Conservative plans to use the unemployed as free labour

[Brendan]

The Daily Mash summed up my thoughts on this perfectly.

"If someone doesn't want to get off their arse then by all means stop giving them money, but that doesn't mean you're allowed to poke them in the chest and tell them they have to pick up litter just because you think it's good for them. Prick."

I?m just morbidly curious to find out what contrived rubbish they?ve cooked up to sell this one as even vaguely morally justifiable.

(posted in the Lounge so that I can say things like fuck, cunt and motherfucker.)

[Ladymuck]

This latest tactic of utilising an unpaid workforce will only serve to enable the state to cut jobs even further. Maybe they consider that to be morally justifiable.

Can I really say things fucking wankers on here?

OK: fucking wankers!

[womanofdulwich]

I cant help thinking if the street cleaning was 9.30 - 3pm mon - fri, then a lot of people with kids at school would apply to do the job, paid. why cant employers think along these lines anyway? there is nothing wrong with cleaning streets-outside job- meeting lots of people- school friendly hours.....

[DJKillaQueen]

I personally don't have an issue with the unemployed doing something...what I do have an issue with is the number of hours the government is proposing.

My suggestion would be two hours each morning...that will get the truly work shy out of bed and used to going somewhere. At the same time, those who have been looking for work will still have the time they need to continue doing that.

But the government does need to be careful. It has been suggested that the agencies that would organise this 'work' would be the same agencies that currently arrange community service for convicted criminals. There is also the issue of impact (if any) on local jobs. And many unemployed people already do lots of what could be considered as voluntary work. They may help their local community in any numbers of ways. That should be accepted as part of the deal. Also sending skilled people to pick up litter will only serve to demoralise them. Those without skills aren't going to pick any up either.

I am increasingly of the view anyway that this government is determined to make being unemployed and on benefits as miserable an existence as possible. That's fine in a city like London where there are good chances of finding work if you are prepared to do anything.....but it won't do anything for those in areas of high unemployment...where they have a 1 in 10 chance of getting a job (and that's assuming a level playing field). The reality is the LTU are unlikely to ever be employed because of the prejudices of employers.

And worse still for those with mental health conditions and some physical conditions. At present everyone being reassessed on incapacity benefit and ESA fails (apart from those with terminal illness or severe disability). And those being moved onto ESA will after a year be put onto JSA irregardless of their health. These people are particularly vulnerable - especially those suffering from depression which this government doesn't even recognise as a debilitating condition for some people. Thay also forget that employers won't adsorb the cost of employing someone that can change from day to day.

[Ladymuck]

I think motive is an issue here. If the Government genuinely wishes to help the unemployed back into work by making them feel socially useful and training them etc., then fine. However, if this is about demeaning or punishing so-called scroungers or malingerers, then I am not comfortable with that.

fuck fuck fuck fuck (because Brendan says we can)

[Huguenot]

Gosh, there must be something I can't see.

I don't even see it as vaguely morally justifiable to hand out taxpayers money to anyone for housing and upkeep with nary a peep of gratitude.

There's a reason to understand and share the sense of social responsibility - but this surely isn't the reality of benefits in the UK. The reality of benefits in the UK is the girl who thinks the state should pay her for a one bedroom flat because she's 27 and fancies a lifestyle change and productive jobs aren't really her kinda thing. Or 16 year old Art student who wants to be paid to finger daub her way to 18, spend the following 3 years rioting and smoking dope, and then spend the rest of her 50 years of productive time on the dole.

Yes there are 47 year old blue collar workers in Ripon who haven't got a job through no fault of their own - but I think we'll find they're doing community work anyway, and you won't hear a word of complaint.

I believe in the welfare state, but honestly think anyone who thinks we should ask for nothing in return is nuts.

DJKQ makes sense that the amount of time is key - we should value everyone's time at minimum wage, otherwise there's a fundamental disrespect taking place. But 500 quid a month in housing and allowances is 85 hours. End of.

