Volunteering England welcomes the new measurement system being put in place to monitor progress on National Indicator 6 (NI 6) “Participation in regular volunteering” . For the first time, this system will provide a standard benchmarking tool for Local Authorities to measure progress on this target1.
The new guidance published by the Office of the Third Sector (OTS) acknowledges that previous reporting mechanisms have been insufficient and led to significant under-reporting of volunteering activity. The new standardised measurement of volunteering at a local level will be conducted through the new Place Survey. We are pleased to see that the Place Survey questions are being drafted to complement the existing national Citizenship Survey and believe it would be particularly helpful if the local and national surveys are directly comparable on type and frequency of volunteering. The Institute for Volunteering Research2 would be happy to provide advice on how this might work in practice.
We welcome the recognition that volunteering has a valuable role to play in helping to meet a wide range of National Indicator targets, as evidenced in our recent publication “Volunteering Works: volunteering and social policy”, which outlines how volunteering impacts on a broad number of local government policies and agendas. We also welcome the OTS’ explanation about how the volunteering indicator complements but significantly differs from indicator 7 which examines the local “environment for a thriving third sector”.
Recently commissioned research by Volunteering England shows that inclusion of a volunteering indicator in Local Area Agreements (LAAs) targets is raising the profile of volunteering and leading to more productive partnerships. In areas where the local volunteering infrastructure has organised itself into cohesive networks, there is often a clear process for working with Local Authorities and Local Strategic Partnerships (LSPs) for delivery or coordination of activities needed to achieve the target.
Volunteering England is however disappointed that this guidance published by OTS in April 2008 has come so late in the decision-making process for LSPs. We see great value in more support being provided to promote both the value of the volunteering indicator and the contribution that local volunteering can make to meeting other indicators. Local Authorities should feel encouraged to proactively support organisations which can help increase participation in regular volunteering and local volunteering organisations encouraged to communicate their contribution to LSP targets.
Notes
1 NI 6 ‘Participation in regular volunteering’ is one of the new suite of 198 indicators which can be chosen by Local Strategic Partnerships (LSPs) as part of their Local Area Agreements.
2 The Institute for Volunteering Research is an initiative of Volunteering England
