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Original poster

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

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Tortington · 22/02/2012 22:44

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' Wink...

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

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MNHQ

JustineMumsnet · 23/02/2012 23:06

Evening all,

I do think this issue is actually a bit more complicated that meets the eye, as evidenced perhaps by the difference of opinion seen on this thread.

First, I don't agree that unpaid work experience is wrong per se. This is because it does seem to work. In fact I gather that it is pretty much the most effective scheme of many and various tried by the DWP to help young unemployed people into work. And given that it works, and that long term unemployment is so hugely debilitating for young people, it seems odd to be against it in principle.

That said, I do agree that were there evidence that a company was systematically abusing the scheme to avoid hiring people to permanent roles, and to merely to benefit from "slave" labour then we would most likely agree that they were right buggers and wouldn't want their presence on Mumsnet. I do think the new Tesco position, offering a paid four-week placement with a job if you complete it satisfactorily is an intrinsically better way of doing things because otherwise there will always be a suspicion/risk of abuse.

I also think that the compulsory element of this scheme (I think that if you drop out after the first week you lose a couple of weeks of benefits) does seem too Draconian - I think it's come about because of the idea that companies might devote resource into training etc so there has to be some incentive to stop people just being flaky - but it smacks a bit of it not being something that both parties voluntarily enter into for mutual benefit which is the only way it stacks up. That of course is for government to change, not individual businesses and we'll certainly see if anyone from government would like to come on to talk about that.

By the by we have just started an intern scheme here at MN. Interns are paid £1k per month and do a rotating 6 months around different bits of MNHQ and I really hope we end up hiring some of them permanently and that if not it helps them get jobs elsewhere.

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