Are volunteers getting the training they need to develop relevant skills?

While there has been a substantial rise in volunteering in the UK, more are working part-time and fewer are receiving training
skills training
The decline in number of employees recieving training led Minister for Civil Society Nick Hurd to appoint Dame Mary Marsh to conduct a review of skills and leadership in the sector last October. Photograph: Anna Gordon

Volunteering in the UK is on the rise. Both formal and informal participation rates have increased substantially since 2011, halting a downward trend apparent since 2005, while the most recent Community Life Survey data shows an increase in social cohesion and a sense of belonging.

To what this can be attributed is not clear, however. "The honest answer is we don't know," says Justin Davis Smith, executive director for volunteering and development at the National Council of Voluntary Organisations (NCVO). "It's probably too soon to be talking about a long term trend but it is quite encouraging.

"The most obvious explanation is that some of the spirit from the 2012 Olympic Games has begun to seep through but my sense is that there's something more profound taking place, in how volunteering reflects the spirit of the age. People are definitely more aware of suffering going on around them, manifest in things like food banks for example."

As with other sectors, the voluntary sector has been affected by the economic fallout of that age in various ways. The numbers employed have increased, but so too has the number of people working part-time, specifically due to an inability to find full-time work, by 36% between 2011 and 2012.

Similarly, the number of employees who received training during that period fell by almost 25%. This has led to a reduction in the availability of certain skills and resources, a problem that Nick Hurd, minister for civil society, tried to address last October when he appointed Dame Mary Marsh to conduct a review of skills and leadership in the sector. The first output of that review has been the creation of Leading Social, a public space for social sector organisations to come together and tackle this skills gap by sharing their knowledge.

This decline in skills is indicative of government support for the sector right now, says Davis Smith. "If I were writing a report card I suppose I would say 'shows promise but could do better'. There's certainly a commitment to volunteering and a recognition of its importance, but the government has yet to recognise that volunteering doesn't just happen, manifest in a reduction in support for local infrastructure agencies like volunteer centres".

James McHugh, knowledge manager at Skills – Third Sector seems largely to agree. "We need to ensure such gains [in increased participation in volunteering] are underpinned by continued support for volunteer centres, volunteer management and other related infrastructure. Continued vigilance needs to be paid to the complex relationship between volunteering and paid work. This is especially true in relation to some of the grey area surrounding internships and volunteering whilst in receipt of benefits."

Similar observations were made in a recent assessment of volunteering and volunteering infrastructure by the Institute for Volunteering Research, which noted the challenge to "both the quantity and quality of volunteer placements". For those still seeking employment, a spokesperson for the Cabinet Office was keen to point out the benefits of volunteering, noting that it builds "both skills and confidence" and saying that "this is why the majority of FTSE 100 companies now offer an employer-supported volunteer scheme".

How does this situation compare with other European countries? It varies. There are similarities in Ireland, according to Yvonne McKenna, of Volunteer Ireland. She says her organisation has seen "a significant increase" in the number of people registering to volunteer since the recession – "effectively, a 100% increase on 2008 levels".

Historically, Ireland has not collected data on volunteering rates (though this is to change this year), making some comparisons between it and the UK difficult. The sector does seem to be under the same kind pressures of reductions in funding, skills and training of volunteers as the UK. "The recession has had a dual impact – organisations are relying on volunteers more, but volunteer management roles have been cut and so there are less resources to invest in supporting and managing volunteers or volunteer programmes," according to McKenna.

Another country whose sense of social cohesion has been in the spotlight is Sweden. Vanja Höglund, press manager at the country's volunteering networking organisation Volontärbyrån, says rates of volunteering have remained more or less static, but the situation is difficult to compare with the UK and austerity has ravaged Europe in general. In Sweden, volunteering is seen as part of a wider participation and involvement in society, meaning there is "no specific legislation relating to non-profit organisations and no specific regulatory system for them", according to Volontärbyrån.

For the UK, in addition to problems around funding and skills there are problems around "people's availability as they work longer hours or more than one job", says Davis Smith. "It's a challenge to make volunteering more viable for people like this, to wrap it around people's lives. "

"Casserole Club, an organisation that helps to facilitate the sharing of extra portions of cooked food with neighbours, is a good example. Technology can also help, through things such as virtual volunteering, whereby people use their computers during their lunch break to virtually mentor children in a local school. We're also seeing a growth in micro-volunteering. It's never going to replace face to face interaction but it can complement it."
