The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Mims Davies)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered connecting communities by supporting charities and volunteers.
I am delighted that the House has this opportunity to discuss a subject so close to the nation’s heart: charities and volunteers. I am sure that everyone across the House will agree that these incredible people and organisations are the bold, brave, beating heart of our communities. And they are not alone. They work alongside the social enterprises, mutuals, community groups and socially responsible businesses that help to make up our civil society.
This country’s civil society is a force to be reckoned with. It has a proud heritage and is admired across the globe. It is everything from a voice for the voiceless to an incubator for innovation. It provides a space for us to display the very best of ourselves and a desire to help and support others. We all know of superhuman efforts that people have made in our constituencies and communities on behalf of charities—running, skydiving, sponsored swims, sponsored silences, with groups, individuals and children all raising millions, thousands or hundreds of pounds for causes they care about.
Only a few years ago, the eyes of the world were on London for the Paralympic and Olympic games. People were amazed by the athletic achievement, but what also made an impact on millions of people were those who came from our shores: our volunteers, the games makers, selflessly giving their time, energy and expertise so that others could have a brighter and better future and an enjoyable time.
We will see that again: with Birmingham 2022, the Commonwealth games, on the horizon, we have a chance to do it all again. Our experience, in London 2012 and beyond, has shown that we can create the right opportunities and environment for volunteers. They will come and step up to the challenge. That energy and that sense of momentum are vital if we are to continue to have a happier and healthier society.
What is the Government’s vision for civil society? Three elements are particularly important to me as we chart this new path. The first is the building of communities that are connected: tackling loneliness, helping people to feel attached to the places where they live and empowering people of all ages to build an even better society. The second is the establishment of a socially responsible business and finance sector that can act as an even greater force for good in our society and tackle, creatively, some of its most entrenched problems.
David Morris (Morecambe and Lunesdale) (Con)
Does the Minister agree that charities should remain autonomous and should not be interfered with politically? I am greatly concerned about a charity in Morecambe that is undergoing that process at this moment.
Mims Davies
I thank my hon. Friend for referring to something that is happening in his community and may be a worry. The Charity Commission plays an important role in giving us comfort in that respect. It is an independent registrar, and it is the regulator of charities. The Government have recognised the demand for its services by granting it an extra £5 million a year to help our charities to be at their best. If my hon. Friend has any concerns about that specific case, I shall be happy to meet him.
Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab)
The Minister has rightly paid tribute to the hundreds of thousands of volunteers—long may they continue, and I pay tribute to the volunteers in my own constituency—but does she think it right that voluntary organisations, including charities such as the Trussell Trust and other food banks, are in effect replacing statutory services, although they are not equipped in the same way as a statutory service?
Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. May I have just one second to help the House? There are 17 speakers besides the Front Benchers, so may I encourage Members to try to help each other?
Mims Davies
I thank the hon. Lady for raising the importance of working across communities to support people in need. It is absolutely right for food banks to play their part, as they have for many decades through churches and local organisations. It is absolutely right that when people are in need, we have the opportunities and the partnerships to reach out to them.
I was talking about my vision, and the Government’s vision, for civil society. My third focus is on harnessing the energy of our young people and ensuring that there are plenty of opportunities for them to contribute in their communities. We want to create the conditions for a bold and bright future in which civil society is able to play an even greater role than it does today. Those themes are captured in our civil society strategy, published six months ago. I will briefly update the House on how we are pursuing our vision, but let me first thank my team of officials for their incredible outreach and dedication in supporting the sector and connecting communities through the strategy and for working so well.
The United Kingdom is already one of the most generous places in the world. Last year, the public donated £10.3 billion, and we have heard about millions of people who volunteered in our communities on each and every day of that year. Gift aid is now worth more than £1.2 billion to charities. Since 1990, when John Major was Prime Minister, £15 billion more has been given to good causes. That is the most successful charity tax relief in the world, and I am delighted that the Treasury has announced that the small donations gift aid limit has been raised to £30.
To support even more people giving back to their local area, I am today awarding a further £3 million to communities that need it most. Some £770,000 is going to six places to boost fundraising directly to local good causes. This investment will unlock funds for Britain’s most deprived communities, improving social mobility from Bristol to the Yorkshire coast. Some £2.3 million will go to 10 more places to put community at the heart of tackling local issues, from the Onion Collective in Somerset addressing skills gaps in the county to Lincoln’s hometown football club building on cohesion in the community. This investment in communities the length and breadth of the country will help even more people take action on the issues they care about most, including helping more volunteering, giving more money directly to local causes that people feel connected with in their community and supporting even more simple neighbourly acts, which can mean so much.
