Voluntary workers - putting the 'great' into Great Britain

I briefly mentioned this in last week's column, but I firmly believe that voluntary workers are the backbone of this country, and put the 'great' into Great Britain.

I can think of so many organisations and events - numerous charities, village Parish Councils, groups of people working in their communities, fetes and fun days, flower festivals, music festivals, youth groups and sporting clubs etc - which just wouldn't exist without utilising hundreds of hours of unpaid labour from an army of volunteers.

Most of these unpaid workers seek nothing in return for all their hard work other than a little bit of gratitude, courtesy and respect - sadly, however, that is not always forthcoming.

It's all too easy for people to take for granted their contributions; their 'going the extra mile' becomes the expected norm; and people keep pushing for more and more when actually they should be thankful for the work that's being done at no cost to them.

Or when things go wrong, as they sometimes do when a busy volunteer simply forgets a task they normally complete, and then people just moan about what's not been done without realising that they're not actually contributing anything useful and positive themselves.

Before people take to social media, or mutter and grumble in the pub etc about things that they think should be done, they need to stop and ask themselves are they willing to undertake said task themselves?

Are they, for example, willing to attend hour after hour of meetings, read thousands of pages of documents, litter pick, fundraise, organise events, publicise them, clean up afterwards, sort out all necessary paperwork and insurances, all while doing full-time or part-time jobs, looking after children and/or elderly parents?

Because if the answer is no, then they have absolutely no right to criticise those that do give up what little free time they have to make their communities better places.

If the answer is yes, then please go ahead and volunteer and make a useful contribution to society - more volunteers are always needed everywhere.