So prisoners and people on benefits should pick fruits on farms now?

[Valentine2]

This is a link to The Sun. I am beyond angry. They suggest we use these two sections of our society to pick farms "to give back"!! WTAF! I am posting here deliberately and not anywhere else so get maximum traffic so maximum number of people could see where it's going.

www.thesun.co.uk/news/1985706/theresa-may-needs-to-remoaners-who-wont-accept-brexit-verdict-back-in-their-box/

Prob be ok for a young able person, but i wouldn't be able to do it.
If i had to go on jsa i wouldn't be to do this job.

I agree with it in principal

I think a lot of people will agree with it in principle. Is that enough though? Do we have the capability to deal with this? If not, coining such toss in the post referendum climate is just going to cause more divisions and anxiety among the poorest sections of this society (benefits).
And another poster upthread genuinely summed it up for prisoners.

Izlet I work on a PIVA, got not a penny for maternity and get paid sometimes at 180 from the end of contract with the government, which can last for one month or for 12 months. But they still expect my taxes on time otherwise I get the infamous green envelope

iPost

I disagree. The worst thing ever done was the refusal to budge on the issue of reasonable wriggle room to fire distinctly under performing employees on permanent contract. If there had been a softening of the hardline position 20 odd years ago, I don't think we'd have seen the legislation that allowed to rise of the temp. contract, or the extent to which risk averse employers tend to avoid perm. contracts like the plague.

never a truer word was spoken. But we also need to get rid of the Giudici del Lavoro who reinstate these workers who are fired for all the right reasons.

And of course the voucher system is abused. Abuse is not an aberration of the system here, it IS the system here.
Very true

Nobody ever moved here for the generous benefits system. that made me giggle. And only because it's true.

It's called The Scum for the reason. What's unreasonable is lining the pockets of those lying fuckwits by buying their shite excuse for a paper.

Fruit and vegetable picking was my first summer job as a teenager. We used to pick fruit and veg.

We stopped becasue the Thatcher government changed the benefits rules and we couldnt do it any more.
Before Thatcher, we put in a claim, then took whatever seasonal woek was available. Any week we worked, our employer signed a book. Once a month we handed it in and didnt get any benefits for that week.

I've done a lot of fruit picking too. It's very hard work but it can make you feel good as you're outside, in sunshine (hopefully if it's summer) and moving all day which actually increases the brain chemicals which make you happy and for those of us wanting to lose weight and be fitter has that added benefit - so win win all round.

'and for those of us wanting to lose weight and be fitter has that added benefit - so win win all round.'

Then there's nothing stopping you from picking fruit as a job again then, Me

I actually agree with people having to do work in exchange for benefits

Is it not better for said benefit claimants to be given a proper job, paid like everyone else...instead of having to do work for (what works out as) less the NMW?

And what about those who have been working from say, age 16 to 58 and are made redundant, finding it extremely hard to get another job due to age discrimination but may have never used benefits in their lives? They get treated like criminals? They are supposed to try to look for a new job on top of picking fruit? Or are we going to start making distinctions because the 'deserving' and 'undeserving' poor like the Victorians did and show we are no further forward in 130 years, still the same mean-spirited, self-serving cunts we were then?

Well, fruit picking is a perfectly respectable job. My dad did it at school to earn some extra money over the holidays.

But if there are all these jobs available, shouldn't they be advertised and paid a living wage? Not given to benefits claimants in exchange for their £70 a week JSA.

And let's see, fruit picking is only in certain regions. So what do we do, transport people on JSA in from other regions to do this for £70/week if there aren't enough in one particular region? Who pays for their housing then?

Well there's nothing wrong with it except that it's unrealistic. Here are two articles that do a good job of explaining why most seasonal workers are comprised of migrant labour and not native workers or benefit program workers.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/sep/13/fruit-migrant-workers

www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/oct/16/brexit-vote-brings-uncertainty-for-fruit-pickers-and-farmers

Quite, expat.

You'd need to bus people in from miles around. Who's paying for that?
Fruit picking isn't 9-5. Who's paying for and providing childcare until 9/10 at night?
How are people to find time for study or apply for jobs more suited to them?
How is a 65 year old who's only ever worked in an office to do this to an acceptable standard?

It's really poorly thought through, and I despair that the Tories have made huge swathes of the population believe someone who's lost their job is as good as a criminal.

Yes anyone can get made redundant

As PP have said, why is it perfectly acceptable that migrants do this work but not Brits?
Who is the Racist here?

DH used to do picking work when on leave from the Army. From the age of 16.

