[Anonymouse]

...or are we in the UK heading for a state in which the only criterion for being fit for work is to be alive? I offer the latest Budget "reforms" (trans.: cuts) to various benefits as evidence.

To sum up for anyone who hasn't read my earlier posts:

On May 5th 2022 I had a stroke. I am still recovering. The right side of my face feels constantly taut; I suspect nerve damage. I am very unsteady on my feet. This is at least partly due to the Ramipril I'm taking for my high blood pressure; it's a side-effect. But since high blood pressure tends to cause strokes, and given that the odds are against me surviving another one, if it's unsteadiness on my feet or high BP, I know which bet I'll take.

Plus I get very tired, very easily, very quickly. Just a trip to my local Lidl, a mere 200 yards or so, does me in, so what I'd be like working I can easily imagine. After a trip to, say, the chemist for my prescription, or to the DWP (I try to combine the two to save money), I'm fit for nowt for a couple of hours. To cap it all off, my right hand is almost useless owing to arthritis; I can't make a fist.

At least one of my eyedrops (Azarga, to treat my glaucoma) is a beta-blocker, which tends to preclude operating heavy machinery. With my right hand seized up, I wouldn't trust myself with a forklift or a Pedestrian Pallet Truck (I was going to do a PPT course, but then the stroke happened and I was hospitalised for a month).

I tend to walk, or rather stagger, as if I were drunk, though I haven't had a drink - or caffeine, or chocolate - in years, as I tend to get heartburn. I cut all three out of my diet and I haven't had it since. I neither know nor care which was causing it (well, not strictly true, I do miss chocolate...).

I can no longer ride my bike. I don't dare - apart from the tiredness issue, there's the unsteadiness issue. I've been off my bike too often already even before the stroke.

Despite all this, the DWP reckons I'm fit for, and I quote, "some sort of work". They haven't said what sort. The last fit note I submitted was not accepted, because it didn't say I'd gotten worse...though in fact I think I have.

See what I mean about fitness criteria?

Doubtless some of you on this board are or have been employers. My half-sister, rest her soul, was for years, and when I asked her if she would take me on, she told me she wouldn't - the liability would be too high. I agree.

She and I never got on as kids, it's true (she was 10 years older than me), but in her last decade or so we reached a modus vivendi and got on quite well. So I knew she'd give me an unbiased opinion despite us being half-siblings. She was always a no-nonsense sort (well, at her funeral I learned to my total surprise that before I got to secondary school she was quite the tearaway, but not when I knew her!). She told me not to bother looking for work.

To be honest, I wouldn't take on a stroke survivor either. I don't believe there's a single employer in the UK which could afford the lawsuit my other half-sister (11 years older) could bring if I died on shift. Could the employer prove the job didn't kill me? I don't think so.

The only reason I'm looking is to be a good little boy by the DWP's lights and thus retain my Universal Credit. In the unlikely event I get an interview, I intend to be honest with the prospective employer. Under the terms of the Health & Safety At Work Act (1974), I believe I should. The employer should be aware before I start work that there are issues. H & S applies to all employees 24/7. So they need to know.

So what do you think, peeps? Am I "fit for work"?