Work for dole

[ReallyTired]

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7514513.stm

I think that proposals like these are long over due. Although I think that if you make people work full time for their benefits they won't have time to look for job.

Prehaps they should work three days a week and look for a job two days a week.

There are people who for good reasons cannot work full time, but certainly could do something part time.

No, she is rare. I think most people realise it's not black and white. People have rough patches in their lives, or they can't earn enough to make things work...

In my RL I never encounter the begrudgery, spite or ignorance I have occassionally read on mn from posters such as Iheartsunsets. Chilling, truly chilling.

It is beyond self-righteous to dictate who should or should not reproduce.

I think the problem is it's an anonymous forum, so people can say things they might never say in RL for fear of being ostracised.

either that, or I'm lucky enough not to meet any of them!

If there are are two adults in a family then one of them (at least) should work, as long as they are not careers.

If they are careers they are already doing a job at home and saving the goverment money. They should also recieve more money and more support instead of having to fight for help.

Long term unemplyed who are not single parents should be made to work.

People on incapcity benefit should be checked out by another doctor as well as their own.

You can't blame people that work shitty jobs for angry at people they percieve to 'be getting something for nothing'. Thats natural.

IMO.

If there are are two adults in a family then one of them (at least) should work, as long as they are not careers.

If they are careers they are already doing a job at home and saving the government money. They should also receive more money and more support instead of having to fight for help.

Long term unemployed who are not single parents should be made to work.

People on incapacity benefit should be checked out by another doctor as well as their own.

You can't blame people that work shitty jobs for angry at people they perceive to 'be getting something for nothing'. That's natural.

IMO.

It has all got very heated and personal. I for one can quite understand why someone would not want to work if they are better on a combination of benefits - I don't think it is fair to point blame at particular indviduals - who are only trying to survive and bring up their families. Though I know that plenty of people that DO take the pss. Blame to be pointed at successive govts who have f*ked up the system so much that this is the end result.

The system was set up to help people who were not in a position to help themselves and that's exactly what it should still be doing.

Make childcare accessible and affordable. Introduce more breakfast clubs and after school / holiday clubs. Make it possible for people to get into employment and sort out the system so that people are always better off working than claiming benefits. Make the tax threshold higher and related to your circumstances and get rid of all these tax credits which must cost a fortune to administer. Sort out the bloody CSA!

Then - and only then - you can address the remaining lazy arses who are happy for the rest of society to keep them. They are the people that these initiatives should apply to.

"Their are very few people in this country who are not in control of their situation"

How the fuck do you know?!

If they're made to work for dole then they can't be moon lighting or sitting around with their feet up. It's what many other countries do and it's sufficiently cadges around with gets out and caveats and time delays that's it's pretty soft by international standards as you would expect from New Labour but I'm sure most people agree with the principle.

It should help people get use to the discipline of getting up for work and having to cram their housework into non working hours like the rest of us. It's a good idea long over due.

Hi Xenia!

Ah, Xenia!

Long time, no 'see'.

I have no objection to people being made to work, so long as they do not have caring responsibilities. What I do object to is the principle that they should work for benefits. If someone is working, they should be paid wages. Otherwise, what is to stop firms from sacking all their paid workers and taking on "unemployed" people to do the work instead, for benefits?

but that's only if they are working in the commercial sector LittleBella - does this paper actually say what sort of work it would be?

could be community work, for example.

Tax credits certainly are benefits. Many people get way more tax credits than they ever have or will pay in tax therefore they are benefits.

The CSA doesn't class them as such, for sure, but then the CSA are a bunch of lying, money-extorting bastards.

What kind of community work? Labour which society needs doing? In which case, why doesn't it deserve paying for?

I also think it's naieve to assume that it will just be confined to community work. Seeing as how everything nowadays is contracted out to commercial companies, they're soon going to be doing all the community work. I haven't the slightest doubt that of course they'd prefer to pay benefits than minimum wage. Much better profits that way.

Watch out for your paid jobs, you might find yourselves doing it for benefits in 20 years time.

I believe that there should be incentives for certain employers to give priority to people on benefits. Even some more help to get real skills (not mickey mouse ones) would be something.

To assert that people are out of work because they're not trying hard enough is utter crap. My DH was out of work on and off for years after being made redundant from his management job in manufacturing. Why? Because there were no suitable jobs for ages due to the recession. Then the trend started whereby paper qualifications meant more than experience. So still no luck.

