirement that the accounts give a ‘true and fair view’ which is not a matter considered as part of an independent examination.
Charity number 1176267
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**The Magpie Project**
**Year ended 31 August 2024**
Annual report and financial statements
I have no concerns and have come across no other matters in connection with the examination to which attention should be drawn in this report in order to enable a proper understanding of the accounts to be reached.
## **ANDREW PHILIP NASH FCA**
## **MEMBER OF THE INSTITUTE OF CHARTERED ACCOUNTANTS IN ENGLAND AND WALES – 2461833**
## **DATED: 13 JUNE 2025**
Enaid Accountancy Ltd Units 24 & 25 Goodsheds Container Village Hood Road Barry CF62 5QU
Charity number 1176267
20
**Year ended 31 August 2024**
**The Magpie Project** Annual report and financial statements
## **Statement of financial activities**
For the year ended 31 August 2024
|**Notes**
**Income from:**
Donations & legacies
3
Other income
**Total income**
**Expenditure on:**
Raising funds
4 & 5
Charitable activities
Support for mums
4 & 6
Total charitable activities
**Total expenditure**
**Net income/(expenditure)**
**Transfers between funds**
**Net movement in funds**
**Reconciliation of funds:**
Total funds brought forward
10 & 11
Total funds carried forward
10 & 11|**Unrestricted**
**Restricted**
**Total**
Total
**Funds**
**Funds**
**Funds**
Funds
**Year**
**Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**Year**
**Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**Year**
**Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
**£**
**£**
**£**
£
221,994
227,808
**449,802**
425,164
5,704
1,624
**7,328**
4,743|
|---|---|
||**227,698**
**229,432**
**457,130**
429,907|
||39,933
1,903
**41,836**
48,110
224,061
213,280
**437,341**
398,470|
||**224,061**
**213,280**
**437,341**
398,470|
||**263,994**
**215,183**
**479,177**
446,580|
|||
||**(36,296)**
**14,249**
**(22,047)**
(16,673)
**-**
**-**
**-**
-|
||**(36,296)**
**14,249**
**(22,047)**
(16,673)
154,552
22,050
**176,602**
193,275|
||**118,256**
**36,299**
**154,555**
176,602|
The notes on pages 23 to 34 form part of the financial statements.
Charity number 1176267
21
**The Magpie Project** Annual report and financial statements
**Year ended 31 August 2024**
## **Balance sheet**
As at 31 August 2024
|**Notes**
**Fixed assets**
Tangible assets
8
**Current assets**
Debtors
9
Cash at bank and in hand
**Total current assets**
**Creditors**
Amounts falling due within
one year
10
**Total net assets**
**Funds of the charity**
Restricted income funds
11 & 12
Unrestricted funds
Designated funds
General funds
Unrestricted funds
11 & 12|**2,770**
**206,349**|**Total**
**Funds**
**Year**
**Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**£**
**869**
**209,119**
**(55,433)**|
7,131
210,741|Total
Funds
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
£
1,539
217,872
(42,809)|
|---|---|---|---|---|
||**-**
**118,256**||
-
154,552||
|||**154,555**||176,602|
|||**36,299**
**118,256**||22,050
154,552|
||||
||
|||**154,555**||176,602|
The notes on pages 23 to 34 form part of the financial statements.
These financial statements were approved and authorised for issue by the Board of Trustees on 6 June 2025 and signed on their behalf by:
## Sam Ward
## **SAMANTHA WARD INTERIM CHAIR OF TRUSTEES**
Charity number 1176267
22
**Year ended 31 August 2024**
**The Magpie Project** Annual report and financial statements
## **Notes to the financial statements**
## 1. Accounting policies
## **Basis of preparation of the financial statements**
The financial statements have been prepared in accordance with ‘Charities SORP (FRS 102) - Accounting and Reporting by Charities: Statement of Recommended Practice applicable to charities preparing their accounts in accordance with the Financial Reporting Standard applicable in the UK and Republic of Ireland (FRS 102) second edition (effective 1 January 2019)’, the Financial Reporting Standard applicable in the UK and Republic of Ireland (FRS 102), including Update Bulletin 1, and relevant charities law.
