What does job centre/society actually expect this woman to do?

[steppemum]

I support a lady (friendship through a charity) I'll change some details to make it less identifiable.

She has a son aged 5 and in school and so the job centre are giving her a lot of hassle to get into work. But I just cannot see how she is supposed to do this:

• she is a single mum. Her partner is not son's dad and doesn't live with her.


• she lives on a large council estate out of town. Very little work on the estate. 20 minute bus ride into town. Some work in town, mostly in shops (which I doubt she would get, she's not likely to get a customer facing job) most work is then a further 20 minutes on the bus from the bus station in town.


• there is no breakfast club or after school club, or holiday clubs at the school


• there are no childminders on the estate. The closest ones are about 1 mile away, and don't do school drop offs or pick ups


• she does have local family, but they are not willing to do any childcare, either before/after school, or in the holidays.


• she is only likely to get a minimum wage job as she has no qualifications.

So, she could only work day time, from about 9:30 - 2:00 in order to do school run, no weekends and she has no-one to look after her son in the holidays.

Job centre has told her she is being too fussy and she must be more flexible with timings.

Am I missing something here? I just don't see HOW she can get a job! She would like to work actually, but is also pretty scared about ending up with less money.

I think she should learn Python and apply for remote/flexible software development jobs. That's what I would do and therefore everyone is the same as me.

I think society should have meaningful work for vunerable people to do. Locally Morrisons is a very inclusive employer with less academically able individuals for example putting trolleys back or restocking shelves. 10% of the population have some form of learning difficulty there needs to be a space for everyone.

It's a difficult situation. I knew I was going to become a single parent and I planned a job that would work for me around that, but using qualifications and contacts built up in the years leading up to this.

However, I did assume that DD would be able to go to a childminder after school a couple of days a week to increase my working hours. Since Covid the two remaining childminders here gave up so now there is no after school childcare in the village.

It is very very difficult trying to bring in a good income as a single parent when there is so little childcare provision available in many places. Also if you're looking at shop work, you could well end up in deficit by the time bus fares and childcare are paid for even if you can find childcare.

In this lady's situation I think she needs to be looking at taking in people's ironing, cleaning etc., unless you think she has the wherewithal to train to do admin from home.

How many TA 's in your school can't read or write?

I have not read the whole thread, but worked out from the OP and on the first page that this woman is likely to be lacking in social skills, and learning disabled to some degree.

I was slightly alarmed by the lack of understanding of people in her situation - echoes of Boris J and Jacob R-M.

People who are at the bottom of the heap often do not have the confidence to drag themselves up - all the suggestions for work for her are what would happen in an ideal world, where people like her had access to family centres and Sure Start (now dead following Tories pulling the funding} to gain confidence in parenting skills and how to get into the job market.

Add in the child care problems for this woman - a challenge to sort for anyone - and her chance of gainful employment is very low, as the OP has identified.

What I would expect of society in this situation is that she should be supported, both financially and in her role as a mother, so that at some point in the future she could find her way back into work when her son is older. That would help her to be a confident mother - a job it is in all our interests that she should do well - prepare her for work with gaining appropriate skills, and give her the chance to step up gradually as she is able.

Unless you have experienced the soul-destroying situation of being bottom of the heap in this fast-paced target-driven society, it is very hard to understand what this does to people and very easy to make judgements. And to understand how the education system that we have finished up with is a one-size-fits-all system that makes pupils like her switch off and fail to see its relevance to real life.

I am sure most people would agree that a child care job is not appropriate - would you honestly want someone with a learning disability being a minder for your children? And even cleaning jobs demand a certain degree of organisational skill that this woman is very unlikely to possess: planning the day, the transport, the childcare, the route the cleaning order etc. Sadly some people are simply unable to do this. As a caring civilized society we should offer all the help we can, both to have prevented her from getting in this situation in the first place and also to support her parental role.

The role that Job Centres now have is to police the government's insensitive and rigid policies - absolutely, everyone should be in a job who is able, but so often many of those who are long-term clients of the Job Centre have pressing problems: drugs, lack of education etc., and the staff there are basically fighting a losing battle.

Better to acknowledge that fact and put the effort into helping people to be more employable and to prevent them finishing up in this situation in the first place, rather than holding the threat of destitution over their heads.

If there are any factories nearby then don’t dismiss out if hand on basis will be shift work. Worth a try.
Local factory to me advertising for 10-2 shift Mon to Thurs packing biscuits.

I agree with Hastings that given the choice I’d prefer space for everyone

she might have had facial piercings or tatts, or have problems dealing with strangers.

You're right, and while I completely agree that safeguarding and H&S is a good thing to be encouraged, it is now quite sad that EVERYTHING is regulated.

When I was wee (late 80s/early 90s), we had people working in our community who, in the OP's words, 'weren't very bright': not fully literate, perhaps some undiagnosed SEN, certainly not university material, but they had jobs and worth, whether as a cleaner, or gardener, or janitor or similar.

The community knew who they were and they looked after them. Our church warden had, I'm almost certain with hindsight, quite severe SEN (possibly combined with ASD), but he was loved and appreciated and he did his job.

It is very sad that such people are now cast adrift, unless they have community or family links to advocate for them.

