[Vicky.]

Also the workfare rules are STUPID given you are not allowed to do college courses and stuff (you know, things that could actually help longer term unemployed people to find work?) as apparently you would not have enough time to search for work if your course is (I believe it was..) 16 hours per week+

[Cherie]

Originally Posted by Vicky.

Also the workfare rules are STUPID given you are not allowed to do college courses and stuff (you know, things that could actually help longer term unemployed people to find work?) as apparently you would not have enough time to search for work if your course is (I believe it was..) 16 hours per week+

As most uni courses are about 16 hours, I guess you would be considered a student and not eligible for jobseekers if your course was more than 16 hours a week though

[Vicky.]

Originally Posted by Cherie

As most uni courses are about 16 hours, I guess you would be considered a student and not eligible for jobseekers if your course was more than 16 hours a week though

You can't get maintenance loans though for the part time courses AFAIK. And its fit to send someone to work 30+ hours per week for free and still claim they have time to jobseek? Seems...daft

[Cherie]

Originally Posted by Vicky.

You can't get maintenance loans though for the part time courses AFAIK. And its fit to send someone to work 30+ hours per week for free and still claim they have time to jobseek? Seems...daft

I'm not advocating sending anyone to work for 30 hours for free, I don't think a day a week work experience would kill anyone though, and with regard to job seeking I refer you to a mark L's post

[user104658]

By the official rules you DO have to jobsearch "full time". The caveat being that if you are tech savvy and able bodied you can obviously do it much more quickly than that. With my brief experience of JSA (about 8 years ago) it definitely stated 35 hours searching per week but, at least back then, they were understanding of how unrealistic that was in that area. Sure you can probably search / apply for jobs all day if you live in or near a major city... When you live in a dirty backwater in the North of England (as we were at the time) you could apply for literally EVERY job going in the area within a couple of hours, and sometimes nothing new at all would come up for weeks

[Cherie]

I would add that a day a weeks work experience would help people with no previous work experience or people who want to change their job into work, it wouldn't be that useful for people who have lost a job and are seeking similar employment.

[Kizzy]

Send people to work for their jobseekers... Was there ever a more oxymoronic sentence uttered?

What of travel costs incurred and/or child care, should they perhaps walk however far it is, maybe carrying a 'drain on society' placard?

[Vicky.]

Could always pay people for this one days work that can be found from nowhere if unpaid. Obviously take some of the wages off their jobseekers. Hell a day on minimum wage is the same as a weeks jobseekers rate anyway thinking about it

I was having an argument on another site about workfare actually (though this thread is not about workfare..seems to have veered that way though) where someone claimed the 'lazy bastards' would get used to being up through the day and such and it would prepare them for work in the future. But...giving them the same position but PAID would have the exact same effect, and they would have the added perks of...receiving a wage like everyone else. Employing the unemployed and not paying them, simply for being unfortunate enough to be unemployed...is ridiculous.

[Cherie]

Originally Posted by Kizzy

Send people to work for their jobseekers... Was there ever a more oxymoronic sentence uttered?

What of travel costs incurred and/or child care, should they perhaps walk however far it is, maybe carrying a 'drain on society' placard?

If you actually read what I had to say instead of jumping on everything, I did say it would be useful for young people who have never had employment or those changing jobs, as lack of experience is a huge barrier to getting work, maybe their travel costs could be met, maybe their childcare could be covered, the existing system doesn't really help anyone, job centres sending people for job interviews where they are turned down due to lack of experience, you seem to be in favour of keeping the current system when it clearly doesn't work..pardon the pun

[Niamh.]

Whatever happened to the Kizzy/Cherie sisteromance?

[Kizzy]

Originally Posted by Niamh.

Whatever happened to the Kizzy/Cherie sisteromance?

We still have one, we just don't kiss each others arses, we have our own minds Niamh

[Cherie]

Originally Posted by Niamh.

Whatever happened to the Kizzy/Cherie sisteromance?