The effect of any event relating to the year ended 31 August 2024, which occurred before the date of approval of the financial statements by the Board of Trustees has been included in the financial statements to the extent required to show a true and fair view of the state of affairs at 31 August 2024 and the results for the year ended on that date.
Under the exemption available to smaller charities the Board of Trustees has chosen not to include a Statement of Cash Flows within the financial statements.
The functional currency of the Charity is sterling and amounts in the financial statements are rounded to the nearest pound.
## **Legal status**
The Magpie Project is a charitable incorporated organisation registered in England & Wales, and meets the definition of a public benefit entity. The registered office is Grassroots Centre, Memorial Avenue, London, E15 3DB.
## **Going concern**
The financial statements have been prepared on the going concern basis as the Board of Trustees is confident that future reserves and future income is more than sufficient to meet current commitments. There are no material uncertainties that impact this assessment, and the ongoing COVID-19 global pandemic has had no material impact on this assessment.
## **Fund Accounting**
General funds are unrestricted funds which are available for use at the discretion of the Trustees in furtherance of the general objectives of the Charity and which have not been designated for other purposes.
Designated funds comprise of unrestricted funds that have been set aside by the Trustees for particular purposes. The aim and use of each designated fund is set out in note 11 of the financial statements.
Restricted funds are funds that are to be used in accordance with specific restrictions imposed by donors or that have been raised by the Charity for particular purposes. The cost of raising and administering such funds are charged against the specific fund. The aim and use of each restricted fund is set out in note 10 of the financial statements.
## **Income**
Income is recognised when the Charity has entitlement to the funds, any performance indicators attached to the item(s) of income have been met, it is probable that the income will be received, and the amount can be measured reliably.
Donations are recognised in full in the Statement of Financial Activities when entitled, receipt is probable and when the amount can be quantified with reasonable accuracy. Gift aid receivable is included when claimable – i.e. when the eligible donation is received.
Grant income is credited to the Statement of Financial Activities when received or receivable whichever is earlier, unless the grant relates to a future year, in which case it is deferred.
Charity number 1176267
23
**The Magpie Project** Annual report and financial statements
**Year ended 31 August 2024**
## 1. Accounting policies (continued from previous page)
## **Expenditure and irrecoverable VAT**
All expenditure is accounted for on an accruals basis and has been included under expense categories that aggregate all costs for allocation to activities. Indirect costs, including governance costs, which cannot be directly attributed to activities, are allocated between activities proportionate to the direct costs incurred in those activities. Grants payable are charged in the year when the offer is conveyed to the recipient. Irrecoverable VAT is charged against the category of expenditure for which it was incurred.
## **Tangible fixed assets and depreciation**
Any assets costing more than £500 are capitalised other than those purchased using restricted funds. Tangible fixed assets are stated at cost less depreciation. Depreciation is provided at rates calculated to write off the cost of fixed assets, less their residual value, over their useful life, on the following basis:
Computer equipment
20% reducing balance
## **Cash at bank and in hand**
Cash at bank and in hand includes cash in hand, deposits with banks and funds that are readily convertible into cash at, or close to, their carrying values, but are not held for investment purposes.
## **Debtors**
Trade and other debtors are recognised at the settlement amount after any trade discount is applied.
## **Creditors**
Creditors are recognised where the Charity has a present obligation resulting from a past event that will probably result in the transfer of funds to a third party, and the amount due to settle the obligation can be measured or estimated reliably.
## **Financial instruments**
Basic financial instruments are measured at amortised cost other than investments which are measured at fair value.
## **Critical estimates and judgements**
In preparing financial statements it is necessary to make certain judgements, estimates and assumptions that affect the amounts recognised in the financial statements. The treatment of tangible fixed assets is sensitive to changes in useful economic lives and residual values of assets. These are reassessed annually.
In the view of the Trustees in applying the accounting policies adopted, no judgements were required that have a significant effect on the amounts recognised in the financial statements nor do any estimates or assumptions made carry a significant risk of material adjustment in the next financial year.