To take taxpayer cash and refuse to do anything in return is the absolute insult. If taxpayers can't see that then they're suffering from doormat syndrome.

[Huguenot]

Option One

Visitor: "Who's that bloke there?"

Resident: "That's Harry Smith. Poor bastard lost his job last year, but we all club together and pay his rent and his bills. He's a smashing feller, to pay us back he cuts the hedges, does the shopping for Granny Jones once a week and takes the local kids on fishing trips."

Option Two

Visitor: "Who's that bloke there?"

Resident: "That's Harry Brown. His parents take money from us every week on threats and menaces of jail and give it to him. He spends most of the day in bed or down the shopping centre. The evenings he gets pissed on cheap cider. I caught him vomiting in my garden the other day, and when I asked him why he didn't get a job he spat on my shoe and told me it was his 'rights'"

The thing about Harry Smith, is he won't bat an eyelid if you ask hime to do community service to support his benefit payments. Harry Brown will whine like a stuck pig and frankly deserves to be shat on.

We live in the real world, not some theoretical left wing idyll.

[NXgirl]

From what (little) I've heard, it all sounds rather indiscriminate and demeaning. If it were possible to enrich the community by using the skills and time of those who don't work by matching them up with jobs that might not otherwise be done (listening to children read one-to-one in schools, visiting the elderly, helping to maintain the local environment, for example) then maybe.

Having been off work previously for health reasons, I know that it can be extremely difficult to regain the confidence to do anything at all, but I'm not sure that encouraging everyone into semi-manual labour is going to be helpful in that respect.

I've just moved to ED from an ex-council flat in Bermondsey, and I'm trying to think of the people that lived in the block who were unemployed, and what they would have made of the proposals. Lots of them were very much of the opinion that they'd been hard-done-by and that benefits were their right.

[Huguenot]

"Lots of them were very much of the opinion that they'd been hard-done-by and that benefits were their right."

*Case resting activity* ;-)

[Marmora Man]

'Want, Disease, Ignorance, Squalor and Idleness'. Th welfare state was / is supposed to combat these evils. The current benefits system is contributing to the Want, Squalor & Idleness in many many instances. The original concept was to support those out of work between jobs - not to create generations within ghettos that have never been employed.

If there's a certain degree of shame attached to being unemployed - that's not necessarily a bad thing if it encourages people to go and do something. If all benefits (Housing, JSA etc) are taken into account the "pay" is close to the minimum wage anyway, it's only the ideological left that are characterising this as "slave labour".

On last night's Question Time there was a significant majority of the audience in favour of the work while on the dole concept.

[Huguenot]

I certainly feel ashamed when I'm not working. That's self-employment for you.

Perfectly healthy.

[Huguenot]

Workfare cuts poverty. If you'd like to cut poverty DJKQ, the first thing to do is persuade people back to work.

The impact of the introduction of workfare in the US in the mid 90s:

http://www.heritage.org/static/reportimages/27A2C53BEA293C0C17B863950E2F8D2C.gif?w=370&as=1

[SeanMacGabhann]

that much eh? wow, truly I am a mug for going to work every day when I could be living it up like that

Huguenot's graph is very dramatic until you realise that even by 2000 that's still a third of women classed as poor. No definition of what constitutes "poverty" in that graph either

And the welfare bill? Small beer compared to the amounts lost to tax avoidance. But far easier to belittle the poor eh?

And they should get jobs should they? That?ll be interesting with the unemployment rate rising

I?m not disagreeing with anyone who says there are pockets of society that have become welfare dependant, and it feeds on itself and that something should be done. But it?s not the case that the benefits systems exists solely to support those people ? they just provide critics with easy ammunition

I?m sure the thread will decend into statistic waving, without ever once grasping what it means to be on the lower rungs (whether on benefit or working for poor salaries)

[????]

It's the liberal equivalent of the Daily Mail on here once again folks. Featuring "Back to victorian times", "Tory Millionnairres", "destruction of the welfare state"....does anybody actually look at these proposals rather than the howling headlines of the usual suspects? Don't see much evidence...Daily Maillike crap from the other end of the political spectrum.

