2025-12-11

I appreciate the chance to raise an issue that deserves far more national attention. It is the future of volunteering in Ireland and the need for a national volunteering strategy that delivers for communities and for the country. I applaud my local volunteer centre in Louth. It does incredible work. Our volunteer centre recorded 40,000 volunteering hours last year, an equivalent of €1.2 million in economic value. The team in Louth, like many across the country, is outperforming the investment the State provides. It is navigating staff absences for sickness, or whatever, rising operational pressures and a funding model that does not match the output. Some centres receive significantly higher allocations than others with the same or even fewer numbers of volunteers. This kind of disparity undermines the very idea of a national strategy. Let us be honest, in that the last national volunteering strategy did leave a lot of gaps. We still do not have unified data tracking despite 29 centres independently collecting their own figures. We still do not have common key performance indicators, KPIs, making national comparisons impossible. We still have not invested in the kinds of modern system that would allow us to capture, measure and communicate the true value of volunteering. When proposals were made, like reviewing the national database or creating shared staffing supports, these did not progress. We need clarity because volunteer centres cannot plan on the basis of guesswork. There have been positives. The Louth Volunteer Centre received €70,000 from the community recognition fund to purchase a minibus, which is something genuinely transformative for outreach and mobility. These are exactly the types of focused, practical support that work. Isolated wins, though, cannot replace structural reform. There is talk about innovation and volunteering is changing. People want flexible roles, skills-based roles, short-term opportunities and digital volunteering options. Centres are eager to pilot these ideas, but without a dedicated volunteering innovation fund, good ideas remain stuck in the "maybe someday" drawer. This is not how we future-proof a sector. Volunteering is not just a hobby for Ireland; it is a core pillar of community life. This applies to our festivals, sports clubs, Tidy Towns groups and local response organisations. Volunteering keeps people connected, develops skills and strengthens local cohesion at a time when this is badly needed. I am asking the Minister of State to set out how the new national volunteering strategy will deliver fair and transparent resources across all volunteer centres, if it will introduce a standardised national reporting framework with common KPIs, if it will include a dedicated innovation fund to support modernisation, and how the Department intends to ensure staffing stability, including temporary cover, when absences arise. The people running these centres are doing phenomenal work with limited tools. I know the Minister of State has engaged heavily with them. They are delivering far more than their funding suggests. What they need from us now is ambition. This ambition needs to be backed by those resources, clarity and the new strategy that will be implemented. Ireland's volunteer sector is one of our greatest national assets. It is something we should be really very proud of and we should really treat it like it is a national asset.