Hmm @steppemum , I think there is actually some options here, but admittedly not many

1. Buddy with another person in the same situation (would she be safe minding another child?) but wouldn't require any certificates.
2. look for a school job (i.e. cleaning or dinner lady) - would she DBS check?
3. You/your charity lobby for availability of wraparound care with the school...

I so agree with what @AffIt is saying.

I know a couple and both are fully diagnosed and receiving benefits because of Learning Difficulties. In each case they probably would be capable of a low stress, reduced hours option such as used to exist.

But these days those jobs don't exist or if they do are zero hours so require organisational skills to note down changing hours etc. Everything seems to require a high degree of computer literacy.

As a result they do nothing and appear to have very unfulfilling lives.

It must be even worse if not diagnosed or perhaps just over the line in terms of abilities so wouldn't be diagnosed, and with childcare issues to sort out as well.

For those suggesting dinner lady/lunchtime supervisor at school, those staff have to complete the same training courses that teaching staff have to. Health and safety, diversity etc.
it can be a struggle for some of them especially when they don’t have great computer skills. I’ve personally sat and helped some of them do these but technically I could have gotten in trouble for doing it.

school cleaners mostly work out of school hours as well. I have worked in one school (a large secondary) where there was always 2 in during the day but it wasn’t usual.

wraparound care in this country is woeful. I was very very lucky as the time that DD left nursery a new childminder opened up for our primary, the only one in fact, without her I would have lost the job I had at the time.

I agree that a mile isn't much but a child of 5 can't walk a mile unaccompanied to a child minder after school or to get to school.

I think the OP was meaning there is no wrap around care so her friend could work longer hours.

This would only give her about 10 hrs work a week but nureries often recruit unqualified staff to cover the 12-2 shift when other staff are taking a lunch break. Or a dinner lady at a school might offer similar hours.

Might an organisation like Home Start be able to help her?

www.home-start.org.uk/Pages/FAQs/Category/how-home-start-helps

It sounds very tough, OP. She is lucky to have you as such a support to her.

I think many of these ideas are impossible for someone with borderline learning disabilities.

Cleaning sounds good for someone in her position, subject of course to the big problem of working hours.

A manual job sounds good, maybe one that requires minimal training.

Could she look at supermarket shelf stacking or trolley organisation?

Washing up in a cafe at lunch time?

Window cleaning?

Car washing?

I appreciate that some these are customer facing though, so not great.

Good luck to her, and good on you for helping her.

Does she have any local friends who could babysit? Even if it was just once or twice a week, or for half an hour before school.

Have you/she looked into PIP? You don't need a diagnosis and it sounds like she may qualify.

Sorry if those are obvious things you've already considered. My sympathies for your friend, it's a shit situation.

@Sugarplumfairy65

If she can't read or write she can certainly clean or do kitchen work (I've done both alongside colleagues who could not read or write).

I've also taught countless adults to read and write, who for various reasons had failed to acquire those skills in childhood . Charity worker OP might direct her friend to free one-to-one literacy programs.

If I was her I'd probably stay on benefits and apply for jobs knowing I stood no chance of getting them so that the job centre could tick the boxes to say you're actively looking for work blah blah.

Ummm. No, I don’t. That’s why I said “in an ideal world”. And “I guess the job centre aren’t offering anything like this”.

I’m confused as to how you read this as me thinking that they are offering it 😐

No, she definitely can't be a dinner lady/lunchtime supervisor. If in the kitchen she'd need to be able to do training courses online, as well as read and count for the recipes. Lunchtime supervisors also have regular online training, as well as note keeping for incidents and first aid.

Our local Starbucks is flexible for working parents. My SIL works 10-2pm. Many start off in kitchen washing up, but I guess she could stay doing that if it suited - again not sure if they'd require online training.

Other posters have hit nail on head that even manual work requires IT skills to apply and some literacy and IT as part of job eg H & S training. In past your Auntie could have put a word in or you’d just show up and be taken on. Obviously you sound like you’d help her apply and hopefully someone would help her on the job but it’s difficult.
I used to work with young men who worked in local abattoir. It was hard poorly paid work - if you could get a job anywhere else you wouldn’t be there. They were usually illiterate (uk born) Some would admit it - I’m a bit dyslexic love was code for I can’t read. Lots of accidents - dangerous work and they used to just put a squiggle on pages and pages of H & S training they were given.

cleaner
childminder
a work from home customer service type role
work at the school as a TA/ dinner lady etc

there are loads literally no excuse to not work in this instance. This is why we have so many on benefits as easier to use all those excuses you have just described.

Rtft

Not sure what the answer is, but for those saying she should set up as a cleaner, most offices and factories etc use cleaning agencies, she would need to register with those. Those suggesting domestic cleaning, how long or expensive would the commute be to get to the sort of areas where she could have clients? Because the sort of estate she lives in won't have people paying cleaners-my partner and I earn a decent wage and we would consider it a bit of an extravagance. OK, we don't have children, if we had five it might be a necessity!

As for at home call centre work, this involves using a laptop, often with multiple applications open, dealing with people who might be angry, not have English as a first language, and being relatively articulate, all while entering notes and details in a literate manner and with correct spelling.