[SeanMacGabhann]

Iiiiiiiiit?s Friday

It? a common refrain ? ?leftie liberals in headline grabbing missing the point ? just the same as Daily Mail but from the other angle!!?

Like that angle doesn?t matter, an irrelevance

Not all of the proposals are bad ? I?m certainly not jumping up and down and screaming and adopting a kneejerk stance

But it?s nuts to suggest that the proposals will make people better off as Clegg claims "Across the country households will be better off,"?

All of these people coming off benefits stand a chance of getting work when they are competing with the newly unemployed, recently skilled workforce do they?

I mean all glib jibing aside, really? That is astonishingly optimistic

[DJKillaQueen]

There's lot's of points for me to agree with here, but if we do want to look at the US, the work/ welfare scheme is fraught with problems, especially for single parents for whom there is no childcare provision. And instead of helping those people into better employment many employers descriminate against work/ welfare applicants, in the same way employers descriminate against the LTU here.

And just like here the US has high unemployment in parts with no jobs for the unemployed to occupy.

The example of Harry Brown and Harry Smith is a good one. It's a complex issue. And add to that the ill and disabled that the government is now also going to decide can work (again some genuinely can and have been milking the system for years, other genuinely can't but the re-assessment doesn't measure for it - which is why almost half of appeals are sucessful).

It will need a complex case by case approach, which in turn will cost money (?760 million alone in just awarding the contracts to private companies to manage it). People forget that in order to put the unemployed to work, supervisors, managers and a whole host of other things will have to be paid for...including transport costs for the unemployed themselves. It's perhaps why in the past, the unemployed have been required to attended short back to work courses from time to time (rather than any fully time scheme). They are far cheaper to run and easier to manage. The moment you set out to keep the unemployed occupied full time...the cost will rocket. That's just a fact.

In the US the work/ welfare scheme does displace local jobs. They cut the management costs by placing people in things like retail and kitchen porter placements - effectively taking away those positions as jobs.

If the government go for a one size fits all approach, it won't work.

[Keef]

I'm with Sean on this.

[????]

Sean - it's true. The relentless shouting of "Tory Cuts" - and what would Labour have been doing had they won?, smashing up Tory HQ (didn't Labour introduce tuiton fees?) and the shrill, shreiking, relentless, screeching (with an enoromous amount of glee of rediscovering the 80s on many parts of the left rather than any real concern for the good of our country, economy and, dare I say it the poor). Meanwhile the coalition has to make some very tough, responsible decisions many of which will be enormously unpopular as Labour would have had to done if they'd been re-elected...although I think many of their mps and much of their support are much happeier in this no responsibility, shreiking mode...as the great welsh winbag put it "We've got our party back"...yup irresponsible and self-indulgent and potentialy unelectable.

Funnily enpough I think your posts on this and other similar threads have been pretty considered..I think you recognise that there is a lot of shreiking going on

[DJKillaQueen]

I agree with Sean too in many respects.

My view is that if we are going to spend that amount of money....sending people out to 'pick up litter' is not the best way to spend it.

For a start, the unemployed who want/ need help finding employment or training should be able to access that right away, not after six months which is the case at present (it's six months because of the cost btw). Specialist agencies that Labour set up - paid by results (with good success rates) to help LTU, will tell you they can always tell who is most likely to become LTU. They'll often be over 50, or lacking in skills or self esteem, or have been in the same job for a long time. Sometimes they will have poor attitude. But it can be spotted before those people become LTU.

The coalition intend to scrap all those sepcialist agencies (who tailor jobsearches to the individual) and replace them with a one size fits all agency. It's a backwards step.

The Coalition seem to think they can tackle these problems on the cheap.....threatening those that don't comply or worse still get failed by the new syatem with the loss of benefits for three months. Well that will I'm afraid condemn a samll number of people to homelessness and starvation...and they won't all be work shy scroungers....some of them with be vulnerable people.

