Unemployed could be forced to do compulsory manual labour

[Ramrod]

Originally Posted by RizzyKing

One of the first things for some to understand is that most people that are unemployed would actually welcome the oppurtunity to do something

This initiative isn't aimed at them. Its aimed at those who wouldn't welcome the opportunity to do something.....

[vanman]

Originally Posted by Ramrod

This initiative isn't aimed at them. Its aimed at those who wouldn't welcome the opportunity to do something.....

so who decides who want's to work and who don't.
i QUOTE

The Work Activity scheme is said to be designed to flush out claimants who have opted for a life on benefits or are doing undeclared jobs on the side.

this is aimed at the claimants doing undeclared jobs on the side

Originally Posted by vanman

so who decides who want's to work and who don't.

i would say it is aimed at the long term unemployed ,if that means 6months or 12 months hasn't been made clear yet .

[vanman]

Originally Posted by martyh

i would say it is aimed at the long term unemployed ,if that means 6months or 12 months hasn't been made clear yet .

just because you are not qualified to do a job or your to old or to young.
or you face dont fit don't mean you don't want to work

In some areas of this country it is quite easy to be out of work for over 12 months despite best efforts to find work and that is something that has to be remembered. This does smack a little of exploitation to me if it isn't done the right way i really hope it is although as i said i would much prefer they train people to fill skills gaps rather then keeping taking skills from other countries.

Originally Posted by vanman

just because you are not qualified to do a job or your to old or to young.
or you face dont fit don't mean you don't want to work

i haven't said so

[Stuart]

Originally Posted by chris9991

I wonder who's going to pay for the travelling costs to get to this work. I can't imagine genuine claimants having much money to do so. I think they'd rather spend it on surviving and trying to get a job

Exactly how much travelling do you think the claimant is going to have to do?

Originally Posted by punky

I stand by what I say. There are people that literally make a careet out of dodging work. Deliberately sabotaging their CV, throwing interviews, getting fired...If they put as much effort into doing work as they do avoiding it they'd actually quite a lot.

I actually had a friend like that. He and his girlfriend were living off a combination of her wage (which was lower than mine at the time) and his benefits. While they actually had an OK lifestyle (she knew how to make clothes and was good at growing her own food, so she actually made a lot of the stuff they used, wore and ate), they didn't have a lot of money.

She worked with me, and I could see where she came in through my office window. Every morning, the BF would walk her to the gate, wait for her to get out of sight, then vanish into the pub which was next door. I saw this, every morning.

I knew him for about 4 or 5 years, and in all that time, on the few occasions when he did get a job, he never lasted more than 1 week before being fired due to attitude problems. And yet, on a personal level, he was a very nice man.

That is the sort of person we need to stop claiming benefits.

[Ignitionnet]

I can't say I really like this.

While I'm all in favour of reducing the welfare bill and beating people who make a career of welfare back into work with giant tax payer funded sticks this is a quite illiberal, authoritarian way of going about things.

This feels like authoritarianism and big government, aspects of things you don't expect from Liberal Democrats and Conservatives respectively. From the Tories in fact I expect neither.

If the government think these people are playing the system the obvious approach to me would be to change the system so that those who demonstrably avoid work are unable to continue to game it.

[punky]

Originally Posted by Mr Angry

It's there in the previous link - people with terminal illnesses being taken off benefits and put in a position whereby they are forced to work to survive. It may not be specific to picking up litter - and it may be uncomfortable reading for you given your stated position - but it is a fact.



Legally is the key here, obviously.

"Not wanting to" work and "not being able to work" are two very different things. Not wanting to work is hard for any third party to discern. However not being able to work is, by comparison, fairly easy to identify.

Forcing people to work for four weeks will not change the mindset of those who do not want to work. They will simply comply with the requirement (costing the treasury more money) and then revert to form. It will do them no discernable good.

It is a pyrrhic victory of sorts - at best.

Forcing people who are genuinely not fit to work to work for four weeks serves no purpose and represents the potential threat of an even greater long term fiscal cost.



Yes, you see the difference in your example is that he achieved what he did at his own volition - he wasn't "forced" by a third party. He also acted primarily due to his own acknowledgement of the onset of mental health issues (low self estreem and depression).

