Occupy Mumnset - Mumsnet, i know you are P(p)olitical. Seriously, can't you tell your advertisers to fuck off if they are workfaring?

I think it is obviously better to have on a CV that you have done some work, whether on this scheme or not, because the prospective employer can then get a reference from an employer. But, surely there are better ways of doing it.

I want to know how I can get that email.

'What I do see in the industry I'm in are big employers forced to bring in large numbers of overseas temporary staff, at considerable expense, because local unemployed people won't take on the physically demanding jobs or, if they do take on the job, they give up after a few days because it's 'easier' to sit home and take the JSA for doing nothing.'

What do they pay these overseas temporary staff? Is it just the equivalent of JSA or do they pay the legal minimum wage?

I don't believe that our young people are a load of lazy shirkers. All young people want to earn decent money to pay for clothes, going out to pubs and clubs, buying drinks and for the scandalous extortionate car insurance that they have to pay. They can't do that on JSA money.

If an employer saw ,on a c.v. a prospective employee had been "forced" by leaverage of benefit sanctions to engage in such a scheme, maybe he/she might think ,well... dunno , it may be a difficult one to call ?

Oh and I don't care who started the Workfare schemes. I just want them gone. They don't fit with the Capitalist, free-market or small state objectives of the right and they don't fit with the "fair day's work for a fair day's pay" objective of the left.

The state has no business sponsoring big business.

Organised, short term work experience that is well managed with clear, achievable objectives and evidence of a positive impact on return to work rates = good.

Voluntary work that is not conscripted and does not replace jobs (eg is "nice to haves" rather than essential work) like teaching children football skills, hospital visiting, doing admin for local branch of charity with zero state or regular funding, repainting classrooms at local school, running a support group etc etc = good and valuable to society.

Sadly Workfare is neither of those two things.

Angry feet life is political. Vetoing these companies is the right thing to do.

Yes, I think these internships are not right.

MN has always had political objectives. They have principles they apply when making advertising decisions and they run great campaigns that lobby on behalf of parents. It is part of the reason why I'm such a fan - a social conscience is important.

I would be very happy if Justine et al would think about how they participate in the scheme via advertising.

Yes, EdithWeston. It looks like it is only about "guidelines" and "pledges".

Thanks! I'd missed that.

I hope it will also stop the excesses of eg the NSPCC auctioning internships.

'The firms backing the Clegg campaign will provide financial support to interns, such as expenses or accommodation, or treat internships as a job covered by the national minimum wage. The Government is sending out new guidance saying interns who do "real jobs" must receive at least the legal minimum.'

www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/clegg-recruits-big-business-to-fight-culture-of-unpaid-interns-6288349.html?origin=internalSearch

There was bad press about free internships/work experience when the Labour government introduced Workfare in 2009. There was much hand-wringing, but I don't remember ever seeing any proposals (from anyone) to change it.

Weren't they trying to get rid of these free internship programmes?

What's next? Getting the unemployed to clear weeds in the landed gentry's gardens (at under minimum wage) and calling it work experience?

(actually, that last, parenthetical bit, isn't true unless Tesco stashed its ill-gotten savings under a mattress. It just means £1000000 less private money in the wage economy, I suppose an absence that will be doing its bit for the growing gap between median wealth and the fortunes of those at the top.)

It doess seem to be helping private companies by using taxpayer money. It doesn't seem right. If people were working for teh benefit of the state (i.e. for all of us) then it would seem less bad. We need to create some state businesses and give people some real state jobs that help the entire community with the community's money.

Yes there is an increased cost to the taxpayer, because, for example, Tesco got about £1 000 000 worth of labour from the taxpayer that it would otherwise have paid for itself. And the resulting absence of £1 000 000 worth of work opportunity for people who would otherwise have been paid for that work means extra benefit claims somewhere along the line (as well as being £1000 000 less privately sourced money in the economy)

Don't really understand how this works. Is the state paying JSA and also paying companies on top i.e. is this an increased cost to the taxpayer?

"cogito - also, can you not see there is a difference between your hard-working young man choosing to better himself, which I applaud, and a big company being paid by the tax payer to take on slaves,"

I'm sorry, I see no fundamental difference and I don't think work experience is slavery either. What I do see in the industry I'm in are big employers forced to bring in large numbers of overseas temporary staff, at considerable expense, because local unemployed people won't take on the physically demanding jobs or, if they do take on the job, they give up after a few days because it's 'easier' to sit home and take the JSA for doing nothing.

I havent got the figures to hand (Im getting ready for the hell that is a school trip), but I will find them later. I could be wrong, and thinking about disability/sickness benefits.

What cognito said.

Since when is this a political website?

How much voluntary work are you allowed to do without losing your benefits and in what areas of work?

breadandbutterfly, exactly. will tesco really take on new staff at 30hpw on minimum wage when they can get the labour for free? and get paid for it to boot? how naive must you be to believe that?

or rather Occupy outpost? :)

By the way, I like the Occupy Mumsnet label - could we start our own little Occupy movement, please? :)