Unemployment Mandatory work scheme does not improve job chances

soundood said:
as i see it, there is a job for everyone, they just havent found it yet, or achieved the training needed for that job.

or they simply are too precious about that job they will do

i am a 43 year old male originaly from glasgow, now in london.

over the years i have never 'signed on' or been part of any work scheme.

at 16 i went out looking for a job at the start of a recession, with 2 'O' levels, it took me 14 weeks to find a job sweeping a yard/picking up ****, at a welding firm. since then i have done many, and any job i could find, including,

for those that have no handicap or disadvantage, there is work there, they just need to go and get it, instead of watching thier moms and pops on Jeremy kyle.

and they should hit the pavement/internet every day looking for it.

/end rant :)
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So you started work from school and have never signed on and have probably walked into other jobs because you have a verified history of employment.

Sorry but you don't have a clue what its like on benefits, if there is a job for everyone why are nearly 3m people out of work, I'm pretty sure there aren't 3 million jobs waiting for them to walk into.
 
Amp34 said:
On the other hand a lot of the companies who provide the "experience" are almost certainly taking the ****...
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Agree aswell.

I did some unpaid voluntary work experience last year at my local voluntary council that supports many charities around the west london area.

It was part admin and part accounting. At that time I had just finished AAT level 2. I was very enthusiastic and looking forward to learning further about how sage50 software is used in an organisation plus accounting in general and thought this would be perfect opportunity to put something concrete on my cv.

The admin part was taught by a very friendly lady (who has also since then become redundant :() who taught me very efficiently about general admin tasks etc. However I couldn't say the same thing about accounting aspect lol.

I did some petty cash transactions on the spreadsheets. So it was all very basic stuff. I never once did any sage stuff or deeper accounting. After around 3 months I was getting the feeling that the finance director wasn't very keen and interested in supervising my training or teaching me new stuff.

My feeling was confirmed and soon I was told they can't place me in the new time table slots for the next month. I enquired about it and was told by finance director that he would call me in 3-4 weeks time.

He never did and gave the usual excuse he was very busy. This just left bitter feeling for me and from there onwards I never bothered with that organisation ever again.

When I went to recruitment agency afterwards I was told that 3 months experience isn't enough especially as I only did very basic stuff:(
 
Rich_L said:
I predict two answers:

1) This is obvious as people on benefits are clearly lazy workshy good for nothings and a taste of work will send them scurrying back to benefits sharpish.

2) This is obvious as people on benefits are there for a genuine reason and/or are virtually unemployable so a mandatory work program will have no benefit for these people.

I see the benefit of the idea in principle but I think it is being implemented horrendously, massively expanding the apprenticeship programs seems a far more appropriate way of doing it as the people involved actually get something out of it rather than being a woefully under-paid dogsbody in the company.
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I'll go for a third answer and suggest that people who are basically forced to work for no wages, probably treated like **** by their employer and then got rid of without so much as a thank you don't really come out of it feeling engaged with the world of work. If that's all they have to look forward to, well it's not surprising they won't find a job soon.
 
free labour for those who can afford it?

I was involved in the Community Action Program (CAP) until recently.

Part of the mandate was to find 'work placements'.
Based on my previous run through the welfare to work scheme, supervised by a company called Intraining (formerly Fernly business centre) I was acutely aware that real businesses were not interested in the bother of being involved with the welfare to work program, even if it meant a few quid from the taxpayer for the privilege - they were too busy making money to want to be sucked into another government benefits black hole.

Realistically, the only people who are prepared to take on 'work placements' are charities.
I worked for my local PDSA shop (did something local for my area - big society and all of that bs). As far as I know, the PDSA did not get any money from the government for my being there 4 days a week for three months, but I do know the company who was operating on behalf of the DWP as a middle man was getting money based on its contractual obligations to the government and jobcentre plus.

To be fair, I enjoyed working at the PDSA, they were a nice bunch of people and I was sad to leave them to start a paid job.