Some people are not that lucky.

As I stated earlier I acknowlewdge that there are vast numbers of people in receipt of benefits who should not, ordinarlily, be in receipt of those benefits. There are very real problems with this proposal by Duncan Smith and I feel he is playing to the gallery rather than trying to get to the root causes of the problem. Perceived entitlement and fraudulent claims being but two of those issues.

I'll people should be cared for, not stigmatized and lumped together with ner do wells who exploit a system.

You are still convinved that this will affect people that are medically incapable of work without providing any evidence of this. You mention a white paper but that's barely consultation, let alone law. Yet, you still you cling on to this notion that the genuinely ill will be forced to work. Couple this with your nasty little asides trying to paint me as a nasty little Daily Mail reader who is advocating the return of Victorian workhouses and sending orphans up chimneys. You point back to some claimants going through a despute over their benefits with the DWP. Well, it's been going on years and neither the coalition's, IDS' or my fault. It is a despute which has no relevence to this article. Which sums up a lot really as to why you mentioned it.

Given the above i'd suggest you're a lot more prejeduiced than you think.

Originally Posted by Ignitionnet

I can't say I really like this.

While I'm all in favour of reducing the welfare bill and beating people who make a career of welfare back into work with giant tax payer funded sticks this is a quite illiberal, authoritarian way of going about things.

This feels like authoritarianism and big government, aspects of things you don't expect from Liberal Democrats and Conservatives respectively. From the Tories in fact I expect neither.

If the government think these people are playing the system the obvious approach to me would be to change the system so that those who demonstrably avoid work are unable to continue to game it.

Don't you think that we have tried the softly softly approach and it hasn't worked ,even made things worse

[Gary L]

Just heard on the news that it's all claimants that have been out of work for a year or more to do 30 days "voluntary" work for their benefits. so much for picking on only a certain few.

it's going to have to be a massive thing then.

[danielf]

Originally Posted by Ignitionnet

I can't say I really like this.

While I'm all in favour of reducing the welfare bill and beating people who make a career of welfare back into work with giant tax payer funded sticks this is a quite illiberal, authoritarian way of going about things.

This feels like authoritarianism and big government, aspects of things you don't expect from Liberal Democrats and Conservatives respectively. From the Tories in fact I expect neither.

If the government think these people are playing the system the obvious approach to me would be to change the system so that those who demonstrably avoid work are unable to continue to game it.

You big Pink Bedwetter

[Gary L]

Originally Posted by Ignitionnet

If the government think these people are playing the system the obvious approach to me would be to change the system so that those who demonstrably avoid work are unable to continue to game it.

They had a system in place already. if you don't show that you're looking for a job and/or you get pulled up about it you get your benefits stopped for a certain time. repeat offences mean losing it for longer.

that wasn't good enough to weed out the genuine ones. they've got a bigger net to catch a significant load more instead.

which will probably make/save money for somebody somewhere. the unemployed get to work for their benefits and some of us will think it's ok that they don't get the legal minimum wage for manual labour in this country.

but because they might be seen as 'second class' anyway. we don't care.

Originally Posted by Gary L

They had a system in place already. if you don't show that you're looking for a job and/or you get pulled up about it you get your benefits stopped for a certain time. repeat offences mean losing it for longer.

that wasn't good enough to weed out the genuine ones. they've got a bigger net to catch a significant load more instead.

which will probably make/save money for somebody somewhere. the unemployed get to work for their benefits and some of us will think it's ok that they don't get the legal minimum wage for manual labour in this country.

but because they might be seen as 'second class' anyway. we don't care.

Problem is though that system wasn't working ,this system will have the benefit of stopping people working on the black market and claiming benefit ,it will get people back into the routine of getting up and working ,and it will make people realise that the good old days of the state supporting you for life are over

Originally Posted by Hugh

Life is rarely that binary/black & white, Gary.

We need (imho) to be careful about these sorts of things, because whilst the intention may be honourable, it soon descends into "work-shy" versus "hard-working tax-payers", and as we know from this forum, whilst it is easy (and often makes us feel better) to pigeonhole people into simplistic categories, we seem to end up putting applying labels to large numbers of people, when the labels actually apply to small numbers of abusers of the systems.