The Government are also helping connect communities by tackling loneliness. We are the first country in the world to have a Minister for loneliness, and I have had interest from Governments, businesses and charities around the globe—from places such as Canada, the USA, Australia, Sweden to Japan—that want to learn from us. To help tackle loneliness across England, we have secured £20 million of new grant funding for brilliant projects that are directly connecting communities, such as the Rural Coffee Caravan in Bury St Edmunds. The Care Leavers Association is also included; it is helping to develop a digital platform to connect care leavers of all ages so they can share, learn and support one another.
Stephen Kerr (Stirling) (Con)
Can the Minister comment on any discussions she has had with the devolved Administrations specifically about loneliness?
Mims Davies
I have had conversations with the devolved Administrations on sport and connecting communities, but I have not directly had any on that issue. I am however very happy to take that up and co-operate with colleagues across the House to work with the devolved Administrations. As a Wales Minister, I was very aware that there are particular communities that we need to make sure Westminster and Whitehall are reaching.
We are breaking down barriers to volunteering for everyone, and we are focusing on those at risk of loneliness and looking to the long term to help those people who might want to get involved and who might need a new direction and feel isolated. I am backing that again today with cash: £250,000 for new funding to do exactly that.
When communities are facing their moment of greatest need, a connected community is what matters most. We saw that in the aftermath of the Grenfell Tower tragedy. Local charities at the heart of the community stepped up, working in partnership with national organisations and emergency services to provide support for those in need. The public responded, too, by raising over £29 million. That was unprecedented, and it highlighted that we are at our very best when we come together and help each other. This community support was invaluable in helping the Government reach the Grenfell victims and their families quickly, and we will continue to support them. We are working with our experienced charity partners to further strengthen the response and be ready for any future emergencies.
How can business help our communities? Society’s needs are at the heart of good decision making. The private sector is a great force for good, and this is a chance to address society’s most pressing issues by encouraging innovative public services to work alongside private investors, socially responsible businesses and social enterprise. From tackling homelessness to helping young people reach their full potential, business and finance can and must play a crucial role.
Through social impact bonds, we are bringing together investors who want to make a difference with charities who have the expertise to make real change. This successful model is already having a positive impact on people and communities across the country. Charities such as St Mungo’s and Thames Reach are working with the most vulnerable rough sleepers in London to help them rebuild their lives. This social impact bond gives charities the financial safety net to do this important work, and I was struck by the passion and commitment of the staff I met last week and the results they have achieved. Since the project was launched in 2017, it has helped more than 150 people to find homes. We know that this funding model works, and that is why we are investing £80 million through the life chances fund to give more support to social impact bonds that create people-focused results. People matter, and we are delivering for them.
Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)
I worked on social impact bonds prior to entering this place. One of the big barriers that social enterprises face in drawing down social impact bonds is the lack of expertise in unlocking these complex instruments. What support will there be within the fund to ensure that that money can be drawn down by social enterprises?
Mims Davies
In my new role in this Department, I have found nothing but complete expertise to absolutely make this work. If the hon. Gentleman would like to raise a particular issue relating to his experience, I would be happy to hear from him directly.
There is more that we can do to help vulnerable people across the country. We are working with the banks and the building societies to unlock millions of pounds from dormant accounts. Instead of gathering dust, that money is being invested in helping our young people into employment and in tackling problem debt. In 2018 alone, £330 million of dormant assets funding was announced, and by 2020, the total distribution from dormant accounts will reach more than half a billion pounds. We will expand that scheme further to help more vulnerable people to benefit. This funding is changing lives for the better, with £90 million helping the most disadvantaged young people into employment and £55 million tackling problem debt. These initiatives are led by two independent organisations.
The Government want an economy that works for everyone in every part of their life. We are building a strong foundation for social impact investing, which is bringing more capital funding to social enterprises and charities in the UK, alongside traditional forms of funding for these organisations. I am mindful that lots of people want to speak, so I shall try to commute my remarks, but I want to get these key messages out. This works in practice. Since its launch in 2012, Big Society Capital has committed more than £520 million and leveraged more than £1.2 billion of additional co-investment into this space.
The Government are building on these successes and will be using a further £135 million from dormant accounts to help further charities and social enterprises. In addition, the Government have commissioned an advisory group, and the Prime Minister has personally asked for an industry-led implementation taskforce to deliver its recommendations. We also have an inclusive economy partnership, where we work with businesses such as O2, Landsec and Accenture and with social innovators to find practical solutions and to unlock the issues on the ground. We also have the This is Me programme, an inclusive workplace programme that focuses on mental health issues, and it is working with Landsec. This is an area in which we are working with business and the community to ensure that we can deliver on the ground.