I thank Deputy McGreehan for raising this very important matter. I thank her for speaking up, advocating on behalf of volunteering and referring to the forthcoming second national volunteering strategy. As the Deputy rightly said, in Irish society volunteering is part of who we are. It is woven into our communities, our culture and our sense of identity. From the GAA pitch to the soccer pitch to the parish hall and from community gardens to climate action, people living in Ireland have always understood that a strong society is built not only by Government or policy, but by people who look out for one another - our volunteers. The gift given by volunteers is priceless. It changes people’s lives for the better and makes our country and our communities, as the Deputy said, a haven and a place to call home. Volunteering keeps our communities resilient, compassionate and hopeful. As Members will know, the first national volunteering strategy was launched in December 2020. It was developed in collaboration with stakeholders from the sector across the country. It is a whole-of-government framework to support volunteers, their representative groups and a range of not-for-profit organisations. It comprises five strategic objectives with 56 associated actions aimed at achieving its vision of "a society where volunteering is [not just] promoted, [but is] valued, facilitated and supported so that people can contribute to developing and maintaining vibrant, inclusive and sustainable communities". The Government has allocated increased funding each year to implement the strategy. Funding has risen from €3.1 million in 2020 to €7.3 million last year. This includes core funding for the network of volunteer centres across Ireland, and for Volunteer Ireland, a national advocacy body. Funding is also made available each year to support capacity building in volunteer-involving organisations, and to carry out research and projects to support the implementation of actions in that strategy. Additional supports for volunteering were provided during the Covid-19 pandemic and additional funding for the volunteering response to the Ukraine crisis, broadened to include integration generally, has been provided since 2022, with €1 million provided each year in 2023, 2024 and 2025. As the first strategy comes to a close, and having engaged with the sector and met Volunteer Ireland, I note there is a commitment in the programme for Government to publishing a second national volunteering strategy. Our Department of Rural and Community Development and the Gaeltacht is currently working to develop that new strategy. A review of the approach taken in the first strategy has been commissioned from TASC, the Think-tank for Action on Social Change. That work is ongoing and is focused on consultation with the community and voluntary sector and other stakeholders. That is well under way. This continues the collaboration and co-operation that has characterised the current national volunteering strategy. I hope we will have a second one as well. I heard the remarks made by Deputy McGreehan and I will certainly feed them back into the review. Our Department has supported volunteer centres across the country to consult with their volunteers and volunteer-led organisations and officials. We have seen officials from our Department travel across the country to receive feedback and input from each of the volunteer centres. Deputy McGreehan is right. She referred to County Louth, but the volume and value of what is being done by our volunteer centres across the country is extraordinary. In addition to what I referred to already, meetings have also been held with national stakeholder organisations, including Volunteer Ireland, the Local Development Companies Network, Comhlámh and the Irish League of Credit Unions, among others, to hear their views. Officials are collaborating with The Wheel and Sport Ireland to consult with their many stakeholder groups on priorities for the new strategy. In conjunction with the Department of Children, Disability and Equality, young people involved in Comhairle na nÓg have also been consulted to gather their views on the issues. To ensure that the new strategy is a cross-governmental policy, a series of bilateral meetings will be held with Departments to ensure volunteering under each area is reflected. In conclusion, while the process of consultation is still under way, I do not wish, as Minister of State with responsibility for volunteering, to anticipate the areas that may be focused on in the new strategy. I can guarantee to Deputy McGreehan, however, that the second strategy will build on the progress we have made through the first one, strengthening our long-established volunteering infrastructure and continuing to progress areas of best practice to ensure that support for and recognition of the value of volunteering is sustainable into the future.

I thank the Minister of State. I am glad to hear of the ongoing work and I appreciate he cannot pre-empt the second national strategy. I reiterate that we want to be ambitious about what volunteerism is and can be and to future-proof it. It is not just about standing in a gap, standing collecting money or standing ushering crowds. There are many different skills that we need now, including digital skills for community groups, sports clubs, etc. An incredible amount of intellectual capacity in our communities. If we provide the framework for people to be able to deliver those to community groups, sports clubs, etc., I think we can be hugely successful. I reiterate the need for an innovation fund, for the KPIs and to ensure staffing stability, including temporary cover when absences arise. When people are out sick, that brings down the volunteering hours, and these things happen in organisations. I thank the Minister of State for his engagement because this is hugely important. I say this constantly: if the volunteers in Ireland stopped working, the nation would be at a standstill. From Covid to flag days to looking after Ukrainian and other refugees across the country, it is volunteerism that brings us together and raises us up. It is a core pillar of our community life and brings people together. Every single cent is well spent. As I said, 40,000 volunteering hours were contributed in County Louth last year and this was the equivalent of €1.3 million of an investment. I am sure that not even a percentage of that amount was delivered by the Government to volunteering in Louth.

I thank Deputy McGreehan and I share her ambition in terms of recognising volunteering and its importance. We are ambitious. The Deputy is right that volunteering is the cornerstone of our society. Volunteers play a critical role and we are the better for it. It is articulated and reflected in the programme for Government commitment in terms of the second national volunteering strategy being published. As the Minister of State with responsibility in this area, I emphasise to the Deputy that we have a huge value in volunteering. We are very much committed to supporting volunteers and to putting in place a programme of consultation to ensure that in the second iteration of the strategy as many voices as possible are heard. In that way, we will ensure that the objectives in the new policy will reflect the issues on the ground, as articulated by Deputy McGreehan today. Again, I express my appreciation, and that of everyone in the House, for the huge work and contribution being made by volunteers across the country. Deputy McGreehan mentioned County Louth in particular and it is the people from the wee county and across the country that are making our society a better place. For my part, as Minister of State with responsibility for this area, along with the Minister, Deputy Calleary, we are committed to supporting and celebrating volunteers and volunteering as an important part of who we are as a country. Volunteers are at the heart of the development of vibrant, sustainable and inclusive communities.