Employment in voluntary sector continues to rise
Latest Labour Force Survey figures for the first quarter of 2010 show that the voluntary sector now employs 778,000 people, an increase of 6.5 per cent over the last year. This is in contrast to the public and private sectors which have shown a decrease of 0.5 per cent and 2.3 per cent respectively.
The findings were produced by the Third Sector Research Centre (TSRC) and the National Council for Voluntary Organisations (NCVO) in partnership with Skills – Third Sector.
They are part of an ongoing study being conducted by these three bodies into overall voluntary sector workforce trends.One of the reasons why the workforce of the voluntary sector is currently bucking overall employment trends is that the main fields that the voluntary sector works in have not yet been affected by the recession.
For example 93 per cent of voluntary sector employees work in social care, health, education or real estate (housing). These industries are still growing in employment. In contrast, numbers of employees in mainly private sector industries, such as finance, manufacturing and construction, have decreased over the last three years.
However the recent emergency budget has outlined large cuts to the public sector, and this is likely to significantly impact on the voluntary sector over the next year.
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