I'm not above a good old fashioned rant at the banks. If it's good enough for (insert middle of the road comedian) then it's good enough for (insert me). Plus I've spent all last week pursuing a complaint made on the 21st to what seems to be a giant black hole of complete indifference.
For about the last year, until this March, I was treading ground with my account which was just within the £200 overdraft, merely paying off the interest thereon. I was then informed that, as of April, they were going to change their overdraft arrangements (as you do) which would leave me unable to pay them and thus incur charges. Wanting to avoid this I contacted them, despite their total lack of interest (because I wasn't technically in debt) I made a complaint which resulted in an arrange to pay off that amount at £3 a month with the overdraft being removed and the account being closed at the end. They even wrote to me notarising this. Great, thought I.
So everything had been going along swimmingly with this arrangement until the middle of this month whereupon I receive a letter urging me to get in touch and warning of credit default consequences and that action would be taken if I failed to contact them. Huh?
Turns out that, when they said, back in March, that they would review the situation in 6 months - which is fine - they meant that the agreement would only ever last 6 months and that I'd have to find £180 to pay back pretty sharpish or my credit rating goes tits up and they send my debt on to the Mitchell Brothers to collect instead. Well that's bollocks; why would I have agreed to that as doing so has effectively left me in a much worse position with no overdraft and a large amount of money I now actually do owe and no agreement to pay it off!
On top of that no one told me this in September, or until now - but they've been happy to accept my payments made in what seems blissful ignorance. The overdraft should have been removed (had the agreement gone as intended) in March, but was in fact removed in October - a month after the agreement supposedly ended. Again they could have warned me about this in September and a new agreement negotiated.
I've spent the entire week on the phone (god bless saynotto0870.com) to their collections department as well as their complaints department being bounced around between. To say Santander are incompetent, negligent and irresponsible would be to do those words a grotesque disservice. Their reputation for such is...well deserved.
Ever deal with the devil...?
Tuesday, 29 November 2011
Friday, 25 November 2011
Rookie Mistake
Having just signed on this morning I am now kicking myself as I type this. I made a rookie error when presented with a call centre job that's going to be interviewing next week. I agreed to apply for it even though my JSAg recognises that such environments are not the sort of places conducive to a good state of mind for me. I felt I should apply even though I was given the choice; I felt I had to be seen to be playing the game, to be making an effort. What an idiot. Now I'm committed to apply for a job, and one that's being handled by the JC+ themselves, so there's no way I can get out of it! Though more fool them if they employ me I suppose, but I just can't handle those environments, I can't even deal with the idea of being called in for a grammar test (held next Thursday) and an assessment and all sorts of high pressure bollocks the next day as well (at cost to me in terms of bus fares, I have no idea if transport costs are reimbursed).
However one concession was made: as my JSAg is set to 20 hours a week maximum (something that is itself a double edged sword given the cost of transport), the advisor suggested I limit the available hours for this position to 20 (which is why I agreed to apply rather than be seen to keep equivocating). The job is listed at 35 hours with the requirement of a flexible approach to work. The advert itself is rife with the usual vague requirements that I may or may not have anyway. Frankly I could do without all of this. But that's because I'm a lazy scrounger!
It's the nature of the Jobcentre environment, that's the problem. I won't say the advisor was out to trick me, but they are part of the environment. They obviously want me to not be signing on; that's the bottom line. But the heavy handed nature of the penalties for not doing what you are 'required' means that I feel compelled to take decisions and make such rookie mistakes. I feel as though I'm constantly under surveillance in terms of my performance as a jobseeker and with the threat of losing benefit ever present I feel I have no choice, sometimes, but to apply. But the thought of this particular job, and even the whole application process, makes me very uncomfortable. However there's just no alternatives - another reason to want to be seen to playing the game. If I don't apply, questions will be asked with a possibility of a sanction and I doubt, having chosen freely to apply, that I can get away with any excuse or to change my mind. Is this the best system we can muster? Offering people the opportunity iof applying for work the JC has already agreed isn't suitable? Not call centre work is explicitly a part of my JSAg (which makes my stupid decision all the more inexplicable).
Sometimes I think I would welcome a sanction. Not really, of course. Having no income would be absolutely catastrophic for me as it would for any of us. However at least you wouldn't have to then worry about whether one was incoming. The coldest of comfort; but that's how this system shapes you. It wears you down and breeds a paranoid atmosphere. Hardly a place of support for those that need it when out of work.
However one concession was made: as my JSAg is set to 20 hours a week maximum (something that is itself a double edged sword given the cost of transport), the advisor suggested I limit the available hours for this position to 20 (which is why I agreed to apply rather than be seen to keep equivocating). The job is listed at 35 hours with the requirement of a flexible approach to work. The advert itself is rife with the usual vague requirements that I may or may not have anyway. Frankly I could do without all of this. But that's because I'm a lazy scrounger!