I'll relate some of the advice I was given by these people at Intraining/Igneus (whatever they call themselves now - a sub-contractor of a sub-contractor was what I could get them to tell me) -
  • if you sign off for a few months and get some work you can get by on for a little while, then you can leave that job and sign back on and your claim will have lapsed and be treated as a 'fresh claim' meaning that the jobcentre will no bother me to look for a job for another 6 months.
  • Just copy your jobsearch diary for the jobcentre to our forms when you come in for your two hours a week jobsearch on their computers (which didn't work half of the time or had people using them)
  • I offered to help out with their IT training course, passing my knowledge of the use of computers (@ home and work for the last 10-15 years) - everyone nodded and said what a good idea this was, part of the spirit of the scheme and all of that. Nothing ever came of it - I asked every time I went to see my advisor and got the same non-reply platitude each time: great idea, the bosses are thinking about it. I suspect there was a contract somewhere that precluded individuals as part of the program volunteering their services and skills to help those less savvy than themselves at all things IT related - the benefits would have been twofold - I'd have had something useful to put on my CV, those who had trouble with computers would have learned something, thereby increasing their chances of getting a job.


I was out of work for over a year. I applied for all sorts of different work, with very little response (I'm 35 with over 10 years of practical drawing office experience, reasonable qualifications - 10+ gcse, 3 Alevel, C&G CAD 2d,3d wireframe/solids, plus other experience of life and the world etc)

I'm back in work again now (doing the CAD thing again) - this is not as a result of anything the DWP or any of their partners has done with, or on my behalf.
I'll say there are 3 things that worked in my favour in getting work again
  1. time
  2. determination
  3. luck

I will place the emphasis on LUCK - being in the right place at the right time. It could so easily have gone the other way - as it had countless times and applications before the one that was successful.



What I found really funny was the 'sanction of your benefit' that was applied to my case because I had a week before I started my new job and decided to use it to brush up on my CAD skills rather than continue to 'look for a job'. The problem that this can cause is due to the 3 strikes system of benefit sanctions that the DWP and its associates now use.
1st offence - 2 week benefit suspension
2nd offence - 2 week benefit suspension
3rd offence - 6 months suspension

This applies even to a claim that has ceased before the suspension came into force. So, say I get a six month ban (easily achievable by missing one appointment and not contacting the company for 3 days - each day missed will count as another suspension) but I'm signed off before it comes into force. I then work for three months then have to sign on again after a temporary contract has ended. When I sign back on, the ban is there waiting for me to endure for the next 6 months :rolleyes:

This is quite possible to happen.

In my case I was able to speak to my advisor both via email and telephone regarding my new job etc etc and he was able to remove any benefit sanctions relating to the last week before my new job started. Just for the record, I went to the interview on a thursday, by friday morning I was told I had got the job and could I start a week on the following monday - I couldn't have started the job any earlier. What was best? Continue with bs jobcentre nonsense, or ensure I had the best start at my new job by getting my skills in order? I know which is the right answer. The jobcentre is overtly inflexible when it comes to anything resembling common sense.
lol Like the Terminator, the jobcentre does not know fear or pain or pity, and it absolutely will not stop until it messes you about.


To be quite honest if you can have nothing at all to do with the DWP or any of its partners they you must ensure you stay that way - the whole thing is one big awful mess of bureaucracy and intractable incompetence, weighed down by the overbearingly simplistic view of government policy enacted by greedy privately owned firms who care not one jot for anyone actually unlucky enough to find themselves out of a job right in the middle of the worst recession for decades in this country.

That's about as harsh as I can make it with out resorting to foul language.
 
Some very insightful and fascinating experiences:). Really expands the picture of job market and the trouble people have to go through to get the jobs.

Much much more insightful and informative than the usual response; get a job innit!!
 
To be honest, the whole "Community Action Program" is a joke, I finished a placement with them, then had to spend a couple of months, where my advisor appointments consisted of "hi there, how are you, go do a couple of hours jobsearch while I have a chat with my colleagues and see a few other clients, then I'll make you another appointment for later in the week".

