Charity number: 1193772
## Make Space for Girls
**Trustee Report and Financial Statements For the period ending 31 December 2021**
## **Reference and Administrative Information**
|**Charity number**|1193772|
|---|---|
|**Country of registration**|England & Wales|
|**Registered ofce**|3 Gentle Street, Frome,|
||BA11 1JA|
|**Trustees**|Susannah Walker|
||Imogen Clark|
|**Key management**|None|
|**personnel**||
|**Bankers**|The Co-operative Bank plc|
||I Balloon Street|
||Manchester|
||M60 4EP|
## **Report of the Trustees**
The Trustees present their report and the financial statements for the period ending 31 December 2021.
The reference and administrative information above forms part of this report. The financial statements comply with current statutory requirements, the constitution of the charity, the Charities Act 2011 and 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 published in October 2019.
This was the first year of activity for the Charity. This report looks at what the Charity has achieved and the outcomes of its work in the reporting period. The Trustees report the success of each key activity and the benefits the Charity has brought to those groups of people that it is set up to help. The review also helps the Trustees ensure the Charity's aims, objectives and activities remained focused on its stated purposes.
During the first 9 months of operation as a Charity, many people have contributed in time, services, advice and money to the work we are doing. This has allowed the Charity to create a solid base on which to plan the future. To all these people, the Trustees express their sincere thanks.
## Objectives and activities
_“Why would I go to the park, there's nothing there for me" Lily- age 14._
The pandemic highlighted what amazing potential parks and similar spaces have to improve our heath, wellbeing and sense of self. This is particularly true for children and young people, for whom public spaces like parks may be one of the few places where they have autonomy.
As the Children’s Commissioner’s “The Big Answer Report” in 2021 observed:
_“[Children] want to be healthy – mentally and physically. They want to escape the digital labyrinth in which they have been trapped. This report tells you that they want to be outside – to be in open spaces, and play.”_
Parks and similar place can be great for younger children, visiting with adults or older siblings. But what happens as they get a bit older and start to branch out on their own? Where do they play? Is Lily right when she says there’s nothing there for a 14 year old girl?
The data says that she is. Currently, most facilities provided for teenagers, such as skate parks, bike tracks, basketball courts and fenced pitches (also known as multi use games areas (MUGAs)), are predominantly used and dominated by some (but by no means all) boys. In practice, teenage girls don’t get a look in, and the voices of teenage girls are very seldom heard when these spaces are designed.
Make Space for Girls wants to change that and makes parks and similar spaces safer, more attractive and more welcoming to teenage girls. We work to raise awareness of the current inequality and to pilot consultations, designs and interventions which will give teenage girls the outdoor, free to access, spaces they need.
Our charitable objects as set out in our constitution are as follows:
“ _The promotion of equality and diversity in England for the public benefit in particular for the benefit of girls and young women in the reduction and elimination of discrimination on grounds of gender in the provisions of play, leisure and recreational facilities including by (A) the advancement of education and raising awareness; (B) the conducting or commissioning of research and publishing the results to interested parties and the public; (C) influencing public authorities, businesses, charities, trusts and other organisations involved in the provision of play, leisure and recreational facilities on how they can promote the inclusion of girls and young women; (D) providing a platform to ensure that the voices of girls and young women are heard in decision making that will affect the provisions of play, leisure and recreational facilities; and (E) promoting attitudes, customs and practices in favour of equality and the inclusion of the needs of girls and young women in the planning, development, use and maintenance of play, leisure and recreational facilities.”_
## **Our Vision Mission and Values**
The Trustees adopted the following as the Charity’s vision, mission and values:
_**Our Vision**_ : We want parks and similar public spaces to be as welcoming to girls and young women as they are to boys and young men.
_**Our Mission**_ : We will use research, consultation, engagement and education to campaign and drive an approach to the planning, commissioning and development of parks and similar public spaces that recognises the different needs of girls and young women and finds ways to meet those needs.
