Updated: 9 May 2022

On behalf of our members and Victoria’s volunteers, Volunteering Victoria reacts with disappointment to the 2022-23 State Budget and the lack of specific funding allocated to developing and sustaining the volunteering community and ecosystem.  

Our 2022-23 State Budget submission outlined our recommendations to address key issues facing volunteers and the organisations depending on them to deliver essential services across our communities.  

“Over the last six months, we have consistently built the case for the State Government to urgently support volunteering and address the long-standing downward trend in volunteering participation” says Scott Miller, Chief Executive.

“We continue to call attention to the complex issues impacting volunteers and volunteer-involving organisations and the clear need for a strategic shift in the investment in volunteering”

In its analysis of the Budget, the Victorian Council of Social Service reinforces our call for long-term funding stating that volunteers are “fundamental to the operation of the community services sector and sustain a wide range of community and social service organisations. There is some welcome funding to support volunteers in emergency services including Life Saving Victoria and the SES but the budget does not adequately provide for this vital volunteer workforce.    

COVID-19 has decimated Victoria’s volunteer workforce, directly impacting organisations’ ability to deliver services. Funding is urgently needed to reinvigorate volunteering, including to support place-based volunteering services, help Volunteering Victoria build the capacity and capability of volunteer organisations, and to deliver a communications campaign to boost the volunteering sector.” 

We remain optimistic that the Victorian Volunteer Strategy, to be launched in the coming weeks, will help achieve meaningful change across Victoria by prioritising investment in the sector as a critical means of supporting community recovery and resilience.  

Volunteering Victoria is fully supportive of the 2022-23 Budget’s aim to create “A fairer Victoria” and we are ready to collaborate with the State Government to work for the development of a vibrant, inclusive, and diverse volunteering sector.