19th November 2024

Social Justice and Social Security Committee Report on 3rd sector funding

The Social Justice and Social Security Committee published their report regarding 3rd sector funding principles on the 13th November.

This report provides some welcome commentary and recommendations to improve the 3rd sector funding landscape. It also identifies a number of challenges for volunteers and volunteer involving organisations as a result of current funding challenges, including:

the challenges of single year funding for sustainable volunteer engagement.
the impact of the lack of inflationary uplifts to third sector funding on the resource available for volunteer recruitment and support.
the potential cumulative impact of the proposal to remove the PVG fee waiver for volunteers in qualifying voluntary organisations given current funding challenges.

In response to the report’s publication, Volunteer Scotland Senior Policy Officer said:

We are grateful to the Social Justice and Social Security Committee for prioritising 3rd sector funding in their pre-budget scrutiny, and for engaging with so many 3rd sector organisations on the issue, including Volunteer Scotland.

The findings and recommendations detailed in the Committee's report on this issue are welcome, particularly those related to the impact of current funding challenges on volunteers. The Committee specifically recognised that proposals to remove the Protection of Vulnerable Groups scheme fee waiver for volunteers in qualifying voluntary organisations will have a compounding impact on resource for many third sector organisations, leading to an adverse impact on services for children and protected adults.

I'm sure for many in the sector this report provides a glimmer of hope. We await the Scottish Government's response with interest.