_**Our Values** :_ our work is driven by the following values:
_**Evidence-based:**_ research and data guide all aspects of our work.
_**Engagement:**_ the voices of girls and young women are at the centre of what we do.
_**Equality and Inclusion**_ : the needs of girls and young women from all backgrounds must be understood.
## **Our Strategy**
The Charity’s strategy during the 9 months of operation was as follows:
## _**Research**_
To deliver our charitable objects it vital that there is a robust analysis of the available research on the use of parks and similar spaces by teenage girls and that this analysis is reviewed and updated as appropriate. It is also critical that there is more research, focussing on the needs of different communities.
## _**Communication**_
It is also key that we have effective communication processes to raise the profile of the issues. It is important to recognise that this is not a new problem: teenage facilities have been designed in ways that do not meet the needs of teenage girls for many decades. It is a problem that is hiding in plain sight. This provides particular challenges in terms of getting our messages across. A key objective of our strategy therefore involves making the most effective use of the Charity’s limited resources to raise awareness.
## _**Solutions**_
Because teenage facilities have been designed in ways that do not meet the needs of teenage girls, there are significant problems when it comes to answering the question “ _so what would attract teenage girl to be more active in our parks”_ ?
Currently no guidelines or design principles exist for the creators of parks and similar spaces. Indeed many of the current guidelines operate to reinforce the current model of teenage provision and perpetuate the unintended privileging of teenage boys’ rights to occupy park and similar space over those of teenage girls. A key part of our strategy therefore is looking at potential solutions, through the use of engagement, design and pilot studies.
## Achievements and performance
The Charity's main activities and who it seeks to help are described below. All its charitable activities focus on campaigning to make parks and similar public spaces more welcoming to teenage girls, and are undertaken to further the Charity’s charitable purposes for the public benefit.
## **Research**
During our first year we produced and published a comprehensive review of the available research on teenage girls and parks (the “ **Research Review** ”) and we continue to add to this review as new research is published. We believe that the Research Review is unique in the UK in its focus on the needs of teenage girls in parks and its depth in terms of analysing the impacts of the current inequality and the legal framework within which the problems must be addressed.
The Research Review has been very well received and widely cited. For example by _“Out of Bounds: Equity in Access to Urban Nature_ ” published by Groundwork UK; by the Royal Town Planners Institute in their Guidance “ _Children and town planning: Creating places to grow_ ”; in the Canadian Report “ _Measuring Park Quality for Youth 13-19”;_ by the Scottish Government in their Impact Assessment issued as part of Consultation on Play Sufficiency legislation; by SWEEP in their report: “ _More than just a skate park? A review and practical guide on how to make urban green space more accessible to adolescents to support health and wellbeing;_ by the Children’s Alliance in their report: _Physical Health Working Group: The Physical Health Of Children And Young People_ and by tFL in their _Sustainable Development Framework_
Prior to our campaign, very little research had been carried out into the use of parks by teenage girls in the UK. The bulk of the Research Review was forced to draw on research outside the UK. This lack of research is not simply a gap in the academic field: it is a fundamental barrier to progressing towards greater equality for girls and boys in the public realm, and with such greater equality, better outcomes for teenage girls. One of the key aims of our strategy has been to advocate for research in this area and this advocacy has been successful during our first 9 months.
One research project has been commissioned in the autumn of 2021, by Yorkshire Sport in conjunction with Women in Sport and this is expected to report in Spring 2022. Towards the end of 2021 we started to build partnerships that will facilitate research in other parts of Yorkshire, Oxfordshire and London, which we hope to develop during the next financial year.
We have also worked hard to promote the use of the Public Sector Equality Duty under the Equality Act 2010 as an effective means of embedding the practical principle that public authorities are required to consider proactively how to reduce inequality in the
provision of park space between teenage boys and teenage girls. We have used Freedom of Information Act requests to understand the extent to which local councils carry out Equality Impact Assessments when taking decisions about their local parks. We intend to continue with this strand of work into the next financial year.
