E&OE Transcript
Topics: Launch of the National Volunteering Strategy Action Plans; Rapid Review; Frontline workers
AMANDA RISHWORTH, MINISTER FOR SOCIAL SERVICES: I'm really pleased to be here with Mark, the CEO of Volunteering Australia, and Jerry from the Gums Landcare Group who looks after this particular area in Campbelltown to launch the three-year Action Plan of the National Volunteering Strategy. Just over twelve months ago, I was very pleased to see the National Volunteering Strategy come to life. This was as a result of a huge amount of hard work from Volunteering Australia and volunteers right around the country who had their input into what was the vision for volunteering in this country for the next ten years. We know that, particularly after Covid, there has been less volunteers come back. So it was a really important opportunity to actually say, well, how do we not only get more volunteers back, but how do we create an environment where volunteers can thrive right across Australia? So the strategy was funded by the Government, but importantly, led by Volunteering Australia actually working with volunteers. But of course, we don't want just a National Strategy that doesn't lead to action, and today, we're launching the three-year Action Plans, which once again, was led by Volunteering Australia, in consultation with volunteers right across Australia into what concrete actions we can take. I'm very proud that the Australian Government has committed to a range of actions, including a campaign to encourage more people to have another look at volunteering. This campaign will be to be particularly focused on young people to get them to reconsider the opportunity to volunteer in the community. We know that volunteering is an incredibly rewarding thing to do, but we must make sure that we all work together to make sure that those opportunities are available for people, and there are also opportunities that people can engage in and be part of that meet their needs and reduce their barriers. So, I'm really pleased another of the actions that we have committed to through the Attorney-Generals and the Child Safety Office is to look at how we can streamline working with children checks, for example, right across the country, for volunteers. These are concrete, practical things that we've committed to, but there are many other actions in there that organisations across the country, volunteering organisations, are taking responsibility over so we can all work together for a thriving volunteer sector.
MARK PEARCE, CEO, VOLUNTEERING AUSTRALIA: As Minister Rishworth says today marks a point in time at the launch of not just the National Strategy, which came to Australian shores as a function of the thoughts, collective thoughts, aspirations and points of opportunity of volunteers, and volunteer involving organisations throughout this country in February last year. The Action Plan provides the facilitation of that. It brings to life the aspirations of a National Strategy through defined actions. And critically, importantly, as the Minister has said, a strategy is important, but the implementation of the strategy is the critical piece, and the Action Plan provides an opportunity for volunteer involving organisations and volunteers throughout this country to identify things which are important to them, to align with areas of activity and to implement the aspirations of the National Strategy throughout Australia. This is the first of three Three-Year Action Plans. There will be, obviously two more to follow on from this, and it spans the full 10 years of this National Strategy. It's a critical point in time. We've seen a decline in volunteer numbers, formal volunteers, but we're seeing a greater awareness of the role of informal volunteering. Finding a connection between those two things is critically important. The National Strategy speaks to it, and the Action Plan provides opportunities for organisations to better engage with what we would term informal volunteering. That's people just saying, hey, there's an issue, we have the passion, the time and the opportunity to make a difference, and we'll go and do it. And they don't necessarily do that through organisations, but there is an opportunity for organisations to be involved with informal volunteers, to build pathways to better volunteering to enable the collective aspiration of volunteers for better community as we move into the future, I'll hand it to Gerry.
GERRY BUTLER, LANDCARE VOLUNTEER: Thank you very much Minister and Mark. As an organisation that benefits from partnerships with voluntary organisations and peak bodies, this Action Plan will be a great opportunity for us to increase our membership, provide supporting opportunities for governance, to improve the strength and well-being of our organisations. As a volunteer at grassroots, being able to provide working with children checks to my other volunteers has been a critical thing, and so this leadership that's been demonstrated, the partnerships that are being demonstrated here, will be a great benefit to us.
JOURNALIST: It sounds like a lot of the Action Plan sort of revolves around, you know, research and speaking with volunteers to get their experiences. How will this inform policy in the future?
AMANDA RISHWORTH: I think a number of the actions really involve getting both evidence and information. Importantly, the Australian Bureau of Statistics will be collecting information so that informs where our volunteers are, where we need to put extra resources and efforts and what's actually going on to inform policies and procedures. But of course, stories are so powerful. Stories demonstrate, I think, the power of volunteering, not just to the person benefiting from volunteering, but the benefits for the volunteer themselves. We're really encouraging people to have another look at volunteering. It may have been something that crossed your mind in the past, but if you hear the story of how it has transformed someone's life, and certainly for me, as someone that had a grandmother that was a role model when it came to volunteering, it definitely shaped my view of volunteering. So stories are so important, but there's some really practical actions in this Action Plan as well. For example, one of the actions is to provide more legal assistance, or more accessible tools for legal assistance, for community organisations and volunteering organisations. I know that when I speak to volunteering organisations some of them feel a little bit confused about their legal obligations, and so that's a real, practical, tangible action in this Action Plan provided by a Community Legal Centre. So there are a number of important actions that go to helping us frame policy in the future, but there's also practical actions that can be taken now to make it easier for volunteer organisations, so that they can spend their time doing what they love most, and that's actually volunteering.