I can see many problems...poor results and spiralling costs as things are proposed at present.

[Huguenot]

Sean's approach seems to be illogical.

He's against workfare on the basis that it's only reduced single parent poverty from 50% to 30%. On that basis he wants to put 20% of single parents back into poverty* just to suit his ideology.

Poor show.

Workfare isn't abpout demonising benefits recipients, it's about requiring them to work for it.

DJKQ's point about 'exploitation' coveniently ignores the fact that benefit recipients are currently exploiting the hard work of others. Remember, it's not government money - it's your money.

*The US defines poverty in fixed terms. The 2009 figures are here. It's the line below which people literally cannot provide for themselves.

[ratty]

Sad fact is that there are not enough jobs to go round at the moment. However, I am all for the unemployed doing something to earn their corn and to gain some skills. Has to be done fairly though and I doubt that will happen with this lot.

One thing has to be said though. Ian Duncan Smith is no longer a carreer politician. The benefits system is his baby and has been for some time. He is not looking to ideological cuts a la Cameron and Gideon. He is looking at a genuine way of making it fairer for all and the taxpayer. God I cannot beieve I am saying this and my father would turn in his grave, but I fairly trust him with this.

[SeanMacGabhann]

I?m not sure I agree there is nothing but shrieking going on and I?d certainly disagree that here is glee on the left at adopting an 80?s role. There seems to be a lot of conflation on all sides and jumping to conclusions

I absolutely agree with you on a government having to make tough choices which will be unpopular ? and how necessary some of that is

Beyond that tho?, I?m not sure I can share much ? again, I go back to the simple point ? these people who will have their benefits cut are not going to get jobs, by and large. The market is saturated with much better candidates. This does not make these people bad or stupid. And there is an air of ?well it?s their own fault ? these people have a choice? eminating from the government

And even if the labour party, the liberals and everyone else didn?t revert to 80?s type and were supportive of the ?necessary? cuts ? the fact remains that the impact of the next few years will see a return to 80?s misery for many. If that?s scaremongering then I?ll be happy to be corrected in due course ? same time same place in 3 years?

So we have unpopular, harsh policy ? in itself that?s almost doable, but to be prodded and told we are better off as a result is an insult

[Huguenot]

"that will I'm afraid condemn a samll number of people to homelessness and starvation"

No DJKQ, they'll have condemned themselves to homelessness and starvation by refusing to go to work.

If you're talking about the mentally unwell there are other systems to address these issues, not unemployment benefit.

I simply cannot agree with you that litter picking is a bad job. I think it's a great job, and a great contribution to society. I would do it rather than claim the dole. QED.

[DJKillaQueen]

DJKQ's point about 'exploitation' coveniently ignores the fact that benefit recipients are currently exploiting the hard work of others. Remember, it's not government money - it's your money.

You forget that most of the unemployed HAVE worked at some time in their lives and have paid taxes like the rest of us.

The cases we hear about in the Daily Mail number just 50 accross the country and they all have the same thing in common...lot's of children and 'ill' parents. It's the child benefits, housing costs and incapacity benefitis with DLA that create the shocking figures in those cases (all of which can be sensibly dealt with).

MOST people on unemployemnt benefits get just $65 per week. It's a very hard amount to live on for any prolonged period of time as it is. The government has chosen to use the 50 anomalies above as the excuse to bash ALL benefits recipients.

And Labour are absolutely right to oppose things like the proposed 10% cut to HB after a year.

But I've also made some very good points about what a welfare to work scheme would cost to implement. Those of you so concerned about the cost of benefits seem to be conveniently ignoring that fact.

[SeanMacGabhann]

Re ratty?s point about IDS ? I?m going to not only agree with that but also point out that Hague is impressing me as well of late

Huguneot ? I?ve had enough of your twisting truculence. By all means disagree with me but to suggest I want 20% of people back in poverty to suit an ideology is beyod contemptible. And you have been repeatedly doing of late

Basiccally sir, you can fuck off