Communities and volunteering - what's the plan?

A new Volunteering Action Plan was launched on the 15th June 2022 at The Gathering, SCVO’s celebration of Scotland’s voluntary sector.

The plan aims to create an environment where everyone can volunteer, more often, and throughout their lives, with a specific focus on tackling inequality within volunteering, so that those who would traditionally experience barriers to volunteering can benefit and contribute.

Read more on the Scottish Government website

Led by Volunteer Scotland and the Scottish Government, the plan was developed with over 100 participants, who have brought integral themes to the action plan including building knowledge and developing skills, supporting local communities and promoting the value of volunteers.

It will be accompanied by £100,000 investment from the Scottish Government in the Make Your Mark Heritage volunteering campaign, which will help develop training and guidance to support inclusive volunteering.

Volunteering and Communities Channel Scotland

In light of the plan, we will be considering what message we put out about volunteering in the context of the communuty sector - there is clearly a lot of overlap between the work of community organisations and volunteering, although the two are also distinct in many ways.

Scottish Community Development Centre (SCDC), who manage Communities Channel Scotland, contributed to the governance group and other sub groups in the development of the plan. at Communities Channel Scotland, we are currently interested in how the Social Impact Pledge can enable public bodies to help grow volunteering. Please get in touch if you have any thoughts on this.