No different to you and Livia going at it

[Cherie]

Originally Posted by Kizzy

We still have one, we just don't kiss each others arses, we have our own minds Niamh

[Vicky.]

Originally Posted by Cherie

If you actually read what I had to say instead of jumping on everything, I did say it would be useful for young people who have never had employment or those changing jobs, as lack of experience is a huge barrier to getting work, maybe their travel costs could be met, maybe their childcare could be covered, the existing system doesn't really help anyone, job centres sending people for job interviews where they are turned down due to lack of experience, you seem to be in favour of keeping the current system when it clearly doesn't work..pardon the pun

I do think this could be a good idea for those who don't have experience. however, this would cost extra, paying for childcare and travel expenses...and as such it wouldn't happen. And...it should only be in areas where having experience would actually help. So again, not shelf stacking and such which seems to be the go to 'workfare' type 'jobs'. Noone in power actually wants to help the unemployed else there wouldn't be endless cuts and workfare and so on in the first place...its just about saving money and massaging the unemployment figures, along with maybe a touch of punishing poor people for being poor (before anyone starts, I mean labour aswell as the Tories, as they also had an unfair 'free work' programme, though as I recall they did pay people 15 whole pounds per week extra to do the workfare placements...)

[Beso]

Instead of paying their childcare, pay them for looking after their kids.

[Kizzy]

Originally Posted by Cherie

If you actually read what I had to say instead of jumping on everything, I did say it would be useful for young people who have never had employment or those changing jobs, as lack of experience is a huge barrier to getting work, maybe their travel costs could be met, maybe their childcare could be covered, the existing system doesn't really help anyone, job centres sending people for job interviews where they are turned down due to lack of experience, you seem to be in favour of keeping the current system when it clearly doesn't work..pardon the pun

I wasn't referring to your comment, so who's jumping now?

What you are advocating has little or nothing in fact to do in relation to this thread so your accusatory tone is misplaced.
If childcare costs and travel costs are to be met then wouldn't this be similar to the 'sure start' centres that have all but closed, where would the funding come from for such a scheme, if there is no money to pay people to do a job where is the money to pay someone to look after someones kids to not pay them to do a job?....
Not really sure what it is I'm being accused of here Cherie.

[Kizzy]

Originally Posted by Cherie

No different to you and Livia going at it

[Niamh.]

Originally Posted by Cherie

No different to you and Livia going at it

I have no idea what you're talking about, me and Livia agree about everything

[Kizzy]

Listen... I'll tolerate Cherie fence sitting, but you crossing to the dark side?

Not on my watch sweetheart!

[user104658]

Niamh and Livia and Kizzy and Cherie going at it

[Niamh.]

Take your mind out of the gutter TS

[user104658]

Originally Posted by Vicky.

Also the workfare rules are STUPID given you are not allowed to do college courses and stuff (you know, things that could actually help longer term unemployed people to find work?) as apparently you would not have enough time to search for work if your course is (I believe it was..) 16 hours per week+

Yep, this one has always been ridiculous, sanctioning people's income for seeking education / training that would make them more employable, and off of JSA quicker. Madness. That, and the fact that it's set up so that you're not "allowed" to take on small roles, say 4 to 6 hours a week, doing anything as it ends up being financially impossible.

Universal Credit was/is in theory supposed to address the latter problem (you can work a couple of hours and still claim the rest of the credit) BUT the less said about the UC shambles the better really. I'm starting to suspect it'll never come into full effect, it's so broken. And has cost untold amounts already.

[user104658]

Oh and this is one of my fav quirks: if YOU go out seeking relevant voluntary work they will sanction you for not spending all of your time jobseeking. However, THEY can send you on "voluntary" placements of their choosing because it's good for people to have the experience.

[Kizzy]

Don't get me started about UC...That was specifically designed to siphon public money, ow they have gotten away with this 'computer upgrade' scam within both welfare and the NHS I don't know...Corruption is not strong enough a word!