Volunteer Centres Ireland - History

History

Volunteer Centres Ireland began in the year 2000 when some of the earliest volunteer centres in the Republic of Ireland (including what is now the South Dublin County Volunteer Centre, the Volunteer Centre Fingal and Volunteering Ireland), came together to discuss common issues that affected them. In 2001, it was decided to formalise this grouping and Volunteer Centres Ireland was born. VCI adopted a constitution, membership criteria and agreed aims and objectives.

Since its inception, the membership of VCI had lobbied government to support a national infrastructure of volunteer centres, central to the recommendations of Tipping the Balance (2002). In January 2005, the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Volunteering published its report, Volunteers and Volunteering in Ireland, in which it specifically recommended that the existing volunteering infrastructure be developed through volunteer centres and Volunteering Ireland . A few months later, the Department of Community, Equality and Gaeltacht Affairs announced a package of funding measures to realise that recommendation. Core funding from the department was extended to all the volunteer centres (previously only the South Dublin County Volunteer Centre and Volunteering Ireland had received core funding) and VCI itself received funding to employ a national development officer. On February 9, VCI once again addressed the Oireachtas Subcommittee on Community, Rural and Gaeltacht affairs on volunteering trends in Ireland.