Give the Gift of Time

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Charity Bio:

Time is one of the most precious gifts we can give. By volunteering with Helen & Douglas House, you can use your time to make a real difference for local children with life-limiting and terminal conditions and for the families who love them. Whether you can offer a few hours a week or a few hours a month, every hour matters.

Helen & Douglas House supports babies, children and young people with life-limiting and terminal conditions through care at its hospice in Oxford, at home and in hospital. The charity needs to raise around £6 million each year to fund this work, and volunteers are a vital part of making that possible. With more than 800 volunteers already giving their time, every new volunteer helps raise income, save resources and create more moments of care, comfort and joy for families.

Available Roles:

• Retail shop volunteers help raise vital funds in shops across Oxfordshire through sorting, customer service, till work and merchandising.
• Reception, catering and baking volunteers help create a warm, welcoming hospice environment for families and visitors.
• Gardening and estates volunteers help keep spaces safe, peaceful and well maintained.
• Warehouse volunteers help process donations so more stock reaches the shops.
• Crafting volunteers can use creative skills from home to make items for families and products to sell in shops.
• Family-facing volunteers can support care, play, youth activities, music and sibling support, with training and checks where needed.

The Impact of your Time

Your time helps make more possible: specialist care, family support, play and activity sessions, comforting meals, welcoming spaces and vital fundraising that keeps services running. It is not only about filling a role. It is about helping families make the most of every precious moment together.

If you are compassionate, reliable and ready to help, Helen & Douglas House would love to hear from you. You do not need previous experience for many roles - just kindness and a willingness to give your time. Register your interest and start a conversation about how you could volunteer in a way that works for you.

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Charity Bio:

Nai’s House is a safe, inclusive space offering holistic mental health support for young people. We focus on early intervention for suicide and self-harm through peer-led advocacy, 1:1 support, and community-driven programs that build resilience together.

Available Roles:

Listener: The role of a listener is a new position we have identified to provide support to children and young people who do not display or disclose any form of self harm or suicidality. The listener (although this role will be referred to as a supporter to guests) will provide regular and ad hoc appointments for guests who would like support to talk through the challenges they face eg school, friendships, relationships, bullying with a trained Nai's House practitioner. Additionally, they would also help out with calling guests on our waiting list to check in and touch base.

This role would require training, a DBS check and commitment of at least 4 hours a week.

Team Support: This role would provide support to the frontline and wider team and would include photocopying, answering the phone, sending out guest letters, greeting guests, arranging food and refreshments for training etc.

No training would be required, a DBS would be needed and ideally a commitment of at least 2 hours per week.

Check ins: We actively manage our wait list of 380+ guests by checking in with them via phone or text to see how they are doing and whether anything has changed for them since their assessment. Generally, these calls are around 15-30 mins and are appreciated by guests and their families. If things have got more challenging we offer them an ad hoc appointment so that they can speak to someone and receive support when they need it. 

Training would be provided, a DBS would be required and a minimum of 2 hours per week would be good. 

Community Outreach: As part of our focus for 2026 we want to connect and build relationships with other organisations, in particular those who would be interested in training or sponsoring Nai's House and/or our events. This role would involve identifying organisations, making contact and setting up a meeting if there is interest, with the aim of helping Nai's House spread awareness, deliver suicide prevention and intervention training and develop an income revenue stream to help us become more financially sustainable. 

We would provide an induction and support to help this role develop. A DBS is unlikely to be required. A minimum of 3 hours per week would be a good starting point. 

Restrictions:

It would be desirable for volunteers to have an understanding (or personal experience) of mental wellbeing and suicidality, challenges young people face, as well as knowledge of Bicester and the wider Oxfordshire area.

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Charity Bio:

We are an award winning Oxfordshire charity that believes people with learning disabilities and autism deserve to live life to the full! 

We offer a variety of services to those with mild to moderate needs including social clubs, activity days, residential holidays and a traineeship. These projects increase confidence and independence in our members as well as provide respite for families and carers.

Available Roles:

We need volunteers from all types of backgrounds, with all sorts of interests!

Whether you are still at school, at work, retired, creative, sporty or enjoy playing board games we will have a volunteering opportunity for you!

Our volunteering opportunities are not ‘one size fits all’, we will help find something to suit you and you can choose how often you would like to help out.

Restrictions:

Due to the nature of the work, many of the roles available require a DBS check and further screening.

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Charity Bio:

Every day, we collect good‑quality surplus food from producers, wholesalers, and retailers, and distribute it, completely free of charge, to over 250 charities and community groups across the county. Our mission is simple: to stop good food from going to waste and to share it with those who need it most. Last year, we saved over 600 tonnes of food. It’s a fast‑paced, hands‑on environment with a lot happening every day, and our team of around 100 volunteers is essential to everything we do. 

Available Roles:

Base Volunteer: These are volunteers who are stationed at our hub in Botley. They help load the vans each morning, keep the warehouse clean, check food dates, sort items to maintain hygiene and quality, and help unload and organise food when the vans return.

Restrictions:

We operate between 9am and 3pm on weekdays. We prefer volunteers to join us for a full‑day shift, but if that isn’t possible, we can accommodate shorter shifts. All potential volunteers complete our induction process, which includes an online call and reading our health and safety and food safety information.  The nature of volunteering at Oxford Food Hub also involves a fair amount of heavy lifting, so volunteers need to be comfortable with this.