Volunteering must be an integral part of healthcare workforce planning
We are joined by leading health voices in urging the Government to invest in Helpforce's Volunteer to Career programme as part of the upcoming NHS 10-Year Health plan, as a practical and transformative way to integrate volunteering into NHS workforce planning.
Why are we making this call?
Lord Darzi’s review of the NHS in England laid bare the very real challenges in the system and called for “a collective endeavour” to turn things around.
For Helpforce and our partners, that collective endeavour must include urgent action to optimise the role of volunteers and the voluntary sector. We recognise that the Volunteer to Career programme can act as a stepping stone to achieve this goal, as the initiative can enable volunteers to explore healthcare careers, while at the same time bringing about the changes needed in our NHS: bringing care closer to home; getting people off waiting lists; supporting productivity in hospitals; and re-engaging staff.
The statistics speak volumes: Around 107,000 NHS secondary care roles in England are vacant and the annual cost of using agency and bank staff - who do additional shifts at their own or a nearby hospital to earn extra money - has risen to more than £10 billion. Meanwhile, 9.3 million people aged 16-64 in the UK deemed economically inactive.
Our proposal
To date, we have seen 55% of those who have taken part in the Volunteer to Career programme transition to permanent NHS roles or associated training. We are now asking the Government to roll out the scheme to all 215 NHS trusts in England, supporting 50 dedicated volunteers annually per Trust - so that in the next four years, with a similar transition rate, we could guide over 23,650 passionate individuals towards meaningful healthcare careers.
Volunteer to Career's success so far
90%
of staff say support from VtC volunteers helps improve the quality of service they can give to patients
55%
of volunteers completing the programme go on to paid health and care jobs, or associated studies
100%
Volunteer to Career solved one trust's healthcare assistant recruitment challengeHealth leaders who support our call
"At a time when the NHS is severely stretched and tackling long-standing and chronic workforce shortages, Helpforce is doing excellent, innovative work to support volunteers to explore opportunities for an NHS career. To implement Volunteer to Career on a mass scale would require strategic investment in volunteer managers across NHS Trusts, but such investment would likely be cost-effective when set against paying high fees to agencies that supply temporary staff and helping to reduce the health services’ reliance on recruiting large numbers of healthcare staff from overseas."
Sarah Woolnough, Chief Executive of The King’s Fund
“The results from Helpforce’s far-reaching pilot are significant. Scaling-up Volunteer to Career has to be worthy of serious consideration by a government that’s eager to get people back to work, help with long-standing NHS workforce problems and boost social capital in local communities.”
Dr Jennifer Dixon DBE, Chief Executive of the Health Foundation
“It’s evident that a great many NHS Trusts are already reaping benefits from the Volunteer to Career programme. Addressing NHS workforce shortages requires a readiness to explore innovative solutions and bold thinking. The advantage of expanding an already proven model like this is that good practice can easily be shared to deliver results at scale.”
Saffron Cordery, Interim Chief Executive of NHS Providers
Success stories
Angie's story
Eunice's story
As a military wife for 20 years, Angie Duffin spent her life putting other people first. Despite her lifelong ambition of having a career in the NHS, Angie was never able to commit to that kind of job. Now, at the age of 49, she has finally achieved her dream through the Volunteer To Career scheme at Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and is about to start a paid role in Pathology.
Eunice Somade loved her job at Lagos University Teaching Hospital in Nigeria but she and her family were in daily fear of frequent violence, kidnappings, and threats in the city. She came to the UK in 2022 knowing it would not be easy to gain work in the NHS. After applying for the Volunteer to Career programme run by Bradford District Care NHS Foundation Trust in 2023, Eunice was taken on as a volunteer in the baby clinic at the city’s Westbourne Green Community Hospital.
Matt's story
Hui Ping's story
Former roofer Matt Sharp is accustomed to working at heights, but he has set his sights even higher since joining the Volunteer to Career. Matt, from Laxfield in Suffolk, was one of a group of volunteers recruited onto the programme at East of England Ambulance Service NHS Trust. After a successful interview, he began a paid role as an Emergency Care Assistant in April 2024.
Hui-Ping Chen didn’t think that landing a health service role was a realistic prospect after she’d spent 10 years away from employment to focus on raising her child. She lacked confidence and feared that not having a background in health might rule her out.
But thanks to the ‘Volunteer to Career’ programme, she is now moving towards a role as an NHS data analyst – and has regained her self-belief.
