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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to think that this is economically stupid. Tories to announce full and permanent WORKFARE.

296 replies

Darkesteyes · 26/09/2013 23:09

next week according to the Mail.
So how is anybody going to afford to buy anything while working for benefits then.
Even less incentive for companies to take people in proper employment if the workfare workforce is going to increase.

twitter.com/SkyNews/status/383342225926524928/photo/1

OP posts:
mathanxiety · 27/09/2013 05:32

This is Communism surely?

mathanxiety · 27/09/2013 05:33

Mirai -- The people who love it are the people with shares in the companies whose bottom line is so greatly enhanced by not having to pay actual wages to people who work for them.

MisselthwaiteManor · 27/09/2013 05:43

This is incredibly stupid and is only going to make the situation worse, why would these companies bother hiring anyone on a proper wage if they can get it for free?

I am stunned that anyone thinks it's right to force someone to work for as little as £1.89 per hour. Paid by taxes. It must be lovely to have no idea what it's like to be poor.

Charlesroi · 27/09/2013 05:46

I can see the benefit of work placements to get people some experience to put on their cv. What I can't accept is people not getting paid a fair wage for doing this - it's slavery and deprives experienced (e.g. retail) staff of a job they are interested in.

JakeBullet · 27/09/2013 06:31

I don't agree with Workfare at all.....why would a company pay even the NMW to someone on JSA if they can just use Workfare. Utterly stupid idea.

I would much rather see people being offered voluntary work in the community. We have lots of parents who might be out of work, what a valuable resource they might be to new parents who might be struggling. We have elderly people who need help with shopping or to get out.
We have a plethora of community projects which could benefit massively from voluntary help.

Then again none of those ideas benefits the Govt's friends.

AmberLeaf · 27/09/2013 06:39

This work for benefits idea has been around for ages but has never got off the ground. And I don't expect it will this time either. So it's probably just a panic about nothing

Never got off the ground?

Its been happening already!

Look at the boycott workfare link that MrsTerryPrachett posted upthread.

Workfare stops companies giving real jobs to people. why pay a wage when you can get workers for free?

BeyondTheLimitsOfAcceptability · 27/09/2013 06:54

Unbelievable.
I really don't understand how anyone can be so chronically stupid to think this is a good idea.

NicholasTeakozy · 27/09/2013 06:54

This policy guarantees more or less permanent austerity and recession, because:-

Artificially deflating wages in this manner keeps inflation low. But, the things we need more money for, housing and fuel, are going up by many more times the official rate of inflation but are not included in the figures, so the official rate of inflation is meaningless.

Those who are the lowest paid spend the most as a percentage of their income. As their fuel and housing costs rise so much higher than their income the less economically active these people are going to be, leading to a decrease in sales OR an increase in the use of payday loans, leading to them having less to spend etc etc. So it's a vicious circle.

It's yet another proof that the wealth is being transferred ever more upward. How to stop it? Impose capitalism on the rich. Stop bailing them out, stop quantitative easing and allow the markets to decide which businesses survive.

AND PAY A DECENT LIVING WAGE YOU ROBBING BASTARDS.

If you want proof that even the rich think the current economic model is theft, Google Stanley Druckenmiller.

TeWiSavesTheDay · 27/09/2013 06:56

Lots of right wing people don't like workfare, it's bad for the job market and economy as well as unfair on the person doing it.

It's not a leftie issue.

Have any other papers reported on this?

TeWiSavesTheDay · 27/09/2013 07:08

list of companies not using workfare according to boycott.

LustyBusty · 27/09/2013 07:09

I think workfare is a great idea IN THEORY. if there were enough jobs to go round, so that everyone who wanted a job had one, then making people work towards their benefits (if they can) is great. But. There aren't enough jobs. Therefore, as mentioned up thread, forcing people who would like to work into a placement solely to keep their benefits is crap.
As an aside, I've sort of assumed (and I've not seen any mention of it, so I have no idea if this is the case) that the companies who take on workfare staff don't have permanent vacancies available? If they can afford salaries of, say 5 people, they can't afford to recruit a 6th. But if they are not paying a wage, they can take on an extra staff member. I guess this isn't the case?

