A scheme supporting more than a thousand young people across North Hampshire will be forced to close its doors next month.
Basingstoke Voluntary Services (BVS) confirmed that the Government has stopped funding the national Vinvolved youth programme.
In Basingstoke, two members of the six-strong Vinvolved team will be put out of work when the contract ends on March 31.
BVS launched Vinvolved across North Hampshire in 2008 after getting a slice of £75million from V, who bankroll the schemes nationwide.
BVS youth manager, Jaynie Lewis said: “It is really disappointing to be in this situation after all the hard work put in by our dedicated V-team and local young volunteers especially when it links so nicely with the Government’s vision of the Big Society for more people to get involved in their local communities.
“We are all gutted that the programme hasn’t been recognised or supported by the current government initiative and we are sorry to lose two highly valued members of staff.”
Over four years, the BVS Vinvolved team helped 1,350 people, aged 16 to 25, to volunteer.
Ms Lewis said: “If these 1,350 volunteers gave four hours of their time to volunteer per week for 12 weeks this equals 259,200 hours given freely to the community. If we equate this to a monetary value, using the basic minimum wage, young people gave £1,537,056 in monetary value if this time was paid.”
BVS said that potential volunteers can still search the Vinspired website to find volunteering opportunities across Basingstoke.
Future volunteers can also talk to specialists at the Volunteer Centre at The Orchard on White Hart Lane.
But Ms Lewis said: “However with Volunteer Centre resources already overstretched and struggling with high volumes of referrals from the job centres it is uncertain what support there is to people wanting to volunteer will continue in years to come.
“Basingstoke Voluntary Services are committed to continuing our youth support work and therefore we will be continuing a number of the activities developed and delivered by the BVS Youth in Action Team using our reserves, however with limited funding and a limited staff it is unknown how long this work will continue.”