## **Pensions**
The Charity operates a defined contribution pension scheme which is administered by an external independent pension provider. Contributions are recognised in the Statement of Financial Activities as they fall due.
## **Change in accounting period**
During the last financial period the Trustees agreed to amend the accounting year end date from 30 June to 31 August and to apply this to the period that commenced on 1 July 2022 and ran until 31 August 2023. This decision was made to ensure that the financial statements fitted more closely to the operational year. This means there are limitations with the comparatives as they represent a fourteen month period as opposed to the current period figures which represent a twelve month period.
Charity number 1176267
24
**Year ended 31 August 2024**
**The Magpie Project** Annual report and financial statements
## 2. Comparative statement of fnancial activities
|Income from:
Donations & legacies
Other income
Total income
Expenditure on:
Raising funds
Charitable activities
Support for mums
Total charitable activities
Total expenditure
Net income/(expenditure)
Transfers between funds
Net movement in funds
Reconciliation of funds:
Total funds brought forward
Total funds carried forward|Unrestricted
Restricted
Total
Funds
Funds
Funds
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
£
£
£
311,921
113,243
425,164
543
4,200
4,743|
|---|---|
||312,464
117,443
429,907|
||44,503
3,607
48,110
293,320
105,150
398,470|
||293,320
105,150
398,470|
||337,823
108,757
446,580|
|||
||(25,359)
8,686
(16,673)
(15)
15
-|
||(25,374)
8,701
(16,673)
179,926
13,349
193,275|
||154,552
22,050
176,602|
## 3. Income from donations and legacies
|Income from donations and legacies||
|---|---|
|Grants
Donations
Grants
Donations|Unrestricted
Restricted
Total
Funds
Funds
Funds
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
£
£
£
227,948
77,653
305,601
83,973
35,590
119,563
**Unrestricted**
**Restricted**
**Total**
**Funds**
**Funds**
**Funds**
**Year Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**Year Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**Year Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**£**
**£**
**£**
174,208
187,902
**362,110**
47,786
39,906
**87,692**
**221,994**
**227,808**
**449,802**|
||311,921
113,243
425,164|
Charity number 1176267
25
**The Magpie Project**
**Year ended 31 August 2024**
Annual report and financial statements
## 4. Total expenditure
|Direct costs include:
Raising funds
Charitable activities
Support for mums
Raising funds
Charitable activities
Support for mums
Benevolent grants
Food and supplies
Mum’s travel
Nappies and formula
Supporting children’s development
Programme delivery
Other family expenses|Direct
Direct
Staff
Other
Expenditure
Expenditure
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
£
£
37,604
4,224
213,530
132,911
**Direct**
**Direct**
**Staff**
**Other**
**Expenditure**
**Expenditure**
**Year**
**Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**Year**
**Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**£**
**£**
30,789
3,675
241,139
119,134
**271,928**
**122,809**|
**Indirect**
**Other**
**Total**
**Expenditure**
**Expenditure**
**Year**
**Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**Year**
**Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**£**
**£**
7,372
**41,836**
77,068
**437,341**|
|---|---|---|
|||
**84,440**
**479,177**|
|||
Indirect
Other
Total
Expenditure
Expenditure
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
£
£
6,282
48,110
52,029
398,470|
||251,134
137,135|
58,311
446,580|
|||**Total**
Total
**Funds**
Funds
**Year**
**Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
**£**
£
**27,665**
41,368
**6,468**
8,751
**21,484**
16,886
**9,030**
11,229
**2,408**
3,364
**40,725**
32,685
**11,354**
18,628|
|||**119,134**
132,911|
Benevolent grants are payments made to families in need.
Charity number 1176267
26
**Year ended 31 August 2024**
**The Magpie Project** Annual report and financial statements
## 4. Total expenditure (continued from previous page)
Indirect costs, including governance costs, which cannot be directly attributed to activities, were allocated between cost centres proportionate to the direct staff and other costs allocated to those activities.
An analysis of costs of raising funds split between restricted and unrestricted funds can be found in note 5.
