Volunteering - UK 2010 Equality Act

philip.wyett@kathenas.org (Phil Wyett) — Mon, 25 Aug 2025 10:43:00 +0100

As I found out recently, the 2010 Equality Act. here in the U.K. does not protect volunteers. This information provided to me by the Equality Advisory Support Service is very shocking. This lack of protection allows Companies, Charities and Not For Profit Organisations to mistreat and discriminate groups or individuals at will as I have found out myself.

I may circle round back to this after I have done further research and update on further actions taken or to be taken.

Update: 2025-08-25

I would ask those in the U.K. to consider signing the below linked petition and hopefully stir the U.K. government into looking at the rights of volunteers and others in extracurricular activities e.g. contributing to Debian.

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/733537

I believe that this type of safeguarding I would hope expands to cover groups such as Debian, Ubuntu, Fedora and other organised volunteer (in whole or part) projects.

I will be following the petitions progress.

Kathenas - Legal

Volunteering - UK 2010 Equality Act