So your saying if two people came for a job with the exact same qualifications and nothing in it except that one had never worked a day in their life whereas the other had a CV with previous 8-5 employment, you would just pick one at random?
Poundland Girl Wins Forced Labour Ruling
- Thread starter CosmicClown
- Start date
So your saying if two people came for a job with the exact same qualifications and nothing in it except that one had never worked a day in their life whereas the other had a CV with previous 8-5 employment, you would just pick one at random?
Deleted member 66701
Deleted member 66701
Yes exactly. As I pointed out earlier - I don't believe creating a monetary divide between "working" and "benefits" is the asnwer. There are many disadvantages to being employed that need to be overcome before being employed becomes more attractive than claiming benefits - although the "atrraction" to benefits is overstated I believe - only a very small fraction of benefit claimants "want" to be on benefits and certainly not to the scale that the Daily Mail would have you believe.
To sumarise - the key is to make employment attractive, not to make claiming benefits unattractive.
Clearly the people getting the job placements are benefiting as evidenced previously, however "cheap labour" may sound great but the shop are also getting a person they probably wouldn't have given the job too.
Associate
- Joined
- 25 Sep 2009
- Posts
- 2,386
- Location
- Darwen
Apprentices earn qualifications, I haven't seen many apprentice positions for shelf stackers and mop pushers.
No I'm not, but as she's a Geology graduate I imagine the sort of jobs she's applying for aren't going to be attractive to those who have never worked a day in their life anyway, so that's really a non-issue. She was already doing far more valuable voluntary work before she was forced to abandon it.
I'm in two minds about it.
On one hand she's right. Why should large corporation lay off paid employes and take advantage of free workforce provided to them by jobcentre. That is state organised slavery.
On the other hand. She was on job seekers allowance for a long time, and wasn't seeking job, because she felt doing volunteer work for some sort of museum (which had no chance of leading to any paid job) while being sponsored from our taxes suited her lifestyle better than doing menial job for minimum wage. So she was forced to go to "slave" job at Poundland to break the circle. Which it technically did. She's now employed in supermarket somewhere if I understood correctly.
I think the idea might have been right, but execution failed. Instead of providing free workforce to private corporations, the "stuck" claimant should be made to work for people who pay her the jobseekers allowance. Taxpayer. So in short, what they ought to be aiming for is:
If you claimed jobseeker allowance for more than 12 months AND refused job offers from the jobcenter pool of jobs AND/OR it is believed you are not actively seeking any proper job, but instead do volunteer work in line of work that will not lead to employment (be it museum, model in art classes or setting up decks for your mate DJ Boobz) just to get benefit reviewers off your back then to keep receiving job seeker allowance, you will need to do some work for society, paint fences at old people houses, direct traffic to right departments and floors at the gates of your local NHS hospital, serve as lollypop lady in front of local public school. Whatever. How many hours a week? Well, whatever your allowance is, divided by national minimum wage, of course. No more slavery, no more working for free, but, no more handouts as well. Fixed.
On one hand she's right. Why should large corporation lay off paid employes and take advantage of free workforce provided to them by jobcentre. That is state organised slavery.
On the other hand. She was on job seekers allowance for a long time, and wasn't seeking job, because she felt doing volunteer work for some sort of museum (which had no chance of leading to any paid job) while being sponsored from our taxes suited her lifestyle better than doing menial job for minimum wage. So she was forced to go to "slave" job at Poundland to break the circle. Which it technically did. She's now employed in supermarket somewhere if I understood correctly.
I think the idea might have been right, but execution failed. Instead of providing free workforce to private corporations, the "stuck" claimant should be made to work for people who pay her the jobseekers allowance. Taxpayer. So in short, what they ought to be aiming for is:
If you claimed jobseeker allowance for more than 12 months AND refused job offers from the jobcenter pool of jobs AND/OR it is believed you are not actively seeking any proper job, but instead do volunteer work in line of work that will not lead to employment (be it museum, model in art classes or setting up decks for your mate DJ Boobz) just to get benefit reviewers off your back then to keep receiving job seeker allowance, you will need to do some work for society, paint fences at old people houses, direct traffic to right departments and floors at the gates of your local NHS hospital, serve as lollypop lady in front of local public school. Whatever. How many hours a week? Well, whatever your allowance is, divided by national minimum wage, of course. No more slavery, no more working for free, but, no more handouts as well. Fixed.