An analysis of charitable activities split between restricted and unrestricted funds can be found in note 6.
An analysis of staff costs can be found in note 7.
Indirect costs includes:
|Indirect staff costs
Other staff costs
Meeting and travel costs
Offce costs
Rent
Premises expenses
Professional fees
Other expenses
Governance costs
Independent examination
Insurance|**Total**
Total
**Funds**
Funds
**Year**
**Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
**£**
£
**28,646**
18,813
**4,000**
1,260
**896**
303
**12,611**
11,016
**8,860**
11,667
**14,400**
-
**1,332**
1,275
**11,410**
11,303
**2,285**
2,674|
|---|---|
||**84,440**
58,311|
||**Total**
Total
**Funds**
Funds
**Year Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
**£**
£
**2,100**
2,100
**185**
574|
||**2,285**
2,674|
Governance costs includes:
Charity number 1176267
27
**The Magpie Project** Annual report and financial statements
**Year ended 31 August 2024**
## 5. Expenditure on raising funds
|Expenditure on charitable activities
Direct staff costs
Direct other costs
Indirect other costs
Direct staff costs
Direct other costs
Indirect other costs
Support for Mums
Direct staff costs
Direct other costs
Indirect other costs
Support for Mums
Direct staff costs
Direct other costs
Indirect other costs|Unrestricted
Restricted
Total
Funds
Funds
Funds
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
£
£
£
37,604
-
37,604
4,221
3
4,224
2,678
3,604
6,282
**Unrestricted**
**Restricted**
**Total**
**Funds**
**Funds**
**Funds**
**Year**
**Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**Year**
**Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**Year**
**Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**£**
**£**
**£**
30,789
-
**30,789**
3,647
28
**3,675**
5,497
1,875
**7,372**
**39,933**
**1,903**
**41,836**|
|---|---|
||44,503
3,607
48,110|
||**Unrestricted**
**Restricted**
**Total**
**Funds**
**Funds**
**Funds**
**Year**
**Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**Year**
**Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**Year**
**Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**£**
**£**
**£**
116,288
124,851
**241,139**
50,306
68,828
**119,134**
57,467
19,601
**77,068**
**224,061**
**213,280**
**437,341**
Unrestricted
Restricted
Total
Funds
Funds
Funds
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
£
£
£
163,735
49,795
213,530
107,401
25,510
132,911
22,184
29,845
52,029|
||293,320
105,150
398,470|
## 6. Expenditure on charitable activities
Charity number 1176267
28
**Year ended 31 August 2024**
**The Magpie Project** Annual report and financial statements
7. Staff costs
|Gross salaries
Employer’s NIC
Employer’s pension|**Total**
Total
**Funds**
Funds
**Year**
**Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
**£**
£
**276,328**
246,291
**19,881**
18,602
**4,365**
5,054|
|---|---|
||**300,574**
269,947|
The average headcount during the period was 11 persons (2023: 7 persons).
No employee received employee benefits above £60,000.
The total employee benefits paid to key management personnel during the period was £93,972 (2023: £112,274).