He tried and tried to get a job, any job in the end, but guess what? He was over-qualified. And the so-called "advisers" were utterly clueless and as useful as a chocolate teapot.

Also, aren't people denied benefits if they're doing so-called "voluntary work" that the Government decides they should be paid for. What's the difference between that and this "community work" business?

The work proposed is stuff like litter cleaning and graffiti so any idle benefits claiming mumsnetters had better get on with retraining into something more interesting or else they'll be picking litter before they know it. Not there's anything wrong with remedial work. We often pick litter off our own street for no pay and it's only a few weeks since I was out there with special chemicals removing graffiti.

If you really do want to work I can't see why you would object to working for the benefit. You'll feel more useful. It will be a moral good. You'll be giving something back to the community, making the streets less litter strewn. It will make you happy. It will do you good. It will also slim a lot of the fatter ones down as they'll be on their feet and moving and have no access to junk food as they're picking up the litter etc,.

I don't see how any government could think that would benefit the economy to do that, but you never know!

as for jobs that need doing should be paid jobs, well yes, but there's millions of underfunded areas of the community - parks, youth clubs etc where there simply isn't the money to pay for these jobs. and yes, if the benefit money was put into creating those jobs, that would make more sense, but then you'd have to take benefits away from people and risk leaving them destitute, iyswim.

tbh I don't know enough about the details of these proposals to judge on that one.

As for tax credits being benefits - I guess for me they're not benefits because they're linked to our personal tax payments as well as our personal circumstances, unlike JSA which is a set amount per week for people out of work, is that right?

I wouldn't think of a person who works and claims tax credits as being 'on benefits' iyswim. I'd think of it like maternity pay, if that makes sense.

'People on incapcity benefit should be checked out by another doctor as well as their own.'

erm,they are.you have to provide a sick note from your gp when you first apply and then after a few weeks you have to have a medical with some private company the DWP pay god knows how much to.your own gp never gets a say in the matter after the initial sick note is sent.

i have said it on threads like this before-all this stereotyping from certain ignorant posters makes me laugh as much as the predjudice i used to face when i first moved to this town and was assumed to be a 'rich,southern,snob' ,as alot of the ignorant people on benefits up here, who cant get work cos of 'maggie bloody thatcher', assume that all southerners are well-off lucky feckers who can just walk into any job they please.

The trouble is though Xenia, that it isn't exactly helping people to look for suitable work, is it? Part time work maybe, but not full time. That's draconian and counter-productive. It is also very demeaning. They don't give that kind of work to criminals for more than a few weeks at a time. Why make law-abiding people do it?

If it needs doing then jobs should be created. Although I stand by what I said before that people would probably be better off in the end doing it for benefits.

the CSA dont exist.

Dundee's Job Centre was going to advertise vacancies for lap dancing clubs and escort services.

So that way, women on JSA could potentially be told they'll have their benefits stopped for not trying to find work hard enough if they don't apply for jobs like stripper and pro whilst the government reveals itself as the Big Pimp it is.

I'd imagine stripping and hooking would be a great slimming technique, though.

Pardon? Tell that to my DH!

The other thing about these workfare schemes, is that they cost a fortune. Far more than dole.

So all our taxes will go up to pay for these schemes. Or public expenditure on social necessities will be cut.

Either way, they'll cost us more than letting the tiny minority of lazy arses sit on their arses.

LOL - that was to Divastrop!

I clean. I mop up sick from children. My sister had a cleaning job. If we can do that I don't see why people on benefits can't. There is a strange culture in the UK that people are some how too good for cleaning and yet we all clean in our homes and many of us do it for pay. What's demeaning about it? They should be proud to be of service to the nation and if they don't like it it looks like they're just going to have to lump it, doesn't it. Will do them the world of good.

Why give them that work? Because it's going to be more of an incentive for them to look for other work or find a man / woman to keep them than if it were something where people don't have these silly hang ups over it. Anyway there are all kinds of things they could do - mind children under 5 of other mothers who are out street cleaning would be a good idea too. Mowing the grass of the elderly or work like my cleaner finds - things like spending a few hours a day with an old person with dementia etc.

I think in the first year it's just a few years by the way but from the second year is more.