Not that he really cared about what jobs I was putting on my 'jobsearch' sheet, so long as I was filling it out.. and really, why would I want to use their pathetic little computers, that have depressingly restrictive policies in place, when I am more than capable of doing the same thing from home, with a nice cup of tea, and no stinking oiks ranting beside me about "dey make me do dis innit, hooman rites innit blud".. blah..

Waste of my time, waste of their time, and waste of taxpayers money..
 
Eeeeeethan said:
So you started work from school and have never signed on and have probably walked into other jobs because you have a verified history of employment.

Sorry but you don't have a clue what its like on benefits, if there is a job for everyone why are nearly 3m people out of work, I'm pretty sure there aren't 3 million jobs waiting for them to walk into.
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there where long periods of unemployment in among this, and i didnt sign on, they can stick their benefits, i am my own man, and i make it alone.

ohh and before you say, how did you manage? where you get food from etc... think about the countrys around the world that dont have a benefit systems, or peeps from other countrys living here with no benefits.

as for the 3 mil out of work, 2.7 mil will be loser slackers who dont want a job, the others just need to persisit in thier quest for a job.

please, you will get no sympathy from me about your situation, man up, go out and get training/volunteering/**** job and make a start on your life.

and dont give up till you get what you want.

life is tooooo short to post on a forum about not having work.

how about you make a shoe shine box? go near to your local train station and make some cash?

i have a good friend who made his job, what job you ask? he goes down the local sainsburys and he takes the trolleys off women just outside the door, helping them to the cab/car. with a smile and a laugh. they inturn let him return it for the pound, he always offers the pound back to them, but mostly they refuse. his previous career? civil engineer.

and although i give no sympathy about your situation, doesnt mean i dont care, i do care about you and all the other out there who are jobless, hence why i replied. we just need to find our own solutions.
 
i have a good friend who made his job, what job you ask? he goes down the local sainsburys and he takes the trolleys off women just outside the door, helping them to the cab/car. with a smile and a laugh. they inturn let him return it for the pound, he always offers the pound back to them, but mostly they refuse. his previous career? civil engineer.
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He's a beggar? :p
 
If its bad enough for those not in work who are able bodied then how bad is it for those that are not:


Fury as Tory welfare police order kidney dialysis patient Paul Mickleburgh back to work

May 31 2012 By Claire Elliot


Paul Mickleburgh Image 1

HE’s one of the world’s longest surviving kidney dialysis patients and has had 33 years of renal treatment, four failed transplants and 14 heart attacks.

But now, in a shameful indictment of Tory welfare cuts, Paul Mickleburgh, 53, has been deemed fit to work.

The dad of three, who was diagnosed with renal failure when he was 19, was forced to give up his job as a technician 20 years ago after his body rejected a fourth donor kidney.

He is now so ill doctors have taken him off the transplant list as he would not survive a fifth operation and will spend the rest of his life on dialysis.

The machine, which cleans his blood, is now the only thing keeping him alive.

But after more than three decades hooked up to it for five hours, three days a week, other organs, including his heart, are also failing.

The Government insists that under their new employment and support allowance scheme, which replaces incapacity benefit, “those found to be too sick or disabled to work won’t be expected to”.

But Paul, from Aberdeen, who has also battled cancer, pneumonia, 14 heart attacks in the last five years and suffers from spontaneous internal bleeding and brittle bones, has been placed in a “work-related activity group”.

This requires him to attend “work-focused interviews” and actively look for employment or his incapacity benefits will be cut.

Incredibly, the Department for Work and Pensions reached their decision without Paul even being interviewed or given a medical.

Paul said: “How ill do I need to be? Apart from being dead, I don’t know how I can get much worse. It makes me so angry.

“I was asked to tell them all my illnesses and when I had finished it was a page and a half.

“I enclosed all my medical history, medication, dialysis times and what it does to me after being on it for 33 years.

“But to my shock I have been passed fit for work and must attend work focus interviews and do everything possible to find work or lose my benefits.

