Chevening Scholarships offer full financial support for future leaders to study for any eligible master’s degree at any UK university.

Since the programme was created in 1983, over 50,000 professionals have had the opportunity to develop in the UK through Chevening.

British Ambassador to China, Barbara Woodward, said:

Our Chevening scholars are future leaders who have a powerful vision of how they want to change the world for the better.

If you are an exceptional individual who would like the opportunity to study in the UK’s internationally renowned Universities then please apply.

The Chevening China Network of alumni are ambassadors for the UK-China relationship. The network consists of around 4,000 people in leadership roles in government, business and NGO across a wide range of sectors and from every province in China.

This year, there were more than 800 applicants from every province across China. Around 50 chosen scholars will travel to the UK in September this year.

Chevening runs a selection process based on equality in gender, disability, sexual orientation, religion and age encouraging Chinese nationals from all backgrounds to apply via http://www.chevening.org/apply.

More information

Visit www.chevening.org/scholarships for detailed information on the eligibility criteria and scholarship specifications.

5 ways UK universities are COVID-19 secure: https://acu.turtl.co/story/covid-secure/page/1

Notes to editors

Chevening Scholarships are the UK Government’s global scholarship programme, funded by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) and partner organisations. The scholarships support study at UK universities – mostly one year taught master’s degrees – for individuals with demonstrable potential to become future leaders, decision-makers, and opinion formers.

Chevening began in 1983 and has developed into a prestigious international awards scheme. Chevening Scholars come from over 160 countries and territories worldwide, and over the past five years we have awarded almost 9,000 scholarships. There are over 50,000 Chevening Alumni around the world who comprise an influential and highly regarded global network.

The name ‘Chevening’ comes from Chevening House in Sevenoaks, Kent – currently the joint official residence of the UK’s Foreign Secretary.

More information is available at www.chevening.org

The second ballot of the Youth Mobility Scheme 2020 for South Korean Nationals will launch next month. Unlike previous years the selection criteria has changed to a lottery based system managed by UK Visas and Immigration (UKVI). There will no longer be the requirement to provide a Certificate of Sponsorship previously issued by the South Korean authorities.

There are 1000 places in total available to South Korean nationals in 2020. Approximately 800 applicants were selected for the first ballot earlier this year with the remaining places up for grabs in the second ballot in September. If your application is successful you will be able to live, work and study in the UK for up to 2 years.

If you would like to apply for the scheme you should send one email (only) to: SouthKoreaYMS2020.BallotRequest@fcdo.gov.uk between midday on Monday 21 September 2020 (12pm) to midday Wednesday 23 September 2020 (South Korea time). The email header or subject line must contain your name, date of birth (DD/MM/YYYY) and passport number as shown in your passport. This must be written in English only.

For example: KIM Jayne – 31/01/1990 – Passport 123456789

In the main text of your email you should include the following written in English only:

1. Name

2. Date of birth

3. Passport Number

4. Mobile phone number

The email account will be open for 48 hours only and all emails received within this time frame will be sent an automated reply confirming receipt.

When the email account has closed, applicants will be chosen at random by UKVI until the annual quota is filled. If you have been chosen to apply a second email will be sent to by Wednesday, 30 September 2020. This email will confirm acceptance and further instructions on how to make an application and appointment, along with documentary evidence required to apply for your entry clearance.

Please note successful applicants must prepare online applications and online credit card payments no later than 30 October 2020. Failure to submit your payment online by this date will automatically remove your name from the list and your allocation will be retracted. After you have paid online you have 90 days to submit your paperwork for consideration.

If you are a South Korean national living overseas you can also apply following the instructions above, and if you are chosen to apply you will be able to do so in your country of residence. Applications cannot be submitted for the Youth Mobility Scheme in the UK.

An email will be sent to unsuccessful applicants by 30 September 2020 to inform them they have not been chosen and that no further action is required.

The charity regulator today launched an improved public register of charities, which makes more information about individual charities available to donors and the public.

The register at www.gov.uk/checkcharity receives over 40 million page views per year. The Charity Commission says the public feel strongly about transparency around where charity money goes and the efficient use of resources by charities, and the register is an important source of information for the public, funders, philanthropists and charities themselves.

Greater transparency

The new display is designed to increase transparency for the public and others by displaying a wider range of information than before.

Where a charity has been held to account by the Commission, ‘regulatory alerts’ on its register entry highlight the specific action taken or underway. The regulator has a range of powers, including to issue official warnings to charities, open statutory inquiries or install interim managers.

Financial information includes the number of staff within a charity that receive total income packages over £60,000, and whether trustees, who are usually volunteers, are paid for their services to the charity. It also highlights income that individual charities receive from government grants and contracts.

The new display also shows whether individual charities work with a professional fundraiser and whether they have specific policies in place, including on safeguarding.

Better service for charities

The new display is also designed to make it easier for trustees to access and update their charity’s information with the Commission, and new data download functions will help sector professionals better analyse information about the charity sector as a whole, including trends and developments in the size and make-up of the sector.

The new tool also allows potential supporters – donors or grant makers – or those thinking of setting up a new charity to search for charities in their area, or to identify charities that promote a certain cause.

