To wonder what jobs the government are expecting people to get?

There's no expectation that they actually get jobs, they will just be transitioned to jobseekers allowance at a much lower rate than their current disability benefits and subjected to a punishing regime of having to complete reams of job applications every week that never get anywhere, punctuated by facile and useless "into work" training offers which are totally unsuitable and don't make any difference. The hope being that the stress of this will kill them off quicker so as to reduce the overall burden on the state.

Except people suffering from active mental health conditions often can’t focus or retain new information? As do people with ND like untreated ADHD?

Too bad the Government just cancelled the only program they have to help people with disabilities find suitable work.
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2024/apr/21/help-disabled-people-england-wales-jobs-axed-benefits-crackdown

I think everyone knows a guy or gal that has their mental illnesses well managed, but there are many who do not and are languishing due to the parlous state of the NHS.

So does mine. She was denied PIP because they did a phone assessment and she panicked and said “I do ok” to every question. She said she felt zombified from the fear. I wasn’t allowed to say anything. All the medical evidence was ignored and even though I wrote an MR letter explaining she was too petrified to really answer questions, it was no good. A tribunal would have been worse, there is no way she could go in person and sit in a court room to be questioned. So she doesn’t get PIP. She is considered high functioning so I wasn’t allowed to be her official representative.

The government have scrapped the Work and Health programme that was set up to support people into work which seems a very odd thing to do.

Problem is that HoL can be overruled by the Commons. They are advisory only. They tend to give way rather than give appearance of being overruled as just happened with the Rwanda is a safe country law 😞

It really depends on the disability.

I have GAD, ADHD, PMDD and PCOS.

I work full time and mostly from home. I go into the office when I fancy it, which always perks me up even though I get very nervous before I go in.

I have flexible hours (can start any time between 7 and 10 but must finish corresponding times aka 7-3, 8-4, 9-5, 10-6).

My job actually helps me with my mental health most of the time.

Obviously we are all different.

If there were no benefits, what would you do?

That's the basis of this policy.

I saw a TicTok recently of a one armed tyre fitter in Hyderabad, India. His channel is all about how he manages to do the work, even though he is disabled. He does these TicToks where he works against the clock, timing how fast he can change a tyre.

In the UK, he could simply sign on benefits and not work, as he is disabled, and the thought of a one-armed tyre fitter would give the Health and Safety guy at Halfords a coronary.

I'm NOT suggesting the above as a serious proposition.

However, the Government is looking at what people can do, not what they can't.

You've missed the point.

What help and where? How can you find out about the help available if you can't use a computer? The yellow pages?

As above, libraries used to be able to help but in many, many cases they've been cut to the bone. I've checked just now and all my local library has is a course run by volunteers, once a fortnight for an hour to teach you computer basics. How many weeks would it take to get someone to the point they can write a professional CV on it?

I've worked in call centres and an understanding of computers was a basic requirement to get an interview. Not only that but you need to use them proficiently because otherwise the customers get pissed off at you. Using Netflix isn't the same as being able to write a letter using Word, or update a field on a spreadsheet using excel, or write a cv, or understanding training on a call centre system. In the ones I've worked in, we've always had to use Microsoft office as well as the call centres own software, emails etc.

Some people in the call centres i worked in were stymied by the fairly simple call answering software where you pressed one button to take a call, and another to prevent calls. Someone working in IT as evidence that people with learning difficulties can use computers is a bit of a straw man - that person has clearly had an education opportunity they were able to access, that included computing, and probably has an interest in computers and is therefore motivated to learn about them. Not everyone has the same opportunities.

Again, it's not as simple as "disabled people can get a job" if the support isn't there.

But I'm sure this wonderful government has fully costed how they intend to address the skills gaps, and to ensure that everyone who is currently on disability benefits is fully supported in the workplace and ensuring that employers understand their legal duty to make adjustments for disabled people. I'm sure they have a fully thought out plan for helping vulnerable people get work, and stay in work, and not just throwing them under the bus for the media and the public to ravage.

I'm sure there are thousands of disabled people who would love to start work, or succeed in jobs if they are already working. The support is not there. That's what needs sorting, not going after some of the most disadvantaged people in society.

You can use a PC and Internet in libraries and even LDs are not necessarily a barrier, depending on what they are. Our IT tech at work has LDs.

Again, not saying it's possible for everyone, but it's very possible for many.

I have zero understanding of Microsoft but would be absolutely willing to learn if it meant I would be employed. There’s plenty of help to do this.

Microsoft's videos on their website will get you to a basic level assuming no LDs, and access to a laptop and internet.

Call centre staff probably wouldn't need to use MS Office anyway, they'd use the proprietary software that drives their scripts.

Like the pp I'm not saying it's possible for everyone, but it's not impossible for everyone.

