Key findings from NCVO’s annual civil society almanac

3rd November 2023

NCVO’s annual UK Civil Society Almanac was published last month, showing that the voluntary sector’s workforce has declined by 4% over the last year, reversing the increase seen in 2022.

On the state of the sector’s finances, NCVO reports that while income and spending has increased consistently since 2000/01, the rate of growth has slowed down in recent years, with “a drop in income and spending in 2020/21, the year of the pandemic”. Even though the number of all organisations, apart from micro organisations, declined in 2020/21, over the longer term, larger organisations have received an increasing amount and share of the sector’s total income. In 2020/21, the income of smaller organisations was shrinking at a much faster rate than that of larger organisations.

When it comes to where the sector draws its income from, the data shows that the public continued to be the largest income source (47%) in 2020/21. The sector’s total income was £56.9bn and compared to £53.8bn in spending, the vast majority of which goes to charitable activities (69%), followed by grants (18%) and then raising funds (12%). And on volunteering, the findings highlight that an estimated 14.2m people in the UK have volunteered through a group, club or organisation at least once in 2021/22.

You can check out the full findings here NCVO UK Civil Society Almanac 2023