Sir John Hayes (South Holland and The Deepings) (Con)
My hon. Friend is keen to speed on, but I should just like to say that she has already made a great impression on the House and on the sectors for which she is responsible in the time that she has been a Minister. In that spirit, will she take account of the rural areas such as the one I represent with regard to the things that she has said? They sometimes miss out, and it would be great if we found some means by which we could get her to come to places such as Lincolnshire to evangelise the case that she has made so powerfully today.
Mims Davies
My right hon. Friend is absolutely right to say that we should not forget our rural communities. We should work on this through the loneliness fund and the building connections fund, and I have more to say on that. I absolutely must speed on, but we need to make sure that we can cater for everyone across the land.
Moving on to youth opportunities, we need to harness the energy of young people and ensure that they have the opportunity to contribute to their local area. Volunteering provides young people with many of the skills that they will need later in life, and we are reaching out to the next generation to give them more opportunities to get involved.
Chris Elmore
I am extremely grateful to the Minister. Will she join me in paying tribute to the guide and scout movement, which does an enormous amount of work to try to ensure that young people understand the value of volunteering? It was refreshing to have scouts and guides approaching me as their local Member of Parliament to engage in National Democracy Week last year, so that they could begin to understand the wider process of democracy, which is linked to volunteering.
Mims Davies
The £5 million that the Government invested in creating new places for disadvantaged young people through uniformed youth groups, including Girlguiding and St John Ambulance, shows that we are committed. We also have half a million participants in the National Citizen Service. Working with the National Lottery Community Fund, we are investing another £80 million to help young people be active in their communities. We want our young people to have a voice in decision making, and we are creating two new groups to involve them.
Mr Robert Goodwill (Scarborough and Whitby) (Con)
May I share one slight concern with the Minister? The public sector, including the health service, sometimes leans on effective charities a little too heavily. I was at Whitby and District Community Transport on Friday, and its worry is that the criteria for patient transport are changing, which is increasing pressure when it already has trouble getting enough volunteer drivers.
Mims Davies
It is right to work with local authorities and community groups so that we do not stop people volunteering. We should be actively encouraging people and giving them a chance to shine.
Finally, on youth services, the civil society strategy included a commitment to examine the guidance given to local authorities to provide appropriate local youth services. Through such efforts, we will help people to be more active in their communities, and we have promised a review.
Mims Davies
I am going to conclude, because I will be in trouble otherwise.
Despite the challenges in our growing and changing communities, as Members will know from their constituencies, civil society represents an opportunity to come together. The British people are the most generous, enterprising, imaginative and downright determined people in the world. As a Member of Parliament and a charity trustee and fundraiser, I know what it takes to be part of that, and I salute people across all constituencies, including Eastleigh, for what they do. I look forward to hearing from people about what is going on in their communities. Civil society is the best tool we have to connect our communities, to boost the economy and to make us happier, and we can work together to connect our communities further.
Martin Docherty-Hughes
I see that the chair of the all-party parliamentary group and the Minister agree. It is a fundamental point that we need to reinforce.
The sector in Scotland has a combined turnover of £5.8 billion. For the record, that is higher than the whisky industry. Some 78% of charities in Scotland are locally based, and four out of five Scots used a third sector organisation last year.
Mims Davies
With the leave of the House, I want to respond by picking up on a few points. I thank the hon. Member for Oldham West and Royton (Jim McMahon)—and thank goodness for men’s sheds. I thank the 18 speakers from across the House who have contributed to this really positive debate this afternoon. We have heard about some incredible organisations and incredible individuals and about what we are doing in our communities to support and connect people.
I want to pick up on some of the challenges for and concerns of charities. Charities hold assets of about £260 billion, and their total income has gone up from £52 billion in 2009 to £77 billion today. We have heard about charity trustees. There are over 700,000 unpaid charity trustees, and charities employ over 1 million people. I will come on to say a little more about trustees in a moment.
We heard about some of the amazing charities, and I completely agree, particularly about the citizens advice bureaux. There are the RNLI and independent lifeboat charities; our hospices; those who volunteer to support the NHS; yes, the men’s clubs; neighbourhood watch; our air ambulances; and Singing for Syrians. There is diversity and resilience in our charities and social enterprises through our trustees, patrons and organisers. I completely agree that they all need support because of the difference that they make. Our civil society is a force to be reckoned with, as we have heard today. This Government are committed to supporting growth in civil society to make sure it continues to have an impact for many years ahead and truly helps us to build a country that works for everyone. As we heard today, we never meet an unhappy volunteer. Volunteers often give because it helps them have great self-esteem.