It's the nature of the Jobcentre environment, that's the problem. I won't say the advisor was out to trick me, but they are part of the environment. They obviously want me to not be signing on; that's the bottom line. But the heavy handed nature of the penalties for not doing what you are 'required' means that I feel compelled to take decisions and make such rookie mistakes. I feel as though I'm constantly under surveillance in terms of my performance as a jobseeker and with the threat of losing benefit ever present I feel I have no choice, sometimes, but to apply. But the thought of this particular job, and even the whole application process, makes me very uncomfortable. However there's just no alternatives - another reason to want to be seen to playing the game. If I don't apply, questions will be asked with a possibility of a sanction and I doubt, having chosen freely to apply, that I can get away with any excuse or to change my mind. Is this the best system we can muster? Offering people the opportunity iof applying for work the JC has already agreed isn't suitable? Not call centre work is explicitly a part of my JSAg (which makes my stupid decision all the more inexplicable).
Sometimes I think I would welcome a sanction. Not really, of course. Having no income would be absolutely catastrophic for me as it would for any of us. However at least you wouldn't have to then worry about whether one was incoming. The coldest of comfort; but that's how this system shapes you. It wears you down and breeds a paranoid atmosphere. Hardly a place of support for those that need it when out of work.
Tuesday, 22 November 2011
Mr Grayling!
Mr Grayling...(to paraphrase Ozzy Osbourne!) has written in the Guardian. Here's my response to thsi awful individual's free piece of propaganda.
This is grandstanding; a far greater injustice is forcing people, in lieu of withdrawal of their only source of income, to work somewhere they have no say in for no wage. How is that acceptable? You have substituted opportunity for competition; forcing people to fight like hungry jackals over increasingly scarce scraps thrown by deign of the master's will from the capitalist's banquet table. Money for you and the welfare provider pimps, such as A4E, nothing for the worker. How is forcing a graduate to work at Poundland anything other than a scandalous waste of their education (and thus taxpayer money)? How is forcing increasing numbers of the unemployed into the same merry go round of menial drudgery ever going to help them? Will you give them work experience in the House of Parliament, sir? Or are such jobs only for the scions of the rich who get to bid on positions in the city? (Warning link to the Daily Fail).
Why does a position of low skill such as shelf stacking require eight weeks worth of unpaid experience? How will that give them an edge against their peers who are forced into the same situation? You are simply lowering the standards for competition and thus profit. Disgraceful.
So the ends justify the means? If this is true, why aren't these positions advertised as proper jobs in the first place for people to apply and start work in without the charade of what is simply indentured servitude. Why the facade, they the jumping through hoops for the sole benefit of employers?
Of course these people are off benefits, because they are not considered unemployed while on these schemes.
What if someone doesn't want to go to POundland for no wage? What alternative is offered to them?
Really that's the norm is it? What about someone that doesn't want to be running a business, or supervising other checkout staff? What is the point of pushing people into a category they don't desire or want to belong in? What are their alternatives other than benefit sanctions and a punitive culture of scrutiny from the DWP? This veneration of business people is ridiculous; life isn't the Apprentice and the people of this country don't all want life to be an episode thereof. Where is your support to science and the arts?
I find you to be a disingenuous individual, representative of an odious coalition of liars besotted by an outdated work ethic and a belief in scarcity economics. You are nasty and divisive and you shall never ever get my vote.
But your evaluation of the work experience scheme is a great injustice to the young people who are benefiting from it.
This is grandstanding; a far greater injustice is forcing people, in lieu of withdrawal of their only source of income, to work somewhere they have no say in for no wage. How is that acceptable? You have substituted opportunity for competition; forcing people to fight like hungry jackals over increasingly scarce scraps thrown by deign of the master's will from the capitalist's banquet table. Money for you and the welfare provider pimps, such as A4E, nothing for the worker. How is forcing a graduate to work at Poundland anything other than a scandalous waste of their education (and thus taxpayer money)? How is forcing increasing numbers of the unemployed into the same merry go round of menial drudgery ever going to help them? Will you give them work experience in the House of Parliament, sir? Or are such jobs only for the scions of the rich who get to bid on positions in the city? (Warning link to the Daily Fail).
The scheme is designed to get young, unemployed people into the workplace for up to eight weeks of work experience.
Why does a position of low skill such as shelf stacking require eight weeks worth of unpaid experience? How will that give them an edge against their peers who are forced into the same situation? You are simply lowering the standards for competition and thus profit. Disgraceful.
