to think most part-time workers don't know what's about to hit them?! (Universal Credit)

[aufaniae]

Do you work part-time and get Working Tax Credit or Housing Benefit?

Did you know that once you're on Universal Credit, you'll be expected to attend the Job Centre to prove that you're looking for better paid work / more hours, in much the same way as unemployed people must prove they're looking for work.

If the Job Centre find an interview for you, you will have to attend (with 48 hours notice) even if it clashes with your paid work.

If you are offered a job with more hours, or better pay than your current one, you will be obliged to take it, even if you have good reason for not wanting to e.g. it's only a temporary post (whereas your current one is permanent) / has no training & worse prospects than your current job / makes picking your children up from school impossible / requires you to travel much further / has nothing to do with the career you're following.

If you don't attend the interview and/or take the job, your UC will be sanctioned, you will lose the UC for months or even years (depending on if it's your first infraction).

You will be forced to continue "upgrading" your job until you earn the equivalent of minimum wage for 35 hours a week.

I suspect there are lots of people (e.g. parents who work part time so they can pick their kids up from school) who will be affected by this, but don't realise it yet.

More info here

thats better thanks sarah

A couple of years ago, I was looking for part-time work. Around 70% of the jobs I looked at had a little clause in the job description which read "some evening/weekend/antisocial hours work may be required. Candidates must be able to be flexible". My husband was working abroad on a six-monthly contract, so I was, in effect, on my own with a small child. How could I be 'flexible'? Who would look after my child when I was called in of an evening? Or on a day which was not my normal working day (nurseries around here are over-subscribed and you cannot just call one morning hoping they'll have a space).

This was for part-time work.

I fear that we will have a situation in this country where the only people who can afford to take the part-time work are those whose partner earns enough to support the family anyway. So the rich get richer.

I know, let's send all the nursing home carers, the teaching assistants, the cleaners, the dinner ladies, the hospital porters and anyone else who works bloody hard for minimum wage here.

Haven't read the whole thread but DH will be studying full time as of September. I understand that under current rules we won't get the childcare element of TC due to the loss of his salary because he will be classed as unemployed. Where does that leave us with UC? I work 29 hours and earn about £21k. DH will get some student support according to the SLC calculator so this is not a snap decision, we have planned it so that we will manage, it's just a question of exactly how tight our budget will be!

FairyJen

"Surely tho you are ... destined o a life of menial work if you don't bother to educate yourself and get a degree in the first place tho?

If that's the case then perhaps you shouldn't complain how shit the wages are."

Are you really saying that ordinary working people - in both skilled and unskilled jobs should accept wages that are not enough to live a decent life on?

So, people in the trades, hospital porters, teaching assistants, admin assistants, shop keeper, the people who clean our streets etc etc - if they didn't get a degree they should just put up or shut up?!

Did you really mean to be so callous?

Not callous no. Just pointing out a different side to the aurgument. Playin devils advocate if you like

DrCoconut is your DH doing a degree? If so he'll be classed as a full-time student, not unemployed and you are probably entitled to a Child Care Grant (unless they're changing that too!)

Oooh, and I've just realised that if I had my time over again, I would be drilling any potential suitor as to his earnings capacity before I even agreed to go out for a drink with him.

Women like me are going to be warning our daughters that it would be best to find themselves a man of means, just in case our daughters, like many of us, find an overwhelming need to be there for their children.

He's doing HND full time over 2 years. He can then top up to a degree if he wants to. Not sure if my earnings rule us out of childcare grant or if it's his that they go on?

Tweak your cv to take off the science degree.

This was discussed on another thread & someone pointed out that it's a form of fraud, deceit in order to make pecuniary gains, or some such.

I really don't understand where the conservative government think all these jobs are going to.magically appear from.....

Couldn't agree more. But I still think there's a lot of scare-mongering in this thread. The government can't afford to be that control-freak in how they implement the changes, for start.

taketheribbon, but what would you advise women like me to say to their sons? Marry someone who works full time and seems to be healthy so they dont cause you to need benefits?

If only life was as straightforward , eh!

ssd, you're right. That was discriminatory of me. I think I would advise any parent to tell all their children not to accept an offer of marriage from anyone who wasn't working full-time in a job which paid quite a lot more than minimum wage!!

