Friday 11 August, 2006
This is an issue both sides of the Tasman with political proposals for a tax rebate for volunteers being promoted in both Australia and New Zealand and in both cases they are causing contention and debate. United Future has put forward a proposal for a tax rebate for volunteers from ‘recognised community agencies and charities’ who do 100 hours or more as a volunteer a year.
The Australian proposal put forward by Liberal Senator Guy Barnett was reported in the last issue of VNZ Update but in response, Sha Cordingley, CEO of Volunteering Australia said the original report from the Canberra Times was somewhat misleading.
“Volunteering Australia’s commitment to the principle that volunteering is undertaken by choice for the benefit of the community and for no financial payment remains unchanged. It is my belief that the Prime Minister of Australia, John Howard, is considering a proposal, put forward by Senator Barnett, which suggests ways government can assist in the sustainability of volunteering, including how to deal with the rising costs associated with it. And whilst dealing with some of these costs under the taxation system is one option it is a long way from ‘paying retired volunteers’ ”, she said.
“The issue is not one of payment but of reimbursement for the sometimes substantial costs incurred in the course of providing volunteer service. The impact of recent petrol price increases in Australia and the cost to volunteers of maintaining uniforms and equipment may prove to be a serious impediment to the continued burgeoning of volunteer involvement in Australia.
“A number of things can be done by governments and the voluntary sector itself to ensure the viability of volunteering. Some robust enquiry into the costs to the volunteer, and how this will be dealt with by a community that values their involvement, cannot be allowed to be sidetracked by a debate premised on a misunderstanding of the difference between reimbursement and payment,” said Sha Cordingley.
Volunteering New Zealand agrees fully with Sha on this issue and we have informed United Future that we have concerns about their proposal, some of them very practical. There is first the issue of whether a tax rebate is really a defacto payment for services and does this compromise the principle of volunteering being service without financial reward.
There are also two practical issues. First the recording of volunteers’ hours would be a major challenge for many community organisations, especially the smaller organisations with little administrative resources, in many cases undertaken by volunteers. Increasingly, volunteers do not work the same hours every week and may also work only periodically. Many organisations may not keep a record of the time these volunteers spend on their role. The focus would be completing the task or providing the service.
Such organisations would need to introduce additional requirements on their volunteers to record their service time and need additional staff/volunteer time to develop and maintain records of their volunteer’s hours. The Government would expect to be able to see such records to ensure that false claims were not being made. It would be another compliance requirement for the community organisations to meet, possibly without the resources to do so.
At the same time volunteers may resist having to record their time and decide to give up their volunteering role rather than comply. Others who wish to claim the rebate may feel disadvantaged if the organisation they are involved with has difficulty providing the necessary record of service and decided to do their volunteering with another organisation.
Another concern is how would ‘recognised community agencies and charities’ be defined. Volunteering takes place across all sectors - emergency services, health, welfare, community support, education, sport and recreation, the arts and culture, conservation and the environment, special interests and advocacy. Services such as civil defence and volunteer fire services may be organised and managed as part of a national or local government programme. VNZ asks if all of these areas of volunteer involvement would be included. If not, why not? The contribution of all volunteers is valuable.
Again as in Australia, the issue of reimbursements of costs to volunteers for expenses they incur and how this should be treated in relation to taxation is what Volunteering NZ would urge the Government to review rather than a tax rebate for volunteering hours.
The Australian story has been featured on the UN volunteer web site www.worldvolunteerweb.org and there has drawn a lot of comment on the issue.