The early results have been encouraging. More than half of those who enter the scheme are off benefits within three months, and many are staying on with the same employers.
So the ends justify the means? If this is true, why aren't these positions advertised as proper jobs in the first place for people to apply and start work in without the charade of what is simply indentured servitude. Why the facade, they the jumping through hoops for the sole benefit of employers?
Of course these people are off benefits, because they are not considered unemployed while on these schemes.
What if someone doesn't want to go to POundland for no wage? What alternative is offered to them?
And let's not be snobbish about this – plenty of people have started on the bottom rung and climbed their way to the top. I met someone recently who had been unemployed for years, got a job on the checkouts and quickly moved into running a staff of 20. A branch manager for a big store is often running a multimillion-pound business.
Really that's the norm is it? What about someone that doesn't want to be running a business, or supervising other checkout staff? What is the point of pushing people into a category they don't desire or want to belong in? What are their alternatives other than benefit sanctions and a punitive culture of scrutiny from the DWP? This veneration of business people is ridiculous; life isn't the Apprentice and the people of this country don't all want life to be an episode thereof. Where is your support to science and the arts?
I find you to be a disingenuous individual, representative of an odious coalition of liars besotted by an outdated work ethic and a belief in scarcity economics. You are nasty and divisive and you shall never ever get my vote.
Where's My Crystal Bath!
This is a superlative article and I enjoyed reading it, even though I felt like I was going to vomit over my keyboard at the lifestyle of the Ecclestones. Crystal baths? Private nightclubs? Pet salons? I sit at a 6 year old creaking pc on a piece of lawn furniture wearing primark's finest and live in a house with zero insulation (i feel as apprehensive about the winter as the heroes of Game of Thrones). I cannot relate to these people at all. I cannot understand it - a £45 million home? I have no idea what miss Ecclestone does, but surely that is wealth beyond the dreams of avarice, to coin a phrase.
I'm not here to compare my lot with hers. It's not a sob story (the only thing I really crave is a decent PC, frankly - and it needn't be made from mexican crystal). But the point is this:
A brilliant concise observsation that the ruling rich disngenuously disown. I personally believe there should be fairness and I am always loathe to hear people trot out the tired old 'life ain't fair sonny jim' line. Life should be fair, and we can start by petitioning our corrupt leaders to do something about it.
I'm not here to compare my lot with hers. It's not a sob story (the only thing I really crave is a decent PC, frankly - and it needn't be made from mexican crystal). But the point is this:
Socialism for the rich, capitalism for the poor: that is how our economies work.
A brilliant concise observsation that the ruling rich disngenuously disown. I personally believe there should be fairness and I am always loathe to hear people trot out the tired old 'life ain't fair sonny jim' line. Life should be fair, and we can start by petitioning our corrupt leaders to do something about it.
Monday, 21 November 2011
Lord Freud Strikes Again!
Or, as I like to call him, Lord Fraud. Once a Labour 'adviser' (his expertise comes from years as a banker with about 5 minutes knowledge on welfare) on welfare reform, now defected to the Tories. Clearly a man who knows which way the wind is blowing.
I don't live in Huddersfield, but this article seems portentous to all of us on benefits, specifically those on sick benefits - or rather those that might come to be! Which of course could be any of us.
To use language such as 'fewer wasted lives' just betrays the tory mindset. They really believe they are on some ideological crusade. This is an absolutely crazy idea that will, at best, emasculate doctors with whom prospective sick claimants will need a deep and personal relationship.
So what will happen? The prospective claimant will probably have to ring up their local ATOS office no doubt to be given a medical in order to claim a sick note - not even a guarantee that sick note will lead to a proper claim for ESA (ATOS will surely demand another medical, once the note is sent in, to decide the validity of the claim). This is one more sinister piece of tory hate. All disguised as helping the feckless and saving them from themselves.
I cannot see how this can even be considered practical; how are sick people going to get the state to validate their condition (you don't have to have a sick note to be sick) if they have to find some means to get to an independent examiner who may not be anywhere near their local GP. Will they attend home visits? Who will they be accountable to? What happens if the patient's GP (or specialist), who is probably in the best position to diagnose the patients fitness to work disagrees with the independent examiner's diagnosis?
Good god, the article even quotes Fraud as saying 'GPs are not experts necessarily in occupational health' - so GP's don't know what's best for their patients. On top of this he seems to want this to be another hurdle to claiming ATOS. On top of having to acquire a sick note from a trained objective and qualified doctor, the patient has to pass an 'independent' medical from the likes of ATOS, and now has to get a second sick note from another (ie ATOS, I suspect) examiner whose quality will of course be beyond reproach.