Angie's story
Eunice's story
Matt's story
Hui Ping's story
As a military wife for 20 years, Angie Duffin spent her life putting other people first. Despite her lifelong ambition of having a career in the NHS, Angie was never able to commit to that kind of job. Now, at the age of 49, she has finally achieved her dream through the Volunteer To Career scheme at Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and is about to start a paid role in Pathology.
Eunice Somade loved her job at Lagos University Teaching Hospital in Nigeria but she and her family were in daily fear of frequent violence, kidnappings, and threats in the city. She came to the UK in 2022 knowing it would not be easy to gain work in the NHS. After applying for the Volunteer to Career programme run by Bradford District Care NHS Foundation Trust in 2023, Eunice was taken on as a volunteer in the baby clinic at the city’s Westbourne Green Community Hospital.
Former roofer Matt Sharp is accustomed to working at heights, but he has set his sights even higher since joining the Volunteer to Career. Matt, from Laxfield in Suffolk, was one of a group of volunteers recruited onto the programme at East of England Ambulance Service NHS Trust. After a successful interview, he began a paid role as an Emergency Care Assistant in April 2024.
Hui-Ping Chen didn’t think that landing a health service role was a realistic prospect after she’d spent 10 years away from employment to focus on raising her child. She lacked confidence and feared that not having a background in health might rule her out.
But thanks to the ‘Volunteer to Career’ programme, she is now moving towards a role as an NHS data analyst – and has regained her self-belief.
The success of the Volunteer to Career programme to date has been significant. We urge the Government to consider Volunteer to Career expansion within its upcoming NHS 10-Year Health Plan, unleashing the potential of home-grown healthcare talent.
Amerjit Chohan, Helpforce CEO
Organisations that are currently taking part in the Helpforce's Volunteer to Career programme:
- Alder Hey Children's Hospital NHS Foundation Trust
- Ardgowan Hospice, Greenock
- Anuerin Bevan University Health Board
- Bradford District Care NHS Trust Foundation Trust
- Bradford Allied Health Professionals
- Barking, Havering and Redbridge University Hospitals NHS Trust
- Central and North West London NHS Foundation Trust
- Central London Community Healthcare NHS Trust
- County Durham and Darlington Foundation Trust
- Compton Care, Wolverhampton
- Cheshire & Wirral Partnership NHS Foundation Trust
- East Lancashire Hospitals Trust
- East of England Ambulance Service NHS Trust
- East Kent Healthcare Partnership HCP
- Forget Me Not Children’s Hospice, Huddersfield
- Friends of Moorefields Hospital NHS Foundation Trust
- Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
- Kingston Hospital NHS Foundation Trust
- Lewisham and Greenwich NHS Trust
- Lincolnshire Community Health Services NHS Trust
- Liverpool Women’s NHS FT
- Mid Yorkshire Hospitals NHS Trust
- North Tees and Hartlepool NHS FT
- North Cumbria Integrated Care NHS Foundation Trust
- Norfolk and Waveney ICB
- Oxford Health NHS FT
- Portsmouth Hospitals University NHS Trust
- Royal United Hospitals Bath NHS Foundation Trust
- South Tees Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
- South Central Ambulance Charity
- St Oswald's Hospice
- St Michael’s Hospice, Herefordshire
- St Michael’s Hospice, Hastings
- Somerset NHS Foundation Trust
- Suffolk and North East Essex ICB
- Shrewsbury & Telford Hospitals NHS Trust
- The Leeds Teaching Hospital NHS Trust
- UCLH (University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust)
If you are a member of the public and you would like to join the Volunteer to Career programme, please contact organisations listed above for more information. For general volunteering opportunities, please contact your local NHS organisations. Alternatively, you can visit www.volunteering.england.nhs.uk/volunteer or www.volunteer.scot.nhs.uk. For those who live in Wales and North Ireland, we advise you to visit your local NHS organisation's websites.
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Our essential evidence
Explore Helpforce's unique data bank about the impact of volunteering on people's experience and wellbeing, and on staff, the wider organisation and on volunteers themselves.
Helpforce's Volunteer to Career programme
Our Volunteer to Career programme creates a pool of experienced, motivated potential employees; often people from the local community who wouldn’t otherwise have considered a job in health or care.And, the programme immediately delivers volunteer support to patients and reduces pressure on staff.
About us
Volunteers are doing great things across health and care, in the NHS and in our communities – but volunteering is still not making the impact it could for patients, staff and on wider systems.Helpforce exists to make this happen. Here we explain how.