## 8. Tangible fxed assets
|**Cost**
As at 1 September 2023
Additions
As at 31 August 2024
**Accumulated depreciation**
As at 1 September 2023
Charge for year
As at 31 August 2024
**Net book value**
As at 1 September 2023
As at 31 August 2024|**Computer**
**Equipment**
**Total**
**£**
**£**
2,111
**2,111**
-
**-**|
|---|---|
||**2,111**
**2,111**|
||572
**572**
670
**670**|
||**1,242**
**1,242**|
||**1,539**
**1,539**|
||**869**
**869**|
Charity number 1176267
29
**The Magpie Project** Annual report and financial statements
**Year ended 31 August 2024**
## 9. Debtors and prepayments
|Creditors: amounts falling due within one year
Prepayments
Other debtors
Accrued grant income
Accruals
Deferred grant revenue|**Total**
Total
**Funds**
Funds
**Year**
**Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
**£**
£
**569**
3,115
**2,201**
683
**-**
3,333|
|---|---|
||**2,770**
7,131|
||**Total**
Total
**Funds**
Funds
**Year**
**Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
**£**
£
**2,100**
5,767
**53,333**
37,042|
||**55,433**
42,809|
## 10. Creditors: amounts falling due within one year
Deferred revenue relates to amounts received in advance for the 2023/24 finacial year from multiple funders and can be analysed as follows:
|Deferred grant revenue brought forward
Released to grant revenue in the period
Grant revenue deferred in the period
Deferred grant revenue carried forward|**Total**
Total
**Funds**
Funds
**Year Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
**£**
£
**37,042**
-
**(37,042)**
-
**53,333**
37,042
**53,333**
37,042|
|---|---|
Charity number 1176267
30
**Year ended 31 August 2024**
**The Magpie Project** Annual report and financial statements
11. Analysis of charity funds
|**Unrestricted funds**
General funds
Designated funds
**Total unrestricted funds**
**Restricted funds**
52 Lives
Baby bank
Benevolent grants - London
Catalyst
Benevolent grants - Praxis
Benevolent
grants
-
SafeLives Circle Fund
Creative partnerships
Discover
Centre
travel
money
Donations Manager
English Language Sessions
Family
Support
Manager
salary
Family
Support
Worker
salary
Graduation Programme
Grassroots - Capital
MOPAC
National Lottery 2024-2029
Pre-school SEND Pathways
Play Lead salary
Tudor Trust - staff wellbeing
Southwest Ham Children’s
Fund - Benevolent Grants
Trips and Activities
**Total restricted funds**
**Total funds**|**Funds**
**Income**
**Expenditure**
**Transfers**
**Funds**
**brought**
**for the**
**in the**
**in the**
**carried**
**forward**
**forward**
**Year Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**Year Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**Year Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**Year Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**Year Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**£**
**£**
**£**
**£**
**£**
154,552
227,698
(263,994)
-
**118,256**
-
-
-
-
**-**|
|---|---|
||**154,552**
**227,698**
**(263,994)**
**-**
**118,256**|
||-
600
(417)
-
**183**
-
10,859
(10,108)
**751**
-
1,200
(1,200)
-
**-**
-
547
(547)
-
**-**
-
2,000
(700)
-
**1,300**
-
9,000
(9,000)
-
**-**
-
224
(224)
-
**-**
-
18,000
(18,000)
-
**-**
3,567
-
(3,567)
-
**-**
-
49,800
(49,800)
-
**-**
-
-
-
**-**
-
7,200
(7,200)
-
**-**
-
15,000
(11,735)
-
**3,265**
12,430
-
(4,637)
-
**7,793**
-
41,667
(37,500)
-
**4,167**
5,000
28,601
(15,179)
-
**18,422**
-
23,834
(23,834)
-
**-**
-
2,000
(1,835)
-
**165**
900
18,900
(19,700)
-
**100**
153
-
-
-
**153**|
||**22,050**
**229,432**
**(215,183)**
**-**
**36,299**|
||**176,602**
**457,130**
**(479,177)**
**-**
**154,555**|
**Creative Partnerships** : Grants to support our collaborations with artists, musicians, dancers, and other creative professionals.
**English Language Sessions** : Grants to provide English language sessions for Magpie mums.
**Family Support Manager salary** : Grants towards the salary of our Family Support Manager.
Charity number 1176267
31
**The Magpie Project** Annual report and financial statements
**Year ended 31 August 2024**
## 11. Analysis of charity funds (continued from previous page)
**MOPAC** : Discretionary fund for emergency grants to Magpie families affected by domestic abuse.
**Play Lead salary** : Grants towards the salary of our Play Lead.
**Pre-school SEND Pathways** : Grants to support Magpie children with potential special educational needs to access appropriate advice and healthcare.