Up until last month I was an investment banker on a six figure salary. I'm now a redundant investment banker (who paid a six figure tax bill on my redundancy pay out), on JSA.

I'm not to proud to pick fruit. Rather that than watching Jeremy Kyle.

'I'm not to proud to pick fruit. Rather that than watching Jeremy Kyle.'

So you think all the other unemployed, besides people like you, of course, are sat on their arses watching Jeremy Kyle? It's different for them but not you? You're morally superior to all other unemployed people?

If there's no fruit picking in your area, you can afford to leave it and your family so you can go and pick fruit for £70/week? You honestly think claiming JSA is akin to community service handed out to criminals as punishment?

edwinbear, do you think it is a sensible use of your experience, qualifications and talents for you to be forced to pick fruit as a condition of receiving JSA? Do you believe that the owners of fruit farms should benefit from the use of your services paid for by the taxpayer rather than actually giving someone a job and paying them a living wage? And do you think some of the time you spend fruit picking might be better spent, say, looking for another job or using your experience to do work better related to your previous field, for instance in helping charities with their financial affairs?

For us to be able to do thse skinds of jobs will take a redical tethink of the benefits sytem, and the Right wont do it. they;d have to lose the dog in the manger attitude.
People must be allowed to work temp jobs and not stop their benefit claim. Then they will work when wages for a week are higher than JSA, and they can have their claim suspended for the week they work.

No one is acknowledging that. they are just pretending its ok to make people take shit jobs for benefits. It isnt.
Plus when I did picking a gang master took us to and from the field in the back of a transit van (and a cut of our wages). Its a young persons job, not for older and less able bodied people.

No one is acknowledging that. they are just pretending its ok to make people take shit jobs for benefits. It isnt. *
^this and the fact that if Tories can make such a big fuck up of a big deal like Brexit, I hardly believe they will make anything good out of this kind of idea.
BMW
Who is saying that? In fact I believe this system needs to be looked at and the workers should be given rights. Some other posters have given great suggestions. Please RTFT before jumping to conclusions.

The people of Lincolnshire have been complaining for years about Eastern Europeans taking "their" fruit picking jobs. They voted resoundingly to "kick them out", judging from the interviews I saw on the telly. So I'm sure they'll be rushing joyously into the fields to reclaim their rightful jobs on our post-Brexit independence day, won't they?

Eastenders in London went out to Kent each summer to pick fruit with their children. It became a bit of a holiday although hard work as you were outside all day in mostly sunshine and out of the inner London environment. They tends to go on trains I think as they didn't have cars. I also travelled for work to pick fruit when younger. Many of us have done that.

The Evening Standard by the way is publicising a voluntary effort at present for a charity where people pick crops after the main crops have been picked and there are just left overs usually left to waste. Volunteers pick those up eg potatoes and then they are bagged up and used to feed those needing a free meal in London. SO if anyone is interested in that kind of effort by all means do an Evening standard web search. i cannot remember the name of the charity .

As a retired soft fruit grower with a husband who has spent the last 40 years as a horticultural consultant, I thought that I could add a few comments which might be useful.

Firstly, the whole Industry would soon collapse without the skills, dedication and hard work of Eastern European workers. Now that we are leaving the EU we shall still require these young people and obviously a visa type system will be introduced. However, the worry is will they still be willing to do this work in the long term after hopefully their home country economies improve?

Secondly, the rates of pay are low for what is hard and surprisingly skilful work. This is in spite of them all getting at least the minimum wage as required by law - the better ones earn considerably more. Wages are low in the Industry because prices returned to the grower are very little different to what they were 10 or so years ago. Much of the public feels that UK produced fresh food is expensive - they want it cheap and this is partly why prices are low. Most growers work long hours and even so it is a struggle to make a living. Paying more for picking would put them and their employees out of work.

I can see some of the reasons why people on benefits are so reluctant to take on this work. However, from my experience and those of other growers I really feel that most would still not take on this type of work even if it was possible to pay considerably more.

In our glasshouses we started picking at 5am and when I used to arrive just before this to open up my group of wonderful gypsy ladies and the few Bulgarians and Romanians were already there waiting. They were hardworking, skilful and intelligent - they knew the best way of doing the job and if there was nothing to do could find something useful without being told. I advertised for local labour who came the first day, required constant supervision and never returned - they obviously did not like the work.

Why do we accept these low wages for so many of these supposedly unskilled jobs? I admire the work ethic of these workers who often live in basic accommodation. Perhaps now that we are leaving the EU we can redirect some of the £350M/week into the areas and deprived parts of the Country that really need it. Many of us are living too comfortably at the expense of others and perhaps now we can think more clearly about our role and responsibility in the World.