November 22, 2022
In the first article of this three-part series, we lay out the current trends for volunteering in Canada and more specifically the CVITP. We present evidence suggesting that the CVITP faces an existential threat with stagnant or declining volunteer recruitment.
What is a volunteer?
This may sound like a trivial question. But several possible meanings here mask some really important issues.
A volunteer may simply be someone who freely offers to take part in an enterprise or undertake a task. (We say that someone volunteered to do a particular job.)
But one form of volunteering is considered to be a fundamental act of good citizenship which we value highly. This is because it contains two additional elements. It involves tasks which advance the community’s interests (as opposed to an individual’s interests). And it involves labour which is not remunerated.
Variations have emerged that are considered volunteering but that do not include the three elements. For example, some employers will pay their employees to work a limited number of hours for a community-based organization. In this case, the element of remuneration is not of concern. Similarly, many high schools in Canada make it a requirement for graduation that students dedicate a minimum number of hours to working for a community-based organizations. In this case, the element of free choice is not of concern.
Who counts as a CVITP volunteer?
In the CRA lexicon, “volunteer” has a particular meaning. The CRA requires anyone outside of the CRA who is involved in the CVITP to register with the CRA as a volunteer.
“Use of the term ‘volunteer’ refers to: (a) persons donating their time to the program; and (2) persons who provide services through the program, as part of their employment with a partner organization.”
Reaching Out, CRA Ombudsman Report (2020), page 5
CVITP volunteers generally fall into three distinct groups: those who prepare the returns, those who help to register clients and those who coordinate these clinics. The last group is usually made up of staff from the host organization although staff may also be represented in the other two groups.
There is no element of free choice in the decision of staff to work in these positions; as staff, it is a condition of employment. As staff, they are also compensated for their time.
We believe that staff do not generally represent what are traditionally thought of as volunteers. Consequently, we believe the CRA should not be including them in their count when they report on CVITP volunteers. (At the very least, the CRA should make the distinction when it reports on the number of people active in supporting CVITP delivery.) As shall be seen in our third article, we believe it is also a relevant distinction when devising a strategy for recruiting volunteers.
What are the current trends in volunteering?
Statistics Canada regularly produces surveys on volunteering in Canada. The results of the most recent survey, which were released in 2021 based on Statistics Canada’s “2018 General Social Survey – Giving, Volunteering and Participating”, provide a snapshot on volunteering in Canada but lack information on trends over time. Because an Internet option was offered to respondents for the first time, the survey results were deemed not comparable with those from previous surveys.
Despite this cautionary note, a Cardus report on barriers to volunteering in Canada released in July 2022 uses Statistics Canada data over time to claim that volunteering in Canada declined from 47 per cent to 41 per cent between 2010 and 2018 (notably, before the pandemic).
Within the CVITP, the most recent numbers suggest that volunteer participation is in decline. There are many reasons for this. Some of the reasons lie outside the CRA’s control. (For example, some municipal police forces charge fees for the production of a Police Records Check, something which many volunteer organizations require to take on volunteers.)
What is the trend in the growth of real CVITP volunteers?
The CRA counts host organization staff and real volunteers together as CVITP volunteers. (It does not report on the two groups separately.) This distorts the picture as to what is really happening with CVITP volunteer recruitment and retention.
Here we assume that one person per host organization is staff and not a volunteer in the sense we mean. (We believe this is a conservative assumption. In some cases, it could be more than one.)
In the accompanying chart, we have drawn on data from our 2020 and 2021 articles on the evolution of the CVITP. (Note the limitations with the data as outlined in those articles. Not all registered volunteers are active. So even the number of real volunteers will be an overestimate.)
The middle line in the chart is generated by taking the total number of volunteers (top line) and subtracting the total number of host organizations (bottom line).
The middle line suggests that the real volunteer numbers have largely stagnated over the past 5 years.
There is more recent anecdotal evidence to suggest the recent decline in volunteering within the CVITP may be part of a broader trend.
The results of one survey, admittedly reflecting volunteer trends as late as 2021 in the United States, indicate that the number of respondents who reported volunteering time has been gradually trending downward since at least 2013.
Closer to home, a 2022 CBC article reports on Volunteer Toronto’s experience with a 20 per cent decline in people interested in volunteering since 2021. Another 2022 CBC article reports a similar trend in the Ottawa area.
An existential threat to the CVITP
Volunteers are the lynchpin in the delivery of the main CVITP service offered free of charge to low-income residents: the preparation and submission of clients’ annual income tax and benefit returns. The CRA’s budget for the CVITP has quadrupled in recent years to facilitate ramping up the provision of this service. But if the volunteer base does not grow, there will be no growth in the CVITP.
So, what is the CRA doing with its increased budget to counter this threat and grow the CVITP volunteer base? Our next article in this series reviews what the CRA has recently said about its plans for volunteer recruitment.