Thing is llj if I only apply for jobs that require a degree then there are not enough to apply for but when I apply for others then many employers won't even read further when they see you have a degree. Tbh fairy I sometimes think that studying for a degree was the stupidest mistake I ever made.

Taketheribbon even that is no insurance, Dh and I used to earn a lot more than now.

taketheribbon, I thought I was sensible when I met dh, he told me he drove an 80k volvo.....wow I thought.....later I discovered he was a bus driver

I feel your pain, LB, I have a PhD, 18 years of work experience, some of it prestigious, and I'm applying for the most basic low paid admin jobs. My cover letters say how that admin job fits with where I want to get to eventually, but due to long gap in employment I know I need to start from the ground up, like any fresh school leaver would be doing. So no reason to think I'll be moving on any faster than they would.

What will happen to me? I wish i hadn't clicked on this thread because i feel more depressed now... I get DLA & WTC & i work 2 shifts (16 hours) as an HCA.
I can't work more than that because i'm recovering from mental health problems (including Psychotic symptoms) which worsen with stress of any kind.

I'm already struggling a lot so does anyone know what happens with people like me?

PS i'm a single young woman with no children too.

Rose - oh Rose. That is what is so tragic, ifnotnowwhen has correctly summed up your posts, and you just don't realise it. You have no idea how your opinions are the product of manipulation by UK Plc. We need to stand shoulder to shoulder with our fellow man, not hate him. There are plenty of people to hate, but they are not the ones on your level, they are the ones further up the tree.

There is another problem with the rhetoric. Many employers believe the lazy, irresponsible etc tag and automatically discount people who are unemployed or underemployed no matter how much previous experience they may have. The employer loses out on a potentially excellent employee and those who have been made redundant face an even more difficult struggle to get back into work.

In a fair world they would be able to compete on a level playing field. There are thousands of highly qualified and/or experienced people being made redundant in the current climate.

"Beautifulbabyboy" - rents? Not mentioned by me. Nor working conditions. None of this is in any of my posts. This is really, really surreal and weird. Are you talking to/about someone else? I am sorry, but I really don't get it. Are you inferring these things from my posts because they are in your heads? So, very weird. And if you see these things in my posts, which are not there, then how do you deal with the world in general which must be a pretty scary place if you keep SEEING THINGS.

Latara, you should be an exception. They haven't clarified how they'll determine what hours you're eligible to work; no doubt it will involve some forms and a spurious 'examination'

If not now when - this is the first time I have felt compelled to write on a post, and I need your help. At what point do you give in and think explaining the link between council house sell offs, private accommodation over-reliance and housing benefit is just too hard; alongside working tax credits being the method by which employers were allowed to keep wages artificially low; to big businesses knowing that part-time staff cost less to employ and therefore not allowing people to work full time; to people believing that the crisis was caused by the poor when it was created by the rich who now refuse to payback.

Rose (and similar posters) - I am exceptionally lucky with a very wonderful life. It saddens me that you truly truly don't understand the mockery the system is making of your life. Sacrifice yourself at the wheel of hard graft, no one will thank you for it when you keel over, they will just find another body to fill your shoes and doff the cap.

Beautifulbabyboy, your posts are incredibly patronising. People that have different opinions to yours on this subject may agree with you on many others. Why are you coming across as if you have some divine knowledge and as if you believe everyone who doesn't see it your way is misguided and foolish and can't possibly come to their own opinions without having been to the Tory party conference?

This has been an interesting debate about something that is fundamentally quite basic - people that work more hours should be better off than those that work less, and people who need to should support themselves as far as they are able with as little financial assistance from the government as possible. Or not, depending on your viewpoint. But both ways of looking at it are valid.

I depise this government & its bullying against those who weren't born with a silver spoon stuck up their arse or those who were not lucky enough to find themselves in a really well paying job.

I have a child under 5, i work 2 days a week whilst i fork out alot of money to put her in nursery, i'm self employed, earning about £50 per week after expenses, i'm going to be FUCKED.

I'm off to uni, to get myself in shit loads of debt, with the desperate hope that it'll lead to a well paying job eventually so that i can tell cameron the dictator to stick his universal credit up his arse.

At the moment i have also started volunteering for the labour party, i'm becoming a member and if i get my way will eventually run for council. Someone who knows what it feels like to struggle, someone working class needs to start speaking up for the rest of the working class who try their best.