This page contains information that has appeared on Sandy Adirondack's legal update website for voluntary organisations at www.sandy-a.co.uk/legal.htm. For current updates, including potential changes that are in the pipeline, see the legal update website.

These websites for each chapter update the 3rd edition of The Russell-Cooke Voluntary Sector Legal Handbook by James Sinclair Taylor and the Charity Team at Russell-Cooke Solicitors, edited by Sandy Adirondack (Directory of Social Change, 2009). The websites are not intended as a comprehensive update and should not be treated as such.

To order a copy of The Russell-Cooke Voluntary Sector Legal Handbook, print out the order form at www.sandy-a.co.uk/bookserv.htm or send an email order by clicking . It costs £60 for voluntary organisations or £90 for others, plus 10% p&p.

Chapter 39
VOLUNTEERS

VOLUNTEERING ENGLAND (LACK OF) RESOURCES

Added 14/11/10. This information updates chapter 39 in The Russell-Cooke Voluntary Sector Legal Handbook (VSLH3).
Volunteering England — once an excellent source of information on legal (and all other) aspects of volunteering for managers and governing bodies of all volunteer-using organisations — has since November 2009 made its telephone and online information service and its online good practice bank available only to VE members. Although membership is free for organisations with annual income under £30,000, I am hugely disappointed by this restriction on crucial information that is not easily available elsewhere. Apart from anything else, why should an organisation join when it has no way of assessing the quantity or quality of information to which it will have access?

In the absence of VE information unless you are a member, The Russell-Cooke Voluntary Sector Legal Handbook, in particular chapter 39, contains detailed information about most legal aspects of volunteering. Organisations which do not have a copy may be able to consult it at their local council for voluntary service or similar infrastructure support organisation.

Fortunately, VE does still have basic information on some of the most common legal questions — who is allowed to volunteer, volunteers on state benefits and volunteers from overseas — in the "I want to volunteer" section of VE's website, at www.volunteering.org.uk.

More usefully, Wales Council for Voluntary Action's resources for volunteer managers, including information sheets and model policies, are still freely available via tinyurl.com/3yh2uz6. Good practice is the same in Wales as elsewhere, and nearly all relevant aspects of the law — minimum wage, tax, volunteers on benefits, volunteers from overseas, discrimination, working with children or vulnerable adults, health and safety, volunteers and fundraisers etc — are the same in England and Wales, although some may be different in Scotland and Northern Ireland.

CHARTER ON RELATIONS BETWEEN PAID STAFF AND VOLUNTEERS

Added 14/11/10. This information updates s.39.1.3 in The Russell-Cooke Voluntary Sector Legal Handbook (VSLH3).
Volunteering England and the Trades Union Congress agreed in December 2009 a "charter for strengthening relations between paid staff and volunteers". Most is general good practice, but items of specific relevance in this era of cuts, competition and the Big Society are:

• the involvement of volunteers should complement and supplement the work of paid staff, and should not be used to displace paid staff or undercut their pay and conditions of service;
• the added value of volunteers should be highlighted as part of commissioning or grantmaking process but their involvement should not be used to reduce contract costs;
• there should be recognised machinery for the resolution of any problems between organisations and volunteers or between paid staff and volunteers;
• in the interests of harmonious relations between volunteers and paid staff, volunteers should not be used to undertake the work of paid staff during industrial disputes.

CHILDCARE AND OTHER CARE COSTS AND NATIONAL MINIMUM WAGE

Updated 16/2/09. This information is included in s.39.4.3 in The Russell-Cooke Voluntary Sector Legal Handbook (VSLH3).
The National Minimum Wage Act 1998 s.44 said that 'voluntary workers' — volunteers who receive any money or benefit — are entitled to minimum wage unless the only money they receive for their volunteering is reimbursement of expenses incurred in carrying out their duties and, in some very specific situations, subsistence payments to cover meals and living expenses; and/or the only benefit in kind they receive from their volunteering is training whose sole or main purpose is to improve the work they do as a volunteer, and subsistence or accommodation reasonable for the work.

This is clearly a very narrow definition but in practice HM Revenue & Customs, who enforce minimum wage, did not treat reimbursement of expenses incurred in order to volunteer as entitling the person to minimum wage. But as part of a review of minimum wage in 2007, the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform said that reimbursement for such costs, in particular childcare and other care costs, is a benefit and should entitle volunteers who receive it to minimum wage.

Following a campaign by volunteer-using organisations against BERR's approach, s.14 of the Employment Act 2008 amended s.44 of the NMWA from 13 January 2009, to make clear that reimbursement of expenses to enable a person to volunteer does not trigger entitlement to minimum wage. This includes travel to the place of volunteering, and childcare and other care costs.

The Employment Act 2008 is at www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2008/ukpga_20080024_en_1.

GOVERNMENT ABANDONS EARNED CITIZENSHIP

Added 14/11/10. This information updates s.39.6.3 in The Russell-Cooke Voluntary Sector Legal Handbook (VSLH3).
The Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Act 2009 s.41 contained provision for immigrants who participate in specified activities without pay to gain UK citizenship in two years less than those who do not volunteer. The Labour government planned to bring this "earned citizenship" into effect in July 2011, but the Home Office announced on 5 November 2010 that it will not be introduced.

UPDATED INFORMATION FOR VOLUNTEERS ON BENEFITS

Added 14/11/10. This information updates s.39.11 in The Russell-Cooke Voluntary Sector Legal Handbook (VSLH3).
Jobcentre Plus issued in February 2010 a revised version of DWP1023 Volunteering while getting benefits. On a quick look, some of the changes from the previous edition I had (which may not have been the most recent previous edition) are:

• Volunteering for "a social enterprise supporting your local community" and volunteering for a local business are included as examples of volunteering (p.4).
• It is explicitly stated that benefits may be affected if a volunteer is "doing what someone else would normally be paid for" (p.4).
• It is made clear that in some cases, the cost of some care expenses may be a legitimate expense (p.7).
• The guidance on full-time volunteering now refers to subsistence allowance rather than volunteering allowance, and no longer gives an indicative amount (p.15). The previous edition I had said the allowance might be £50-£60 per week.
• It is made clear that even people on jobseeker's allowance can volunteer full time, provided they are available for work and actively seeking work (p.16). However a subsistence allowance might affect benefits.

SANDY ADIRONDACK
Governance and legal training and consultancy
for the voluntary sector
39 Gabriel House, 10 Odessa Street, London SE16 7HQ
Tel 020 7232 0726; fax 020 7237 8117
Email:
Web: www.sandy-a.co.uk