**Southwest Ham Child Welfare Society** : One-off grants for Magpie families living in Newham.
**Trips and activities** : Grants towards providing trips and additional activities for Magpie families.
Charity number 1176267
32
**Year ended 31 August 2024**
**The Magpie Project** Annual report and financial statements
11. Analysis of charity funds (continued from previous page)
|Unrestricted funds
General funds
Designated funds
Total unrestricted funds
Restricted funds
Bethany
Williams
Benevolent Fund
Creative Partnerships
Deutsche Bank Foundation
English Language Sessions
Family
Support
Manager
salary
Guildhall School of Music
and Drama
London Catalyst Samaritan
Grants
MOPAC
Newham Enrichment Grant
Play Lead Salary
Pre-school SEND Pathways
Safe Lives Fund
Shoes, Coats and Clothes
Fund
Southwest Ham Children’s
Fund - Benevolent Grants
Trips and Activities
Total restricted funds
Total funds|Funds
Income
Expenditure
Transfers
Funds
brought
for the
in the
in the
carried
forward
forward
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
£
£
£
£
£
119,926
312,464
(337,823)
59,985
154,552
60,000
-
-
(60,000)
-|
|---|---|
||179,926
312,464
(337,823)
(15)
154,552|
||**-**
-
1,000
(1,000)
-
-
6,500
5,500
(12,000)
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
5,820
(2,253)
-
3,567
-
19,200
(19,200)
-
-
500
-
(500)
-
-
-
1,000
(1,000)
-
-
-
12,500
(70)
-
12,430
(15)
-
-
15
-
262
30,333
(30,595)
-
-
-
5,000
-
-
5,000
4,802
-
(4,802)
-
-
(100)
6,490
(6,390)
-
-
400
29,600
(29,100)
-
900
1,000
1,000
(1,847)
-
153|
||13,349
117,443
(108,757)
15
22,050|
||193,275
429,907
(446,580)
-
176,602|
**Designated Funds** : The Trustees have decided to release the designated funds which had been held in relation to the potential cost of relocating to a new premises in 2022/23 as new expected costs in relation to a move are not expected to be this high.
**Bethany Williams Benevolent Fund** : Discretionary fund to meet basic needs of Magpie families and distribute emergency grants.
**Community Links** : Grant to provide creche facilities during workshops for mums.
**Deutsche Bank Foundation** : Grant towards Graduation Manager salary.
**Guildhall School of Music & Drama** : Grant to support collaboration with musicians and composers Breakfast Club Quartet.
Charity number 1176267
33
**The Magpie Project** Annual report and financial statements
**Year ended 31 August 2024**
## 11. Analysis of charity funds (continued from previous page)
**London Catalyst Samaritan Grants** : Discretionary fund for emergency grants to Magpie families.
**Newham Enrichment Grant** : Grant to support collaboration with dance and movement practioners Louise Klarnett Dance Art Foundation.
**Safe Lives Fund** : Discretionary fund for emergency grants to Magpie families affected by domestic abuse.
**Shoes, Coats, and Clothes** : Grants towards the cost of new coats, shoes, and other essential items for Magpie families.
**Tudor Trust** : Top-up grant to support wellbeing and development of staff and volunteers.
**University of East London** : Compensation for placement of social work students.
## 12. Analysis of net assets
|Tangible assets
Current assets
Current liabilities
Tangible assets
Current assets
Current liabilities|**Unrestricted**
**Restricted**
**Total**
**Funds**
**Funds**
**Funds**
**Year**
**Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**Year**
**Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**Year**
**Ended**
**31 Aug 2024**
**£**
**£**
**£**
869
-
**869**
159,487
49,632
**209,119**
(42,100)
(13,333)
**(55,433)**|
|---|---|
||**118,256**
**36,299**
**154,555**|
||Unrestricted
Restricted
Total
Funds
Funds
Funds
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
Period Ended
31 Aug 2023
£
£
£
1,539
-
1,539
191,488
26,384
217,872
(38,475)
(4,334)
(42,809)
154,552
22,050
176,602|
## 13. Trustee remuneration
During the year, no trustee received any remuneration (2023: £Nil). During the year, one trustee received reimbursement for travel expenses of £53 (2023: one trustee for travel expenses of £53).
## 14. Related party transactions
During the year there were no related party transactions (2023: £Nil).
Charity number 1176267
34