## **Communication.**
Our communication strategy has focused this year on raising awareness of the issues and the routes to address them. The core target group for this strategy in the first 9 months has been individuals and organisations that have the power to make changes to the way our parks and similar spaces are designed. Three core strands form the body our influencing work: social media; traditional media; and face to face.
One of our key strategic aims was to create an effective social media presence to support wide engagement with our objectives in a resource efficient way. We have achieved this via an effective Twitter strategy, regularly blogging on matters important to our campaign, using our website to engage with supporters and regularly producing newsletters. In this first year we have produced 22 blogs and 9 newsletters. Our Twitter account has been very effective at generating engagement with our campaign. We started our Twitter account in December 2020 and over the 12 months to 31 December 2021 we gained over 5,800 followers, with our top tweet being seen more than 500,000 times.
Twitter has proved a very effective mechanism to connect our campaign to architects, landscape architects, planners, developers, academics, councils and other third sector organisations. One of the results of the success of this strand of our strategy has been that we have seen our campaign referenced in tenders for parks, from Fife to Brighton.
In terms of traditional media, our campaign has received national press coverage, including features in the Times Educational Supplement, the i newspaper, Bloomberg and Channel 5 News. Articles about our work have also appeared in a number of relevant specialist journals including Landscape, the Architects’ Journal, The Clerk magazine and our work has also been featured on local radio across the country, on several podcasts and in an online discussion with Caroline Criado Perez.
In addition to using media effectively, face to face engagement has also formed an important part of our influencing strategy. We spoke at 25 events, ranging from tailored CPDs for professional firms, to academic events with more than 500 invitees and major conferences such as the Festival of Place, the API Conference and the Homes England conference. We also spoke directly to more than 14 councils interested in making their play spaces more inviting to teenage girls; and engaged with developers, and play equipment and skate park installers. We estimate that these events have allowed us to engage face to face with over [1,000] individuals who are involved in the creation and assessment of parks and similar spaces, and though this engagement, influence them to change the approach taken to creating these spaces.
However we have not yet had the opportunity to create a social media presence that connects as effectively with teenage girls. This will be a key part of our communication strategy over the next [2] years. Our aim will be to use social media to support the Charity in coproducing beneficiary led approaches to campaigning for better park spaces, locally and nationally.
## **Solutions**
Play and park strategies often have as their starting point that teenage provision in parks should consist of a skateparks, MUGAs and bike/pump tracks, failing to recognise that these facilities are dominated by boys and their presence in a larger park often acts as a deterrent to girls and young women. We have struggled to find any examples in the UK of park facilities that have been designed to attract teenage girls.
Skateparks, MUGAs and pump tracks all have well established commercial delivery mechanisms, allowing councils to “pick from the catalogue”. There is no equivalent delivery mechanism for facilities designed to be welcoming to teenage girls. This means that to achieve the Charity’s objectives we have to advocate and support creative new ideas and approaches to park space.
Creating new ideas and approaches relies on two strands of work: research (including qualitative and quantitative assessments); and engagement with local girls and young women, so that their voices are at the heart of the process when space is being created for teenagers.
During the period under review, we have focussed on this second strand: engagement with local girls and young women. In July the Charity collaborated with Julia King from LSE Cities to hold a roundtable which brought together a number of experts working in the area of consultation to discuss best practice in consulting with teenage girls. The Trustees also co-authored a book chapter on consulting with teenage girls with examples of good practice, which will be published as part of a book about interventions for social change. The Charity also undertook a number of direct consultations with teenage girls, including in Bath, Coventry, London, Warwickshire and Wincanton.
While it is important that the Charity itself undertakes direct consultation, in order to maximise our impact we also need to find ways to support others to do great consultations. Therefore we have curated and created a range of resources on our website to support people undertaking consultations on their local parks, ranging from ideas for activities to documentation of successful consultations, along with practical material like draft questionnaires. We have also supported Friends of Park Groups and other local community groups with information and advice on consultation and provided background research and information to support funding bids by such groups.
