Following government plans to require refugees and asylum seekers to undertake mandatory volunteering as a condition for being allowed to settle in the country, More than 320 UK charities have declared and disagree they will not cooperate.
The organisations including the National Council for Voluntary Organisations (NCVO), the Charity Retail Association, and local branches of Age UK and Citizens Advice warned that compelling people to volunteer would be exploitative, unworkable and contrary to the core principle that volunteering must be freely given.
In a letter to the home secretary, Shabana Mahmood, they said the proposal risked creating “a population of people forced to work for free, under threat of having their lives in this country ripped away from them.”
The government is expected to publish detailed proposals shortly as part of a consultation on a broader “contribution-based settlement model” aimed at reducing immigration.
Mahmood had signalled at the Labour conference in September that future applicants for leave to remain would need to prove their contribution to UK society, including volunteering, mastering English to a high standard, maintaining a spotless criminal record, and avoiding reliance on benefits.
Charities warned that enforcing mandatory volunteering would impose heavy administrative burdens on already overstretched organisations, including pressure to report volunteer hours to the Home Office.
Many of the signatories work directly with refugees and asylum seekers and said compelling survivors of war, violence or trafficking into unpaid work could hinder their recovery.
“We will not work with coerced volunteers,” the letter states. “We will not allow our volunteers’ valuable work to be used against migrants and racialised people who are not able to volunteer.”
Louise Calvey, director of Asylum Matters, which coordinated the letter, called the plans nonsensical and said the sector would not enforce an unworkable policy. Sarah Wilson of the Penrith and Eden Refugee Network added that immigrants already contribute significantly as volunteers and warned that such contributions “must not be enforced with threats.”
Leigh Brimicombe, director of voice and impact at NCVO, said making volunteering a condition for settlement “fundamentally undermines the idea of volunteering.”
