Unemployed used as unpaid staff at Jubilee event and expected to sleep outside

[HRHEightiesChick]

This story about unpaid workers doing the security at the flotilla event yesterday is bad. They were misled about not being paid, and had to sleep out in tents or actually outside 'under London bridge' was suggested to them. This is Workfare in action again, I believe.

I was shocked by the article, but perhaps shouldn't have been. The companies involved haven't denied anything that the unpaid workers and apprentices have said, so whatever your feelings about The Guardian, it sounds like this is a legitimate story.

There are so many things wrong with this, but what struck me was that they were expected to camp out under London Bridge with no toilet, washing or changing facilities. There would seem to be a major personal safety issue here, especially in relation to women who had no option but to go to the toilet and change clothes in public, in the middle of London!

My other beef is that the firm "employing them" (if you can call it that,) were paid for the service from our tax money. Perhaps they were able to "win" the contract because they didn't plan to pay their staff, but should public funds be used in this way? Should a company be able to profit from the unpaid (or sub minimum wage) labour of people? Did it mean that companies that would have offered at least a decent wage and conditions, would have complied with the law, were denied a contract because they were to costly?

Nope, all wrong this, and I suspect this kind of thing is happening quite alot now, but we just don't hear about it.

I went to the river on the day and a stewarding was shit and potentially dangerous. Now I understand why.

I'm going to complain to the Met, Close Protection, the Department of Work and Pensions, the MP for Westminster, Mark Field, and the office of that grinning self-publicist Boris Johnson.

It's not a question of what you think of Workfare. Security at an enormous public event is not the place for it.

C+Pd this from my post in the thread in Chat.

"So the firm that was used was Close Protection.

I saw thousands of people in Close Protection vests patrolling the north bank of the Thames in Westminster.

They weren't up to stewarding a village fete let alone an event expected to attract a million people. Now I realise that it was probably because they weren't professional stewards or had any experience of crowd control but were workfare people scared of losing JSA.

Roads down to the embankment were closed to pedestrians and the stewards couldn't explain why or deal with the increasingly irate people who'd come along and were worrying it was all for nothing.

They were also vaguely directing people along without knowledge of access points, landmarks or geography and some were getting upset or shirty with people.

There was almost lynching outside Millbank Tower when one man in a Close Protection vest decided to part the crowds to give an escort to a tuk-tuk bearing a woman dressed as the Queen.

I couldn't believe it at the time. Now I understand.

When I left I realised it was because the embankment was getting too crowded. Fine. But employ proper stewards who can explain that and offer help and advice.

If there had been a major incident they couldn't have coped."

I feel sick after reading that article.

Those poor fucking people. Unless you have inherited vast swathes of land, property and money, there but for the grace of god. Absolutely indefensible.

What's the state of the Embankment after all these workers being kept there for 16 hours without lavatory accommodation? And will they be bringing other workfare people in to hose it down?

16 hours? Where are you getting that figure from?

surely you need trained and properly paid staff to police a large event and to keep people safe. What if there had been trouble, a riot? protest? Untrained staff are a liability. Not to mentioned those conditions they were kept in.

JosephineCD Tue 05-Jun-12 13:14:23
"16 hours? Where are you getting that figure from?"

14 hour shift+ arrived two hours before they started work.

surely, given this was a bank holiday. Proper staff getting time and a half would be beneficial to the economy?

I think all people that work should be paid.
Im sure the Queen did not know of these arrangements?

This is a shocking way to treat a paid employee, let alone someone who is doing it for free, for fear of losing benefits.
People should not be treated like this in a civilised society.

"The woman said that people were picked up at Bristol at 11pm on Saturday and arrived in London at 3am on Sunday.
"We all got off the coach and we were stranded on the side of the road for 20 minutes until they came back and told us all to follow them," she said. "We followed them under London Bridge and that's where they told us to camp out for the night ? It was raining and freezing."