Critical to supporting others to undertake effective consultation is providing images and ideas that can be used as a starting point for discussions. As noted, because teenage facilities have been designed in ways that do not meet the needs of teenage girls for so long, there are significant problems when it comes to answering the question “ _so what would attract teenage girl to be more active in our parks”_ ? It is not fair to simply ask girls _“so what would you like? What might make you more likely to go to the park_ ” because they have never seen anything that was designed with their needs in mind.
Therefore with the support of Part 6 Architectural students from Newcastle University we have created a series of images, drawing on the Research Review to act as a jumping off point for consultations. These images created a significant impact, being viewed more than 400,000 times on Twitter and have generated a lot of discussion. Most of it positive _(“Looks great, really helpful as we start to think about engagement.. in Newham_ ”) some negative (“ _Girls aren’t ‘overlooked’ in parks, they choose not to use the equipment which is there for ALL to use”_ ), some of it questioning (“ _Talking to boys and girls, I’m not sure it’s as simple as different designs_ ” _)_ . But the important thing for achieving our objectives is not whether people do or don’t like the images:
what is important is that they provide a jumping off point for the discussions that need to be had.
## Statement on Public Benefit
The objectives and activities and achievement and performance sections of this report set out the activities which the Charity undertakes for the public benefit. The Trustees confirm that they have complied with the duty in section 15(5) of the Charities Act 2100 to have due regard to public benefit guidance published by the Charity Commission in determining the activities undertaken by the Charity.
## Financial review
Total income for the period ending 31 December 2021 was £9,544.17 (previous yearN/A). Total expenditure for this period was £214.07 (previous year- N/A). This resulted in a surplus of £9,330 (previous year- N/A).
The funds at 31 December 2021 were £9,330 **.** of which £1,400 were restricted and £7,930 were unrestricted.
## Risk Management
The Trustees have reviewed the major and financial risks that impact on the work of the charity. The systems that have been established enable the Trustees to review and take necessary steps to lessen these risks. The Trustees consider the following to be the principal risks that the Charity faces:
- Failure to secure sufficient income which will inhibit our ability to support core costs and maintain the momentum of the Charity’s activities;
- Reduced or damage to public profile and reputation, which will reduce our ability to raise awareness of the relevant issues and influence our target groups to make changes;
- Failure to engage sufficiently with girls and young women to ensure our campaigns are beneficiary led.
## Fundraising
The charity actively solicit donations from individuals using the “Givey” platform. We are also very grateful to individuals who have undertaken fundraising activities for us. All donations are very gratefully received.
We do not sub-contract any fundraising activities to a third party and whilst we are not registered with the Fundraising Regulator, we will be guided by the Code of Fundraising Practice in any fundraising activity. We received no complaints about our fundraising activity.
## Volunteers
The charity has no paid staff and relies on volunteers. The principle volunteers during the period ending 31 December 2021 were the Trustees, who between them undertook all of the core activities of the charity on a voluntary basis. The Trustees undertook the
majority of the project work. We were also delighted to work with a number of placement students, from the Planning Department of Leeds Beckett and from the School of Architecture at Sheffield Hallam.
The Trustees would also like to thanks the many others who have volunteered their time to support the charity, including the amazing individuals and organisations that we list at the end of this report.. Without their incredible enthusiasm and support, we would not have been able to achieve all we have achieved. Thank you!
## Structure, governance and management
Make Space for Girls is a charitable incorporated organisation, registered with the Charity Commission in England. It is currently governed by a constitution dated 25 November 2020 and was registered by the Charity on 11 March 2021. It does not have any members.
The trustees who were also the cofounders of the charity who served during the period were Susannah Walker and Imogen Clark.
## Appointment of trustees
Apart from the first charity Trustees, every trustee must be appointed for a term of 3 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 a CIO.
The Trustees will make available to each new charity trustee on or before their appointment a copy of the current version of the constitution and a copy of the Charity’s latest Trustee Annual Report and Financial Statements.