TeWiSavesTheDay · 27/09/2013 07:15

Hmm. Can't see anything about this in other papers.

BangOn · 27/09/2013 07:23

Yes, financial terrorism is a good description.

I urge all of you who are incensed by the sheer criminality of this government's policies to ask yourselves who politics belongs to, or rather who it should belong to. if the answer is 'each & every sodding one of us!' rather than 'a bunch of rich, sadistic cunts' then please click on this link www.voteforpolicies.org, answer the questions & then contact the local branch of whichever party your beliefs most closely echo, & say you'll offer them whatever time or skills you can, in order to help them become a credible political force & defeat these scumbags.

They will welcome you with open arms, believe me.

NicknameIncomplete · 27/09/2013 07:25

YANBU workfare is awful.

My db has had to do it about 4 times with 3 different companies. Working 9-5 five days a week for 70 pounds is slave labour. How can people think this is a good idea?

5madthings · 27/09/2013 07:29

Can we have a lost of companies that use workfare so we can boycott?

Yes to writing to MPs!

AmberLeaf · 27/09/2013 07:31

As an aside, I've sort of assumed (and I've not seen any mention of it, so I have no idea if this is the case) that the companies who take on workfare staff don't have permanent vacancies available? If they can afford salaries of, say 5 people, they can't afford to recruit a 6th. But if they are not paying a wage, they can take on an extra staff member. I guess this isn't the case?

No it isn't.

Lots of high street names who would otherwise have been offering jobs using workfare.

They definitely can afford to pay a wage.

5madthings · 27/09/2013 07:47

Thanks for the link tewi

Nerfmother · 27/09/2013 07:47

I've made the same assumption as Amber. If it's only 4 weeks do companies really just use a conveyor belt of workfare people rather than hiring one person?

Nerfmother · 27/09/2013 07:48

I'm going to read up on it before judging. Travel costs? Who pays those? Childcare?

littlemisssarcastic · 27/09/2013 07:48

Workfare doesn't just affect the people on benefits being forced to do it. It affects the people who are employed too.
If you are fortunate enough to have an unskilled job, you'd better start worrying. You could easily have your job taken away only to be taken back on at the same company, doing the same job under Workfare.

Is there even a rule that limits how many Workfare placements a company can have?
Effectively, Workfare could replace almost every minimum wage job out there!!!
Why would a company give you employment rights and minimum wage when they can boot you out and replace you with a Workfare placement?

Be afraid if you have a minimum wage unskilled job. Be very afraid!!!

AmberLeaf · 27/09/2013 07:51

If it's only 4 weeks do companies really just use a conveyor belt of workfare people rather than hiring one person?

Yes they do.

littlemisssarcastic is right.

AmberLeaf · 27/09/2013 07:54

Read some peoples personal accounts of being on workfare here

BrokenSunglasses · 27/09/2013 08:08

I don't have a problem with the public sector or charities using these programmes, but I do think big business should only be allowed to do it if they are going to provide relevant training or work experience.

If it were only the public sector and charity using unemployed people, then there wouldn't be a need to worry about it affecting job availability, which is the biggest problem with this, because it's not as if people would be used for free instead of jobs being created. Where a job doesn't exist and will never exist, there's not going to be a problem with workfare replacing a job.

Big companies shouldn't be benefitting from it though.

colleysmill · 27/09/2013 08:10

Workfare seems to be one of those ideas that probably started off on some desk somewhere that looked ok on paper - hey let's give people experience who might have been out of work for a long time or never worked maybe! What a fab idea!

But as most sensible people know, sometimes things that look great on paper just don't work in practice and this seems to be so easily manipulated by big companies to their advantage. And the long term implications on job creation or lack of it make me shudder.

They should go back to the drawing board on this.

buss · 27/09/2013 08:15

there's a list of companies known to have used workfare from the link above here... I don't know how reliable it is, but I just had a look and gasped at one of the stores on there using slave labour...