A 30-year-old steward told the Guardian that the conditions under the bridge were "cold and wet and we were told to get our head down [to sleep]". He said that it was impossible to pitch a tent because of the concrete floor.

The woman said they were woken at 5.30am and supplied with boots, combat trousers and polo shirts. She said: "They had told the ladies we were getting ready in a minibus around the corner and I went to the minibus and they had failed to open it so it was locked. I waited around to find someone to unlock it, and all of the other girls were coming down trying to get ready and no one was bothering to come down to unlock [it], so some of us, including me, were getting undressed in public in the freezing cold and rain." The men are understood to have changed under the bridge." ...

Both stewards said they were originally told they would be paid. But when they got to the coach on Saturday night, they said, they were told that the work would be unpaid and that if they did not accept it they would not be considered for well-paid work at the Olympics."

It just sounds worse all the time, not just the conditions of the unpaid workers, but also the implications for public safety.

I would have my doubts as to whether any of the "staff" had had disclosure checks, despite clearly working with members of the public who might have been vulnerable.

I can only hope that this coming out will bust open other cases where it's happening - where the basic rights of the unpaid workers and apprentices are being flouted and where the public are potentially put at risk where they are being deployed so inappropriately.

i am absolutely disgusted by this. Ive always been against workfare. And im sorry to say that i did see something like this coming. when the Gov. has been getting away with workfare in businesses,shops,factiories and hospitals because not enough people stand up and fight against it, its not really a surprise to me that this has happened.
Its disgusting and its bloody frightening. What if one of them had been attacked or mugged or raped.
If someone had announced 60 years ago that something like this would be happening in the Queens Diamond Jubilee Year people would have laughed in their face. I fucking despair

And sleeping under London Bridge.

They are getting treated worse than murderers rapists and child molesters who are in prison.
Even they arent being expected to spend a night sleeping out in the cold and rain. Its FUCKING SICK.

And there will still be people who insist that workfare isnt replacing paid work.

Disgusting!

this is utterly sick and it's interesting to see that not even one MN rightwinger has come on to defend it (with the exception of Josephine, who seems to be going 'lalalala it's in the Guardian so it CAN'T BE TRUE!')

Practices like this demonstrate that workfare is nothing but an abuse of the unemployed and a way for publicly paid companies to shirk their duties to said public and their customers.

This is our future Daily Fail readers! You wanted it, you got it.

For all those of us who lose jobs in the coming years, and find ourselves too old or ill to find paid work, this is what we can look forward to: little bouts of slavery for corporate gangmasters profiting from using us up for nothing.

btw, LOL at the thought of Queenie giving a toss what happens to her unemployed 'subjects'....

"Surely cheap accommodation somewhere around London can't be that hard to find." I think it is bloody hard to find, especially at Jubilee town.

And I am sure the queen wouldn't give two hoot.s

limited, that's frightening. So not only is this shit company - and whoever gave them the contract - exploiting unpaid workers, they were putting the safety of thousands of people at risk? Good grief.

Does anyone have any better suggestions of how to deal with long term unemployed people? Let me guess, the government should create jobs for them, permanent, well-paid jobs?

There aren't any easy answers. What is happening now is a hell of a lot better than just stopping their benefits as soon as their contributions have run out.

Hang on, do you seriously believe forced, unpaid labour, being made to sleep under London Bridge in the rain and get changed in public is somehow better than an alternative? What alternative, the workhouse?

Yes I've got an idea Josephine.

Ensure that people who are being used as casual labour are PAID for said labour at a decent hourly rate by the companies who are using them to make profits.

Fair enough eh? Or is it controversial to suggest dole scum should be paid for services they are providing?

In Josephines world everything in the Guardian is untrue and everything in the Daily Mail is gospel.
Also in her world she must think the unemployed are worse than murderers and rapists
This is what its come to. These are the type of people in charge in this country.

Wonder if Channel 4 news will cover this tonight.