## Statement of responsibilities of the trustees
The Trustees, are responsible for preparing the Trustees’ Report and the accounts in accordance with applicable law and United Kingdom Accounting Standards (United Kingdom Generally Accepted Accounting Practice).
As a CIO with income less than £250,000 per annum the Trustees are entitled to opt to prepare the financial statements on a receipts and payment basis. The Trustees have opted to do this. The financial statements have not been subject to independent examination as income has not exceed £25,000 in the period.
The Trustees are responsible for keeping proper accounting records that 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 (Accounts and Reports) Regulations 2008 and the provisions of the constitution. They are also responsible for safeguarding the assets of the Charity and hence for taking reasonable steps for the prevention and detection of fraud and other irregularities.
Each of the persons who are Trustees at the time when this Trustees' Report is approved has confirmed that:
The Trustees are responsible for the maintenance and integrity of the charity and financial information included on the Charity’s website. Legislation in the United Kingdom governing the preparation and dissemination of Financial Statements may differ from legislation in other jurisdictions.
The Trustees’ annual report has been approved by the Trustees on 10 February 2022 and signed on their behalf by:
10 Feb 2022
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Trustee
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**Date**
## FINANCIAL STATEMENT FOR THE PERIOD ENDING 31 DECEMBER 2021
## Receipts and payments
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Unrestricted Restricted Total Funds
Funds Funds 2021
2021 2021
Income from
Grant from M&G 1,400
Individual Donations 650
Go-Fund Me 4,055.41
Corporate Donations 1,213.64
Fundraising activities 2,150
T-shirt sales 75.12
Total Income 8,144.17 1,400 9,544.17
Expenditure on
Social media costs 93.60
Insurance 120.47
Total Expenditure 214.07 0
Net of receipts/ 7,930.1 1,400
(payments)
Cash funds last year 0 0
end
Cash funds this 7,930.1 1,400 9,330.1
year end
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## FINANCIAL STATEMENT FOR THE PERIOD ENDING 31 DECEMBER 2021
## Statement of assets and liabilities at the end of the period
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Unrestricted funds Restricted Funds £
£
Cash Funds 7,930.1 1,400
Liabilities 384.70 0
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The financial statements were approved by the Trustees on 10 February 2022 and signed on behalf of the board by:
10 Feb 2022
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## **Trustee**
## **Notes to the Financial Statements**
1.As a CIO, the Charity is required to provide notes if there are any guarantees or debts secured by a charge over the CIO assets. There are none.
2. The liabilities comprise sums to be reimbursed to one of the trustees for costs incurred during the relevant period in relation to charitable activities. These were reimbursed during January 2022.
3. The Charity has incurred no staff or consultancy cost during the relevant period and has relied on volunteers. The principle volunteers during the period ending 31 December 2021 were the Trustees, who between them undertook all of the core activities of the charity on a voluntary basis. The Trustees also undertook the majority of the project work.
4. The Charity has received substantial support in kind in relation to its website and graphic design support, the value of which has been estimated as £2,587.50
5.Trustee expenses of £384.70 are shown as a liability to be reimbursed after the year end. These related to the costs of the Trustees during the period up to 31/12/21; these were expenses associated with attending to the Charity’s activities.
## **WITH SPECIAL THANKS TO:**
Charles Wardman and the team at Wardman Communications
Jenna Goldberg and the team at London Communications
Hannah Taylor and the team from Compton Verney
Caroline Criado Perez
Julian Seymour at Cratus Communications.
Christine Murray from the Developer
Amanda Seims, Sally Barber and the team at Bradford Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
Julia King at LSE Cities
Cathy Long and Lisa West at Women in Sport
The Orbis Investment Employee Giving Programme and Lucie Jichova for nominating us
Steve Heywood, Tanya Martin and the team at Yorkshire Sport
Stride Treglown
M&G Community Donation Fund
Ben Tawil at Ludicology
Tim Bird and Anne Parkin at Proludic
Women in Property
Karen Horwood at Leeds Beckett University
Ciara Jenkinson
Jessica Fox Sophia Moss