Community volunteers should be better supported to play their vital role in society

Charities, community groups and voluntary organisations are vital in contributing to the stronger and healthier society we all strive for. Volunteers are their lifeblood. To help this sector, through the immediate challenges as well as into the future, we must respond to the shifts and trends we have seen across volunteering in recent years, many of which have been accelerated by the pandemic.

We know that volunteering can reduce social isolation and loneliness, build skills and confidence, and provide opportunities for personal development as well as improve mental and physical health. In the United Kingdom we are lucky to have an embedded and longstanding culture of volunteering, which came to the fore through the pandemic: individuals in the voluntary sector went above and beyond to collaborate with one other to help support communities in their hours of great need. The pandemic brought forward innovations and an expansion of virtual volunteering as well as introducing a new and more diverse group of volunteers.

While the pandemic was a hugely traumatic experience, many volunteers, despite working in incredibly difficult circumstances, have very positive memories of their own time helping out in their communities. We saw similar positive sentiment in 2012 for the London Olympic and Paralympic Games and during the recent Commonwealth Games. We must do what we can to harness this new and diverse group of volunteers and it is incumbent on government to help foster a positive legacy from what was an incredibly difficult time for so many. In 2022 community events of happiness celebrating the Queen’s Jubilee, and of sadness remembering her passing, have galvanised communities and demonstrated what the British public can do when it comes together.

Volunteering can be both formal and informal. Recent data released by the government found that levels of informal volunteering, which is defined as “giving unpaid help to individuals who are not a relative”, rose during the pandemic. Whether it is supporting your neighbour or helping in the local foodbank, what is important is that we support all types of volunteers, especially in valuing and recognising the work that they do. We should endeavour to capture as much of the goodwill that we have seen in recent years so that society can continue to benefit going forward.

We hear often about the barriers and challenges preventing a stronger and more sustainable civil society and perhaps now, following the pandemic, is precisely the time for government to re-evaluate and rethink how to engage and retain volunteers. If we don’t we risk losing this new group of volunteers and, in doing so, missing an opportunity to give the sector the valuable new impetus and support it will need in the difficult years ahead.

So perhaps now is the time to assemble a taskforce from across the sector to work out how to reflect the shifts and changes in volunteering to better embed it in society and within local communities. Looking at how we can create more flexibility and engagement will be critical in delivering a more free-flowing environment in which more volunteers can participate, thrive and grow.

It was Winston Churchill who once said: ‘”We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.” We must give charities and organisations what they need to unleash the full potential of volunteering in this country, to give them the support, capability and capacity they need to play an even bigger role in society in the future.