Get Involved
There are many ways in which volunteers work with the Staffordshire Local Resilience Forum. Some people join organised response groups such as a Search and Rescue Group or British Red Cross; others are members of an organisation that, in an emergency may offer support such as a Church offering a building to serve as a rest centre.
Whatever the volunteer involvement, our priority is that all volunteering is done safely and with consideration to all other parties involved during the range of response or recovery tasks. The statutory agencies will always lead the response to an incident and must be supported to do so. Turning up at a scene or carrying out uncoordinated tasks may hamper the response or recovery efforts and could put the safety of volunteers at risk.
It is always preferable to volunteer services in advance. This allows us to identify your skill-set or capabilities and match them to potential roles or tasks. Doing this in advance of an incident means less pressure on responders and volunteers during the busiest times. It also allows an opportunity for training to be delivered to volunteers and responders.
Where individuals or groups have specific skills or resources, we will seek to align you with existing services to ensure your efforts are coordinated with the official response.
However, there are many voluntary sector groups who work with us and we continually review our voluntary sector engagement and look to engage with new groups as they come forward.
If your group has subject matter expertise, resources or provides services to a specific sector of the community, there could be a role in supporting the official response. That involvement could be relatively simple and informal, to more complex and formal, for example:
- Your group may become part of the wider communication network to ensure messages about preparing and responding to incidents are relayed as effectively as possible
- You may have a building, minibus or equipment that could be offered to support affected people
- You could have language skills or expertise that would be suited to work alongside an existing voluntary sector partner.
Interested in knowing more?
There are a few options for you to consider:
- Approach one of our existing voluntary sector partners to join their organisation.
- Approach one of the many organisations working within Staffordshire & Stoke on Trent to seek volunteering opportunities. These include; Support Staffordshire and SCVYS.