I will briefly mention some organisations in my patch: the Countess Mountbatten Hospice Charity in West End, the Hamble lifeboat and One Community, which received the Queen’s award for voluntary service. We heard today what that means for those amazing charities that do so much. I could spend quite some time thanking all the charities in my area. People have done well to lever in so many this afternoon.
The hon. Member for Croydon North (Mr Reed) spoke about having to pick up the pieces of austerity. I want us to recognise that the sector has shown itself to be strong. There is a growing number of charities, as I said earlier. They are an important part of our community and they have continued to thrive.
On the Transparency of Lobbying, Non-party Campaigning and Trade Union Administration Act 2014, it is an important role of charities to speak on behalf of their beneficiaries. That is their role. As I said in my first remarks to the NCVO in December—indeed, the Prime Minister has written to Sir Stuart Etherington about this—we want it to be absolutely clear that we are not stopping providers standing up for what is right. It is absolutely right that charities can continue to advocate for the community.
On EU funding, we know that access to future funding is a concern for civil society organisations. My officials are working with colleagues across the Government to inform our plans about future funds, and I will keep the House updated.
I am very keen to mention the hon. Member for Clwyd South (Susan Elan Jones), as was the Scottish National Party spokesman, the hon. Member for West Dunbartonshire (Martin Docherty-Hughes). Her APPG does vital work to support charities and volunteering, along with the NCVO, which of course is in its centenary year. I have offered to come to the APPG for social enterprise as well. It is vital that we talk about the challenges for unpaid trustees, and I am happy to meet the hon. Member for Clwyd South to discuss her Bill. We should empower and help trustees. The hon. Member for Makerfield (Yvonne Fovargue) spoke about the need to support skills such as accountancy and people management among volunteers.
On dormant assets, we will talk further about that issue. We have a group of industry champions who are working on a blueprint. They submitted their report in December, and we are considering the proposals on extending the scheme. We know how much money is there and how much good it can do. There is great news for people in the charities sector, because there is so much thriving locally and we can all share the best practice.
I just need to say thank goodness for Stirling. We heard today that it is better than average when it comes to volunteering. That gives everybody else an opportunity to match Stirling. Looking around the Chamber this afternoon, we have heard what it means to our communities when people stand up and get involved.
We heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent South (Jack Brereton) how sport can help. Sport is the other side of my portfolio. Some 6.3 million people volunteer in sport. When one person volunteers in sport, eight people benefit. I thank all those who step up.
The hon. Member for Barnsley East (Stephanie Peacock) raised concerns about school holidays and food banks and about children being fit and fed. StreetGames has launched a campaign on that idea, which incorporates holiday activity sessions for communities that need them, with a nutritious meal every day, free of charge. The national lottery is funding that fantastic initiative through Sport England.
As the hon. Member for Colne Valley (Thelma Walker) said, we need to recognise our volunteers. We have the Points of Light awards, so please nominate people. We can nominate people for an honour. Of course, there is also the Queen’s award for voluntary service.
We heard about the NCS and the challenge of getting youth volunteers. Actually, I think people get so much out of volunteering. I have been to NCS sessions, and if our young people find time to give back to their communities, they feel much more connected as a result.
The Government are very concerned about knife crime, which was mentioned in the debate. Knife crime is devastating for our communities, and we are determined to tackle it. We set out a comprehensive programme in the serious violence strategy, and my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary announced a youth endowment fund of £200 million to support interventions for our children and young people who are at risk of getting involved in violent crime.
We have had a great afternoon highlighting the bold and bright future that lies ahead for charities, civil society and volunteers. We are living through a difficult period of change, but there is huge potential to do more to connect communities through innovative ideas. We heard how new technology is providing one such opportunity. We are investing close to £4 million to support civil society, through the tech sector, and the Government are coming together to solve social challenges in this way. We know that it can help to tackle loneliness in particular.
We have a vision for the future where charities, social enterprises and good business practice work together, so that we continue to have charities that are well-regulated, independent and self-sustaining, reflecting the communities and the causes they wish to serve. That includes addressing the issue of safeguarding, where again we have an opportunity to be a world leader. It is important that we get the safeguarding and protections part of charities right, so that civil society can continue its important role of supporting our public services and local partnerships. I will be giving an update on that next month, six months on from the civil society strategy.
It is clear from this debate that we should all have the opportunity to support and encourage our wonderful local charities and volunteers and that we should continue to work together to provide opportunities for young people. Charities and social enterprise can connect communities, encouraging further social responsibility and social finance so that together we can build a connected community that improves lives and society. Working together, we can realise that collective ambition to make our country the very best it can be: a country that works for everyone and supports everyone.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House has considered connecting communities by supporting charities and volunteers.