Resilience Grants funded in 2026
Here are the proposals that were awarded Resilience Grants in 2026, to enable change and develop organisational resilience in the archive sector.
The Methodist Church
The Methodist Church has been creating digital records since the 1990s. Some of these records now need to be transferred to local archive services for permanent preservation as a record of Church’s work in local communities.
This grant will support their staff and network of local archive volunteers to manage the transfer of these records as efficiently as possible. The Church wants to ensure their digital records remain fit for current administrative needs and that any records of archival value are capable of long-term preservation.
We are immensely grateful to The National Archives for this grant will which enable us to create a straightforward digital records management handbook and user-friendly tools. This will help us to fulfil our responsibility to manage our digital records effectively from creation to final disposition.
The Reverend Dr Jonathan Hustler, Secretary of the Connexional Council
The Methodist Church
The People’s History Museum
The People’s History Museum will use their funding to explore opportunities for growth and the future resilience of their internationally significant archive. This includes key pieces of Britain's social and political history from the past 250 years.
The People’s History Museum is thrilled to receive a grant from The National Archives that supports our work as the national museum of democracy, caring for the largest collection of political material in Britain. This grant recognises the importance of The Labour History Archive and Study Centre and its incredible collection, including the Labour Party archive.
Jenny Mabbott, Head of Collections & Engagement at People’s History Museum
The People’s History Museum Researcher, Dan Edmonds, in the Labour History Archive at People's History Museum.
The People’s History Museum
Ushaw House
Ushaw House will use their grant to make their archive, which is held within their large historic library, accessible to academics, local/family history researchers and general visitors alike. This funding enables Ushaw to bring in a qualified archivist to help guide their staff in operating the search room and share best approaches for collections care and conservation.
The consultancy will support business planning and audience development for the archive. Funding will also support archive-specific training for the curatorial and collections team, alongside digitisation and catalogue development through the purchase of high quality equipment.
This year we celebrate 175 years of our Big Library through our programme of open days. It's wonderful to have support from The National Archives to deepen engagement with our archival holdings and make it easier for anyone to discover the breadth of our collection. This is a really timely opportunity for us to shape a sustainable future for our Library and Archive, with access at the heart, and feed into Unlocking Ushaw – our master plan to secure Ushaw's future for the next 100 years.
Lucy Jenkins, Co-CEO
St Cuthbert's College, J. Storey, 1851.
Ushaw House
Bristol Archives
Bristol Archives has received a £20,000 resilience grant which will enable them to set up a digital preservation project. They will be assessing their current provision and surveying all of their digital holdings. This will help them to better understand what they already have, in addition to planning for more robust and future-proof management of digitised and born-digital archives.
We are thrilled to have received this Resilience grant. We increasingly receive archives which only exist in digital formats which currently poses big challenges for us. The timing is perfect as Bristol Archives will be inspected by The National Archives for Archives Accreditation later this year, and we are already committed to supporting the lottery-funded Sounds of the South West audio heritage digitisation project which started in January.
Charlotte Berry, City Archivist
Bristol Archives
Roma Support Group
Since 1998, the Roma Support Group (RSG) has documented the history of Roma migration, settlement, community development, and Roma contributions to London’s social and cultural life. During this time, they have produced and collected material through their work with Roma communities. This has formed a unique archive that reflects lived experience, as well as the social, political, and policy changes that have shaped Roma lives. RSG will use their resilience grant to support their ‘Paths and Papers: The Roma Resilience Archive’ Project. They will preserve their collection and allow it to be accessed and used by wider Roma communities, researchers, students, schools, educators, public authorities, policy makers, and members of the public.
By preserving and making our archive accessible to the public, we hope to enhance understanding of Roma migration, their contribution and community-led charge to challenge stereotypes and support learning, research, policy development and inclusive practice. In partnership with The London Archives, we will ensure that the history of Roma migration is preserved as part of the wider history of London and made available as a public resource, creating a lasting legacy for future generations.
Sylvia Ingmire, CEO of Roma Support Group
Roma Support Group