Archived Grant Opportunity View - GO4716

The Australian Government is inviting organisations via a restricted non-competitive process to apply for a Volunteer Grant under the Families and Communities Program – Volunteer Grants Activity in 2021.

The 2021 Volunteer Grants round begins with a call for Expressions of Interest, with your local Member of Parliament (MP) using a community committee to develop a list of organisations to nominate. Following the Expression of Interest process, the MPs will nominate organisations from their lists. The nomination period is between 6 April 2021 and 2:00 PM AEST 29 April 2021.

Only organisations nominated by their MP will receive an invitation to apply for the 2021 Volunteer Grants. The application period is between 20 May 2021 and 9:00 PM AEST 9 June 2021.

MP Expression of Interest - March - April 2021 (approx)

MP nomination period opens - 6 April 2021

MP nomination period closes - 29 April 2021 (2:00 PM AEST)

Application period opens - 20 May 2021

Application period closes - 9 June 2021 (9:00 PM AEST)

* MP Expression of Interest dates are approximate. Please confirm exact dates for your electorate with your local MPs office.

The Volunteer Grants Activity is an element of the Families and Communities Program, which aims to strengthen relationships, support families, improve wellbeing of children and young people, reduce the cost of family breakdown and strengthen family and community functioning.

The objectives of Volunteer Grants are to:

• help community organisations to support the efforts of Australia’s volunteers
• help community organisations to support the inclusion of vulnerable people through volunteering
• encourage, support and increase participation in volunteering.

The intended outcome of the activity is to strengthen community functioning by increasing participation in volunteering.

To be eligible to apply you must be an organisation that has been nominated by your Federal MP and:

• be a legal entity
• have a minimum of 40% of volunteers working for your organisation
• be a not-for-profit organisation
• have an Australian Business Number (ABN) or be willing to provide a Statement by Supplier Form (reason for not quoting an ABN). Please refer to the Australian Tax Office website for further information
• have an account with an Australian financial institution in the name of the organisation applying.

NOTE: If you are applying as a Trustee on behalf of a Trust, the Trustee must be an eligible entity as listed below. You may be required to provide evidence of your entity type.

• Indigenous Corporation
• Company
• Cooperative
• Corporate State or Territory Entity
• Non-corporate State or Territory Entity
• Non-corporate State or Territory Statutory Authority
• Incorporated Association
• Statutory Entity and
• be willing and legally able to enter into a grant agreement with the Commonwealth (refer to section 10.1).

An organisation can only apply for one Volunteer Grant, with the exception, detailed at section 4.2, of 2 organisations that have agreed to enter into an auspicing arrangement.

Where an organisation works across more than one electorate, and has been nominated by more than one MP, it can only apply for a Volunteer Grant in one electorate.

Branches of a larger umbrella organisation (for example, Scouts Australia, St John Ambulance Australia) are considered to be an organisation in their own right.

Expressions of Interest will open with your local Federal Member of Parliament (MP) in March 2021 and close in April 2021.

MPs will then nominate eligible organisations from the priority list and endorse the level of funding to be applied for.

The department will email an application form to organisations who have been nominated by their local Member of Parliament.