The irony is that the people in the government would be the first people to fire people with mental health issues if they owned a business citing that they couldn’t make the reasonable
adjustments possible as not financially viable.

OK, there will be some people who struggle, but come on, the people with MH issues preventing them from work, on the whole are still managing to use their phones and Netflix, do online shopping etc. There aren't many people with absolutely zero IT skills. All the things they need to get through life.

I just thought it might be helpful, for people with and without disabilities.

@Trainbother No, I was in my probationary period, having been furloughed and made redundant during the first covid lockdown.

Everyone who feels they can work should be supported to, but in honesty, some people struggle to find anything that’s a good fit. Even Disability Confident employers have limitations - they still need to get things done in a timely way and keep their employees safe.

I didn't mean to sound snippy, sorry.

Just that someone with disabilities who can't use a computer, can't learn online about how to use a computer. It's the sort of thing that used to be available through libraries but pretty much all libraries have been shut down around here and the ones that remain have cut down massively on offering this kind of thing due to budget cuts.

If you don't know how to use a computer, how are you going to access that online training?

This is great. But how often is an employee going to choose someone who may need adjustments . For example looking what previous posters have said- they would need to sleep during the day- so may not be contactable at all times, would need a very flexible schedule and reduced hours. Ultimately would likely need more time for the same output. If there are 10 applicants and 9 do not have these needs , the employer will choose to employ one of the 9 won’t they?

Also every wfh job is not made equal. The governments stance puts all WFH jobs in the same box. WFH jobs come with their own problems- more likely to be bullied, less support etc. This is not great for people with mental health difficulties. Also it reduced choice for people. So I chose my job because it’s soemthing I wanted to do and I’m fortunate enough to be able to do it. But if someone asked me to input info into a spreadsheet while WFH I would be very unmotivated. Again a problem for someone with mental health/ neurodiverse conditions.

This is another way of the government blaming, and taking away from
vulnerable people. And being incredibly out of touch witb the real world.

There's excellent free online training for Microsoft applications. It covers everything from very very basic to advanced, in bite sized chunks. I'd recommend it to anyone who thinks it could add to their CV and anyone who has some knowledge but needs to find out how to do more.

Presumably you were supported to do that by a long standing employer though? Would they have taken you on as a new employee in the same circumstances/on the same basis?

What jobs are these exactly?
I’m constantly on the lookout for part time jobs in my area of expertise and in the last three years I’ve found exactly none.

I currently work from home, part time, but would like to improve my salary so I’ve been job searching but completely drawn a blank.

I agree @Spendonsend

If the govt was to do this then employers need to have incentives to employ sen and disabled people. And stick to the law and the individual needs for the person

There is no way this will happen without the employer being given a financial incentive to do this.

Would that be cheaper than PIP

My Daughter for example could
Cope well in a small
Team with a later start time. She can manage 3
Days but needs down time.

If she can wear headphones and her own clothes that helps too.

However she will learn the job extremely quickly and work very hard once there.

Her current boss loves her.

I'm not in receipt of PIP but i am ADHD and ASD, with a side helping of anxiety and depression and a history of PTSD. I probably need PIP to support the extra expense my disabilities cause me but i mentally cannot cope with the assessment as I've heard it's absolutely brutal. I work fully remote in a desk based job.

I manage to work, but even in an organisation that boasts about how disability friendly it is, particularly for ND people, it's not. At all. I had to go through access to work and occupational health to get any reasonable adjustments, and then to get the software that i was awarded took me 6 months, a grievance, intervention by a director level manager, and almost caused me a breakdown because of the feeling of not being believed and just how much of a priority i was not. I was hanging by a thread. All the while the company is running "neurodiversity celebration days". I didn't feel very celebrated, i can tell you. Another of my colleagues with similar diagnoses has been fighting for reasonable adjustments for a year. We are in the position of actually being in a job too so we are fortunate.

I have applied for other jobs. When i disclose my disability, i haven't been offered a single interview. Quite often i just get ghosted. When i do not disclose it, i get interviews. I then tend to fail them because my disabilities make me terrible at interviewing. I've paid for courses, CBT, CV writers to try and improve but my adhd causes me to forget things easily, which in a work situation i have plenty of reminders/systems/coping mechanisms around me and could answer in a heartbeat - in an interview I don't have any access to any of that and if i can't answer quickly enough they tell me i don't have the technical knowledge. I do, i just absolutely cannot bring it to mind under the pressure of an interview. I haven't been promoted in years because of this ridiculous notion that interviewing is a great way to assess someone. Only if that person is NT.

Ironically I'm very, very good at my job because of my ADHD, it makes me naturally very good at what i do and i outperform most of my peers in most areas.

TLDR: It's not so easy for disabled people to just get a job because even in "progressive" organisations like mine, the support is not there.