News

v chief admits frustration at MPs attitudes

Finance | Vibeka Mair | 30 Sep 2008

Terry Ryall, chief executive of youth volunteering charity v, has admitted to feeling frustrated with complaints about the organisation’s progress.

Ryall told Charity News Alert that there were times when it was hard to stay “patient and calm with the things I have to deal with”.

Shadow charities minister Greg Clark and conservative MP Sir Francis Maude have both questioned the effectiveness of v in House of Common debates.

v ‘will bear fruit next year’

Ryall hit back saying it was unreasonable to expect v to start showing results straight away.

“Our main volunteering activities did not start until 2007,” she explained. “Now we have done all the groundwork we will see critical mass next year and all our hard work will bear fruit. We have already funded a programme in every local authority area across England.”

She also remained confident that v would meet the Russell Commission target of creating one million more volunteers aged 16 to 25 by 2011. Since 2007, 180,000 volunteers have taken part in new v-funded opportunities.

v was set up in 2006 in response to the Russell Commission report which recommended the establishment of a dedicated body for youth volunteering. v will receive £117m from the government over the next three years to implement the Commission’s recommendations. It also gets government money from a match fund in which the government matches funds that v raises from the private sector. To date this is £50m.

Browns donate conference outfits to v campaign

Meanwhile, prime minister Gordon Brown and his wife Sarah have lent their support to a new v campaign which launched last week.

Fashion Favours (pictured) will see young volunteers work with fashion designer Ben de Lisi to redesign unwanted clothes for a fashion show aimed at raising awareness of waste and the throwaway culture. The clothes will then be auctioned online in aid of HIV charity Body & Soul.

To promote the campaign, Brown and his wife have donated the outfits they wore at last week’s Labour Party conference for volunteers to revamp.

Sarah Brown said: “When I was asked by Ed Miliband to give something to Fashion Favours project I knew it had to be the dress I wore to introduce Gordon at the Labour Party conference. The great new fashions that result from the project will showcase young people’s determination to make a difference through volunteering.”

Fashion Favours is the first part of the new vFavours campaign which will run a series of volunteering initiatives in areas that interest young people such as fashion, music, art and sport.

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