The key is to universalise the system to remove the split, so any changes in either tax or benefits impact everyone, to remove the perverse incentives and special interests from the system.
- an NVQ level 3 is shelf stacking.
I can see it now (Also good point lol).
You can get an NVQ level 3 in cleaning...
Much like uni's, they'll sell anything as a qualification if they think it'll sell.
Deleted member 66701
Deleted member 66701
I concur - and as I've stated perviously - support the negative income tax solution.
Depends on the jobs they've done. I don't think working at Poundland, Maccies, Burger King and TK Max would have much baring when going for a nuclear scientist role.
Deleted member 66701
Deleted member 66701
I've looked at the syllabus for NVQ 3 cleaning - when it deals with cleaning substances and hazmat it's more like a chemistry degree!
Can anyone tell me the effects of mixing sodium percarbonate with water, the risks to health, it's toxicity and the effects of discharging it into a domestic water drainage system?
A holder of an NVQ 3 in cleaning could
My sister inlaw got an NVQ in hair dressing and nails - she can tell me more about hair growth and skin conditions than I ever learnt in A level biology.
Don't diss NVQ - for thier specific areas of expertise those qualification holders can blow your mind with what they know.
Last edited by a moderator:
I've prefer an NVQ in cleaning over a degree in media studies tbh, at least the first one may be useful at some point.
I can see it now (Also good point lol).
It would fall under NVQ in retail but obviously shelf stacking would probably be level 1 or less and you don't get a qualification in this scheme anyway, hence the exploitatation. All it does is remove an unskilled paying job from the economy at a time of too few jobs.
If Spain enforced this scheme tomorrow a lot of people in unskilled jobs would lose their jobs to make way for the new free labour and their economy would be worse off as a result.
Just as a small point, it doesnt necessarily remove a paying job from the economy. For the job to exist, it would have to produce sufficent additional value to cover minimum wage + employers NI + training costs + misc costs. Having someone on the work scheme only costs training and misc costs.
Associate
- Joined
- 25 Sep 2009
- Posts
- 2,386
- Location
- Darwen
Well it does, if there is enough work to cover 30 hours a week for an unemployed person then the company is essentially getting free labour, why would you create jobs when you can just get people to do it for free.
It's happened to a few mates, been made redundant and weeks later new positions have been created for these work programmes. It's also happened to me, I got made redundant with 6 other people just before christmas and the mates I used to work with have said the jobs are back but this time they get a regular rotation of unemployed people in.
It's happened to a few mates, been made redundant and weeks later new positions have been created for these work programmes. It's also happened to me, I got made redundant with 6 other people just before christmas and the mates I used to work with have said the jobs are back but this time they get a regular rotation of unemployed people in.
I just had a quick browse myself.
It's just proof that you can do the job really. I can't see anything there that anyone holding a supervisor position wouldn't do out of need.
Why should I be expected to pay for someone to live who htinks a days work is beneath them?
she picked the dud degree, or could not be bothered to work hard at it... thats not my fault...
She was doing voluntary work at a museum, she wasn't sitting on her arse all day doing nothing. And since when was Geology a dud degree?
How is forcing her into what is effectively free unskilled labour helping anything?
WITH BACK TO WORK SCHEME
Woman forced to work at Poundland.
One less full time job in the economy - no taxes payed.
Cost to tax payer: £71 a week.
More unemployed as a result of scheme.
WITHOUT BACK TO WORK SCHEME
Woman seeks job/watches Jermey Kyle.
One extra full time job in the economy - government earns tax from it.
Cost to tax payer: £71 a week.
Less unemployed.
It's not rocket science to see the country is worse off under it?