Village Halls

What we do for village halls

As the TSI (Third Sector Interface) for the Scottish Borders we are able to provide the 91 village halls in our region (as well as other community groups, charities, social enterprises) with support on a range of matters:

  • Governance
    • Helping with legal structure/incorporation/charitable status
      Annual reporting requirements to OSCR and Companies House
    • Improving governance practices 
    • Understanding charity law including trustee roles and responsibilities and trustee remuneration
  • Identifying potential funding opportunities and revising funding applications
  • Providing up-to-date information on the latest policy changes
  • Accessing relevant training opportunities in the BCA training calendar
  • Bridging the gap between the third sector and statutory partners through forums and networks

If you are a village hall committee member and have a query, please get in touch with us by email at info@borderscommunityaction.org.uk or telephone 0300 1247522.

Scottish Borders Village Halls Week Celebration, 20 March 2025

If you missed the event, you can watch the video of our Village Halls week online celebration event in which Local Energy Scotland and Luths Services talked about the funding and services they provide to halls carrying out retrofit projects. We also heard from 3 halls (Traquair, Chirnside Community Centre and Hermitage Village hall) about their experience with their retrofit projects. North Northumberland Village Halls Consortium joined us to explain how their network of halls operates just south of the border.

Scottish Borders Village & Community Halls Grant Fund

The Scottish Borders Village & Community Halls operates a general grant support scheme for its member halls with funding received annually from Scottish Borders Council. This grant may be used towards annual insurance premiums and other running costs as well as small projects, emergency grant to keep buildings wind and water tight, for minor improvements and best practice support.

Application Form
Application Guidance Notes

Please return the completed form to your local secretariat at Borders Community Action or email: info@borderscommunityaction.org.uk

Community Spaces Decarbonisation Fund

See details of this forthcoming funding on our main BCA funding page.

Village Halls Retrofit Fund

This fund, allocated by the UK Government through the UK Shared Prosperity Fund is aimed at supporting village halls across the Scottish Borders to adopt energy-efficient measures.  

With a total of £186,000 available, we have supported 14 village halls to implement improvements like the installation of solar panels, improved insulation, LED lighting and heating system upgrades. With a further allocation of underspend this increased to £242,590. 

£8000 of this funding is allocated to evaluating the effectiveness of the fund, which we hope to help leverage and secure further funding. This support will enable halls to continue to reduce energy consumption and lower their carbon footprints, as a result village halls can become more sustainable and cost-effective community hubs.  

We are delighted to confirm the successful applicants as follows: 

  • Caddonfoot £18,160.00 
  • Chirnside Village Hall £11,525.00 
  • Coldstream Community Centre £5,904.00 
  • Forman Memorial Hall £2,200.00 
  • Glendouglas Community Hall £16,130.00 
  • Hermitage Village Hall £30,752 
  • Hutton Village Hall £5,197.12 
  • Lilliesleaf Village Hall £38,070 
  • Newstead Village Hall £3,960.00 
  • Oxnam Village Hall £10,289.22 
  • Oxton War Memorial Hall £1,545.00 
  • Traquair Village Hall £24,938.27 
  • Walkerburn Public Hall £8,484.00 
  • Whitsome Ark £3,534.78 

 A further 35 halls, including x community centres were also awarded funding to provide energy-efficiency assessments, this will enable those halls to plan future projects in preparation fr the Community Spaces Decarbonisation fund becoming available in the 2025/26 financial year: 

  • A Heart for Duns 
  • Abbey Row Community Centre 
  • Allanton Village Hall 
  • Appletree hall 
  • Argus Community Centre (Selkirk) 
  • Bowden Village Hall 
  • Caddonfoot Hall 
  • Chirnside Community Centre 
  • Currie Memorial  Hall ( Lilliesleaf) 
  • Darnick Village Hall 
  • Drill Hall Peebles Community Centre 
  • Drumelzier Recreational Hall 
  • Ebba Centre (VH) 
  • Eddleston Village hall 
  • Edgerston Village Hall 
  • Eyemouth Community Centre 
  • Focus Community Centre 
  • Foulden Village Hall 
  • Gavinton Village Hall  
  • Gordon VH 
  • Lamberton VH 
  • Langlee Community Centre 
  • Maxton VH 
  • Midlem Village Hall 
  • Newcastleton VH 
  • Newstead VH 
  • Newtown St Boswells Community Centre 
  • Reston Village Hall 
  • Sprouston VH 
  • Stobo Village Hall 
  • Southfield Community Centre (Duns) 
  • Tweedbank Community Centre 
  • Wauchope Village Hall 
  • Whitsome Ark 
  • Yetholm VH