Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Bill [HL]

My Lords, like my noble friend, I was impressed by the Volunteering England briefing. I hope that the Government have received a copy, because it contains serious criticisms of the way that the scheme is being approached. Those must be taken on board by the Government, because Volunteering England is a participant in the UK Border Agency’s active citizenship design group, which is advising civil servants on how the proposals could affect the voluntary sector. If Volunteering England, as a participant in the design group, has raised all these questions, surely we need to probe much more thoroughly into what the Government’s plans are. My noble friend listed many concerns raised in this document. I will highlight one item that the Government should pay attention to, namely the burden of the active citizenship scheme on organisations that will employ volunteers and the fact that the scheme has not planned a budget or guidance for helping organisations to meet these costs. I invite the Minister to say whether this is the end of the matter and whether there will be no public money to assist volunteer organisations that participate in the scheme. I also ask the Minister what he has to say about Volunteering England’s injunction to local authorities and other public bodies to fully engage with the scheme as potential host organisations. My noble friend has said that we are expecting a lot of the existing volunteer organisations. Can we not enlist public authorities to fill the gap, if there are not going to be enough places? I seriously think that may be the case, if there is suddenly a host of applications from people wanting to take part in the active citizenship scheme and there are no places for them. How are we enlisting local authorities and statutory bodies to fill the gap? Obviously, no effort has been made so far, otherwise Volunteering England would have known about it.