A journey of improving the register

While developing the new online register, the Commission undertook user research and learnt from the feedback it received in improving and tweaking the display and functionality of the tool.

The Commission says that it will continue improving the way it makes information about individual charities and the sector as a whole available to the public. As part of that, it welcomes feedback on the new register from members of the public, funders and charities themselves.

The Commission is moving immediately into a second phase of work which will include improvements to its register data sharing. This will allow web and app developers to access and analyse the data or display it on their own websites more easily in line with open data principles, and is part of the Commission’s aim for the register to better maximise the benefit charity brings to society.

Helen Stephenson CBE, Chief Executive of the Charity Commission, said:

Decisions about charitable donations are often very personal, influenced by our own life experiences, and those of our friends and family. But we know that most people share an expectation of openness and transparency from all charities. That’s why our new online register increases the range of information available at the click of a button.

Recent months have demonstrated the volunteering spirit of the British public and its generous support for charities. The Commission’s online register has an important role to play in ensuring that generosity supports good causes, and we continue to urge people to check the register before donating to be sure that their money is going to a genuine charity. By widening the public’s window into how individual charities are run, and how they spend their money, we hope people will also now feel able to make more informed choices about how and where they give.

I also hope that the new register display will encourage charities to continue to respond to growing public expectations around transparency and accountability. We know the public expect the way charities go about their work to be consistent with the spirit of charity, and the new mirror we are holding up to the sector should help charities respond to those expectations.

Ends

Notes to editors

1. The Charity Commission is the registrar and regulator of charities in England and Wales. Its purpose is to ensure charity can thrive and inspire trust so that people can improve lives and strengthen society. The Commission is an independent, non-ministerial government department.
2. The new information about high pay in charities (packages upwards of £60k per year) is drawn from data submitted by charities in their annual returns to the Commission following consultation with the charity sector.
3. The new functionality of the online register display helps respond to public expectations about charity, highlighted in recent research which found that people across society expect that:

• a high proportion of charities’ money is used for charitable activity

• charities are making the impact they promise to make

• the way they go about making that impact is consistent with the spirit of ‘charity’.

The Regulator of Social Housing has today published the results of its latest quarterly survey of registered providers’ financial health. The report covers the period from 1 April 2020 to 30 June 2020.

As with the rest of the economy, registered providers have faced numerous challenges in the quarter due to the impact of coronavirus, including the direct impact of lockdown, the short-term closure of the housing market, and increasing economic uncertainty. Despite this, the data collected shows that the sector is in a strong financial position overall during the quarter.

The sector has good access to finance with £107.1 billion of debt facilities in place at the end of June, of which £24.8 billion was undrawn. Available cash balances increased to £6.4 billion, and new finance of £4.5 billion was agreed in the quarter. This new finance includes £1.3 billion from the Bank of England’s Covid Corporate Financing Facility, in which eight providers participated.

The short-term closure of the housing market resulted in sales receipts which were about 10% lower than providers’ March forecasts, some of which had not been updated to reflect the expected impact of the pandemic. Investment in housing supply was £1.8 billion in the quarter to June 2020, lower than the total March forecast, but higher than the forecast on contractually committed schemes.

The sustained period of lockdown and associated increase in unemployment has led to an increase in the arrears and void rent loss figures. Rent collection remained strong at over 97% in aggregate, but this is the lowest level since 2013. At the same time, mean provider void losses have increased to 2.2%. Offsetting reductions in income, providers’ expenditure on capitalised repairs and maintenance was just over half that incurred during the same period in 2019. This was mainly due to lockdown restrictions on repairs during the quarter.

Forecasts for the next 12 months indicate that the sector expects to increase its development and housing market exposure although not to the same level as pre-coronavirus forecasts. Providers also expect to increase their investment in existing stock, with evidence of plans to reschedule delayed capital expenditure from the first quarter of the financial year.

Will Perry, Director of Strategy at RSH said:

The results of the quarterly survey show that the social housing sector continues to maintain a good financial position in the face of considerable challenges.

The next few months may mean further uncertainty due to the continued impacts of the pandemic and we expect providers to be ready to respond promptly to the changing environment, alongside maintaining services and investment, and planning for the long term.

The Regulator’s quarterly surveys are available on the quarterly survey page.

Notes to editors

1. The quarterly survey provides a regular source of information regarding the financial health of private registered providers, in particular with regard to their liquidity position.

2. The quarterly survey returns summarised in the report cover the period from 1 April 2020 to 30 June 2020 and the latest report is based on regulatory returns from 215 PRPs and PRP groups who own or manage more than 1,000 homes. The survey Data about income collection, including rent collection, was first collected in 2013.

3. The Regulator of Social Housing promotes a viable, efficient and well-governed social housing sector able to deliver homes that meet a range of needs. It does this by undertaking robust economic regulation focusing on governance, financial viability and value for money that maintains lender confidence and protects the taxpayer. It also sets consumer standards and may take action if these standards are breached and there is a significant risk of serious detriment to tenants or potential tenants.

4. For press office contact details, see the Media enquiries page. For general queries, please email enquiries@rsh.gov.uk or call 0300 124 5225.