“I’d liken this to what the Nazis did, working the disabled and the sick until they dropped dead and were no longer a burden.”

Paul, who has a mechanical valve fitted in his heart, a twisted bowel and suffers agonising joint pain as a result of prolonged renal treatment, has now written to his MP, Malcolm Bruce.

He needs painkillers just to get him through each dialysis session and it takes him a day to recover.

Paul wrote to the Department for Work and Pensions urging them to reconsider his position but his plea was rejected.

He was told: “You must take part in work-focused interviews with a personal adviser to continue to receive employment and support allowance in full.

“The adviser will help you take reasonable steps to move towards work.”

Paul said he believed it was “all to save money and they don’t care who they upset”.

He said: “It’s unrealistic and unreasonable to expect me to attend these meetings when there is no realistic prospect of an improvement in my health.

“I’m worried sick about these changes and I believe I took my last heart attack due to this cruel policy which makes the disabled feel they are a burden.

“My wife and children have all worked since leaving school. We’re not a family on the take.”

Paul’s wife, Joyce, who runs her own dog grooming business, said: “I understand that they’ve got to sort out the benefits, but there are better ways to go about it.

“There is just no way he can go to these meetings, let alone go to work. When he comes off the machine he goes home to bed and I don’t see him until the next day, he’s so exhausted.

“What’s he to do, kart the machine around behind him? It’s crazy.”

Aberdeen South Labour MP, Dame Anne Begg, said: “A lot of the changes being made by this Government seem to be particularly harsh on disabled people. And the people who are getting hit the hardest are those who have worked hard all their lives.”

A spokeswoman for the Department for Work and Pensions said they did not comment on individual cases.
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Eeeeeethan said:
Yes I have been on JSA, I still have my old Job Seekers Agreement, it was a hell of a lot more than 2 things a fortnight, it was 6 things a week which had to include 2x visits to Job Centre, 2 Spec letters + CVs and 2 looking at job sections in newspapers.
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At least some areas of the country make people take it seriously then. I couldn't believe I was asked for just two things a fortnight. I was regularly doing 10+ a week and couldn't be bothered to fill all of them in.:p

Morgoth said:
I've been on JSA, they never check what you've applied for. You can write down any old **** to make it appear you are sticking to the agreement.
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And for me too.

*Glance*, *sign* "Bye"

Maybe when you are long term unemployed they take more notice, or perhaps it's general attitude and look?
 
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ethan said:
If its bad enough for those not in work who are able bodied then how bad is it for those that are not:
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While I'm not commenting on specific cases (i.e. not specifically commenting on that article) I know two people who are (properly) disabled and work. One has been blind from birth and used to commute in to london every day to work (now lives in london and works) and another that broke his back last year and now has little use of anything under his neck (no use of his legs) and has just started back at work again.

I also know of a second blind guy that commutes every day too. It does beg the question with those that are long term physically disabled and why they can't work, especially if it is something like bad backs etc.
 
I'm currently on ESA coming from IB for health reasons that i'm not going to go into atm. I had the application form which I had help filling in by my social worker, sent it off, not long after I got a reply back and I don't need an interview with a doc, I do have to have a work focused interview at my local job centre which I have been to one, where they were very helpful.
 
Amp34 said:
While I'm not commenting on specific cases (i.e. not specifically commenting on that article) I know two people who are (properly) disabled and work. One has been blind from birth and used to commute in to london every day to work (now lives in london and works) and another that broke his back last year and now has little use of anything under his neck (no use of his legs) and has just started back at work again.

I also know of a second blind guy that commutes every day too. It does beg the question with those that are long term physically disabled and why they can't work, especially if it is something like bad backs etc.
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It all depends on the nature of the disibility inclusive of bad backs and the kind of job that would be available? I would like to know the type of work the two examples you gave are doing, including the level of support? I would also expect the examples you gave are largely the exception to the norm and the one I gave concerning( government) policy; the norm taking the disabled as a whole.

Edit: In my area Remploy was closed due to it not being financially viable just to illustrate the point.
 
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