JOURNALIST: You also spoke about Covid being a challenge - in a post-Covid environment -getting people back. How steep was that decline?
AMANDA RISHWORTH: I saw some figures that suggest there was a 25 per cent reduction in volunteers during that acute period. Obviously, we've seen a lot more volunteers come back in the formal capacity, but as Mark said, there's also the informal capacity people are volunteering. One thing I will be very clear about is that people don't care less about their community. So we have got to make sure that the opportunities to volunteer, and this is everyone from small organisations to larger organisations, to Government and the public service is how do we make those opportunities more flexible, both meeting the needs of individuals and making sure that they are available, that barriers are broken down for those that have thought, volunteering hasn't been for them in the past. I don't know if you want to add into that Mark?
MARK PEARCE: Thanks, Minister. Yes, Covid had a profound impact on volunteering. We saw that two in every three volunteers stop volunteering altogether during the lockdown period. And whilst we've seen a recovery in the rate of formal volunteering, it's not back to its pre-Covid levels. And I will note that whilst we were around about 32 per cent of Australia's population volunteering prior to Covid, that number is too low to start with. So the pre-Covid benchmark is not necessarily the benchmark that we should be aspiring towards. It's much higher than that. The National Strategy provides opportunities and pathways to increase that participation. The other important thing to understand with respect to volunteering is the 6 million people who volunteer informally, there's a significant crossover between those two. So ensuring that the volunteering ecosystem is well supported and is able to survive and thrive into the future is critical to communities. It's critical to individuals, but it's also critical to Australia's national workforce.
GERRY BUTLER: I also volunteer as a Meals on Wheels volunteer, and I just started the week before Covid lockdown in March 2020, and it was just an extraordinary time for everyone. And we didn't lose many volunteers. We lost some, but it was really important for us to keep that service going to the general community, and being able to be there to actually provide that personal contact that people had lost because they couldn't get out was very important. But we as trying to rebuild that numbers of volunteers now, and working in the kitchen is, you know, pretty difficult sort of stuff for some people, but, you know, it's a good fun, good opportunity to actually give back to the community.
JOURNALIST: How do you go about attracting younger people who might be busy with work and have less spare time in their hands?
GERRY BUTLER: Well, I think there's a great opportunity to broaden the understanding in schools about community obligation and community support. Just last week, our Landcare group benefited by having a group from St Ignatius College come in. They are required to do 10 to 15 hours a year with the Year Nine as a community obligation, and that was a great opportunity. We were fortunate to actually have an hour with those young kids. We managed to break down some barriers about working in the environment, you know, spiders and dirt and all sorts of things like that. So it really did give us good satisfaction, but I think it really worked well with kids, too.
JOURNALIST: And how long have you been volunteering for?
GERRY BUTLER: Well, my first volunteering, I suppose, started with Landcare in 1990 when the Labor Government brought in Landcare as a formal program. So what's that? 35 years? It's a love, a passion of mine. I also volunteer with Butterfly Conservation. So really, being a diverse volunteer, one of the things as a leader of volunteers, though, is I think this Strategy will give us a great opportunity to actually be able to broaden our volunteer base and break down some of those barriers where we can increase our volunteering. So I'm very hopeful about that.
JOURNALIST: For the Minister, when will the Government respond to recommendations from the Rapid Review?
AMANDA RISHWORTH: Well, of course, the Rapid Review was put together as an independent review to inform deliberations through the National Cabinet. The Prime Minister had a National Cabinet focused on women's safety and domestic family and sexual violence. We've released the Rapid Review. The Prime Minister will be going to National Cabinet with a range of inputs, including from the National Plan and the Rapid Review.
JOURNALIST: Could it possibly be before the end of the year?
AMANDA RISHWORTH: The Rapid Review is to inform our National Cabinet deliberations. So obviously, the National Cabinet has a focus, rightly so, on some of the really serious issues that we're seeing in terms of women's safety. This was not a one-off meeting. It was a commitment to keep collaborating, and so this will be discussed at the next National Cabinet meeting,
JOURNALIST: And the states and territories are responsible for hiring the 500 frontline workers the Government has funded. Do you know how many have been taken on so far?
AMANDA RISHWORTH: We are publishing a monthly indication of the numbers. At the moment, it's 156 frontline workers that states and territories have hired. That is not reaching the targets that we expect of them. And I'll keep working with my state and territory colleagues to make sure that they do get those workers on as quickly as possible. Of course, there are challenges when it comes to workforce, but my expectation, considering we've made payments to the states and territories, is that they do put those workers on as quickly as possible. Thank you.