Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, with reference to the Figure 11 – Volunteering Schemes – International Comparators (2016) and the conclusion on page 16 of Cost Benchmark Report National Citizen Service Final Report, published on 7 February 2018, what the average daily cost per participant to deliver the NCS programme was for (a) Service Civique; (b) Voluntary Social Year (FSJ) + Federal Volunteer Service; and (c) AmeriCorps (State & National).

The French, German and US schemes referred to in the Cost Benchmark Report do not deliver the NCS programme. These schemes are used to compare the cost of the NCS programme with other international youth programmes. The report finds that overall programme costs of NCS are significantly lower than those of these international comparators, although meaningful comparison is difficult as NCS is delivered in an intensive, 3-4 week programme, and these international schemes are delivered over an extended period, varying between 3-18 months and with varying levels of time commitment. These schemes also include direct and indirect payments to participants.

DCMS and the NCS Trust are committed to further improving the value for money and reducing the unit cost of the NCS programme. A key opportunity to achieve this is the recommissioning of the NCS provider contracts from 2019 onwards.