Occupy Mumnset - Mumsnet, i know you are P(p)olitical. Seriously, can't you tell your advertisers to fuck off if they are workfaring?

[Tortington]

i got an e-mail telling me i had % of retailers that are involved in the workfare scheme and it occured to me that Mumsnet is usually on the side of good

oh staff of MN you know me well, whilst i was disappointed that the Maccy D advertising question was even asked, i wasn't arsed tbh. i've always shouted 'its a business not a charity' ...

but this is different - It is very very wrong, and you are perpetuating the wrongness by advertising them.

by advertising MacDonalds?

I probably agree with you, Custy, if only I wasn't too tired to work out what's going on...

i remember a question about macdonalds was asked of the general mn public

it was asked becuase the mn public had for a long time been against macdonalds advertising.

i mention this as an example becuase - it shows that MN does give a shit about advertisers.

I recieved an e-mail today telling me that i could get 25% of dorothy perkins

DPs are part of the Arcadia group who are in on the workfare scheme ( IIAC?) s

so i thought that mumsnet should perhaps flex its political and consumer muscle and tell them that its not on actually

Ah, that all makes sense and you are dead right. As usual.

PMSL funny

You're assuming that a majority of MN users oppose the work placement scheme and, reading a lot of threads, I don't think that's correct at all. Long term unemployed people need opportunities and, from what I heard yesterday, of the ones that do the work placement at Tesco, about 20%-25% ended up being offered a permanent job. A vocal minority that object should not be allowed to bully MN

Tesco do not offer permanent jobs after workfare

300/3000 approx got permanent jobs fromthe tesco defence last week. Which is still pretty low.

Cogito - perhaps you could answer my "Workfare versus Work Experience" question????? It might help me understand the purpose of Workfare, which is frequently trumpeted as a chance for people go gain work experience for their CVs?...

Here it is again, on this thread:

How important is prior work experience, normally, to a job as a shelf stacker? I would have thought that anyone taking that on via Workfare who then failed to get or take the job at the end of it would be ringing the death knell to any future employment as they would be assumed to have been too slack to even get that sort of work when offered to them on a plate. And I know that unpaid work experience is more or less compulsory to anyone hoping to get into publishing, for example, but I'm sure that nobody would get to keep their benefits if they got themselves a bit of that sort of work experience.

So, basically, I'm a bit unclear as to whom Workfare is supposed to really benefit, apart from those people who wanted jobs in Tesco in the first place, but who now find they can't access them unless they are on a Workfare scheme?????

My ds was sent for a workfare interview at tesco , he was told it would not lead to a permanent job

If you are going to ban advertising by those involved in workfare because it is wrong in principle, then the ban should include all those since the Labour government introduced it in 2009 (from every sector - as if it's wrong, it's wrong).

I think it better if MN stands well clear.

So, it doesn't benefit anyone, then... although Tesco get a few weeks free labour, feel good about themselves and someone gets to put on their CV that Tesco doesn't think they can stack shelves very well.

...or not well enough to get a permanent job... which wasn't available anyway, they were just taking someone else's overtime.

I've answered your question. As I tell any young person that asks me about careers 'fill your spare time constructively'... I know one young man, now age 20, that has had jobs delivering newspapers, cleaning up in the local pub, helping out at the local bookies. Nothing major but always something. He's also doing a degree course and I know that when a future employer looks at his work experience vs someone with the same qualifications that has done nothing, they'll think 'this lad is a worker' and he'll have an advantage. Same applies if you're unemployed. You have an advantage if you can show you're willing to try.

Tesco took 1500 on work placement and their total staff complement is 260,000 in the UK. They could have declined to participate, those 1500 could have stayed at home, and we could all moan about big companies not helping anyone.

cogito, all the responses I've seen show the public is overwhelmingly against workfare - why do you think Tesco changed its policy, Waterstones & Sainsbury's back out etc? Out of the good of their hearts? No, they could see it was commercial suicide because so many people opposed it and were boycotting them as a result, that they would actually lose more money than they saved by benefitting from the slave labour.

If Workfare did apply to jobs higher up the scale, and Workfare applicants got priority for unpaid work experience over people who could fund themselves through unpaid work experience, there would be a middle class outcry. But it's OK to take up unpaid work at the bottom of the scale, even if that takes overtime and permanent work away from other people looking for work at the bottom of the scale. Maybe those other permanent workers are just parasites, taking jobs from others who need them for their self esteem?

Same applies if you're unemployed. You have an advantage if you can show you're willing to try.

thats a very good point, and I agree that filling your CV with volunteer work is a great idea. however, this isnt volunteer work. this is people being forced to work for huge companies for nothing. this is taking the possibility of real jobs out of the equation and wasting even more taxpayers money on... and this is the really funny bit... PAYING companies like Tesco, Arcadia and the like to not employ these worker, oh no, but allow work 30hrs a week to keep recieving £54.

some people might not be opposed, but the majority are, I dont know how anyone can not be outraged. And Labour may have floated the idea back in (was it?) 2009, maybe even started it up, but the Tories have followed it through and reintroduced slave labour.

If you fill your CV with volunteer work, you lose your benefits.

rabbitstew, you can volunteer within reason. you can do so many hours without it affecting your benefits IIRC.

cogito - also, can you not see there is a difference between your hard-working young man choosing to better himself, which I applaud, and a big company being paid by the tax payer to take on slaves, who are not paid for the labour they put in and are forced to do it or starve? Obviously, if all those working on workfare at Tesco's chose to do it voluntarily with no sanctions and Tesco was offering them 'apprenticeships' in shelf-stacking with no benefit to them either, paying them a wage in return for their labour, then we would all applaud both sides.

The reality, however, is that those forced to work unpaid or starve do not have the freedom to make that choice; it is not vontary work experience, it s slave labour.

Plus Tesco etc actually get paid to take on staff, thus reducing the number of paid workers they have. Thus rather than reducing the problem of unemployment, as workfare claims to do, actually increasing it.

I think if those on workfare were being offered either a guaranteed job or free training in a skilled rather than unskilled area which would enable them to get a paid job once the training was completed ie an old-fashioned apprenticeship scheme, then there would be little or no opposition to these schemes. It's the fact that this is exploitation pure and simple - shelf-stacking is totally unskilled work so those doing this will not get any useful experience that will help them get a job over someone else who has not done such a placement.

By the way, I like the Occupy Mumsnet label - could we start our own little Occupy movement, please? :)

or rather Occupy outpost? :)

breadandbutterfly, exactly. will tesco really take on new staff at 30hpw on minimum wage when they can get the labour for free? and get paid for it to boot? how naive must you be to believe that?

How much voluntary work are you allowed to do without losing your benefits and in what areas of work?

What cognito said.

Since when is this a political website?