I don't live in Huddersfield, but this article seems portentous to all of us on benefits, specifically those on sick benefits - or rather those that might come to be! Which of course could be any of us.
To use language such as 'fewer wasted lives' just betrays the tory mindset. They really believe they are on some ideological crusade. This is an absolutely crazy idea that will, at best, emasculate doctors with whom prospective sick claimants will need a deep and personal relationship.
So what will happen? The prospective claimant will probably have to ring up their local ATOS office no doubt to be given a medical in order to claim a sick note - not even a guarantee that sick note will lead to a proper claim for ESA (ATOS will surely demand another medical, once the note is sent in, to decide the validity of the claim). This is one more sinister piece of tory hate. All disguised as helping the feckless and saving them from themselves.
I cannot see how this can even be considered practical; how are sick people going to get the state to validate their condition (you don't have to have a sick note to be sick) if they have to find some means to get to an independent examiner who may not be anywhere near their local GP. Will they attend home visits? Who will they be accountable to? What happens if the patient's GP (or specialist), who is probably in the best position to diagnose the patients fitness to work disagrees with the independent examiner's diagnosis?
Good god, the article even quotes Fraud as saying 'GPs are not experts necessarily in occupational health' - so GP's don't know what's best for their patients. On top of this he seems to want this to be another hurdle to claiming ATOS. On top of having to acquire a sick note from a trained objective and qualified doctor, the patient has to pass an 'independent' medical from the likes of ATOS, and now has to get a second sick note from another (ie ATOS, I suspect) examiner whose quality will of course be beyond reproach.
Sunday, 20 November 2011
Inertia
Signing on gets progressively tougher the longer it lasts. This of course isn't matched with an increase in the opportunities available to you. All that you will ever find, from the JC, is whatever happens to be on their fallible, poorly administered and probably exploitative, database. Something they will never fix. There is an increased inertia which weighs against the claimant as a result of remaining as a claimant.
Advisers will question why you aren't getting shortlisted, picked, interviewed or whatever, but they will not accept that the labour market is on its knees. They certainly won't accept that most of the jobs, in my humble opinion, you are made to apply for are completely unsuitable and probably don't exist. At least not in the form presented on the printout. I always double check the information I'm given because that's the only way to find out what the job's actual conditions are (whether it's in fact part time, not full time, or what the hours are meant to be since the JC decline to tell you).
Increasingly I find I'm repeating myself each time I go in to sign. It's the same conversation with the same, pointless, small talk (small talk makes me uncomfortable): "how are you today". I'm still out of work, what else is there to say? I can't tell them the system is a depressing nightmare of harsh conditionality and that I'm worried I'll be left destitute.
This repetitioin doesn't work in my favour. But again the inflexibility of the system makes it impossible to do anything else. My jobsearch, week in and week out, is almost identical. But there isn't anything else I can do. There's no other options the JC offer. Look on their database, find a bunch of stuff that isn't suitable, struggle to apply for it, get nowhere, get criticised for it.
This friday is my next signing time and I'm feeling particularly vulnerable. There is no willingness to try anything else. Why aren't the unemployed being given the option, for example, to go to university for free? Learn something! Find an opportunity. Every time it's the same process: adviser looks on that stupid database (something I myself have already done and that's also part of my JSAg so that I have to). I feel like a different shaped peg perpetually being forced into a square hole (or pick your own shapes!), over and over and getting blamed when it fails - as it will fail. There is no attempt to, er, find a different shaped hole! I think you get the picture.
Surely the DWP, in 21st century Britain, can find different ways to let people develop a career or find an income, than hand them the same stupid printouts of 'customer service officer/agent/adviser/executive' or 'admin officer/agent/adviser/executive' or 'sales officer/agent/adviser/executive'. Their database parameters are a complete mess: they have about 10 different categories for shop work. How many do you need? Sales assistant, manager/supervisor, and stockroom - if that! It's a complete and total mess and I'm convinced that, as well as cutting and pasting ads taken directly (and probably without the employer's knowledge) from other jobsearch websites, they edit and subtly change the ads that employers place with them.
Either that or they are just plain incompetent.
Advisers will question why you aren't getting shortlisted, picked, interviewed or whatever, but they will not accept that the labour market is on its knees. They certainly won't accept that most of the jobs, in my humble opinion, you are made to apply for are completely unsuitable and probably don't exist. At least not in the form presented on the printout. I always double check the information I'm given because that's the only way to find out what the job's actual conditions are (whether it's in fact part time, not full time, or what the hours are meant to be since the JC decline to tell you).
Increasingly I find I'm repeating myself each time I go in to sign. It's the same conversation with the same, pointless, small talk (small talk makes me uncomfortable): "how are you today". I'm still out of work, what else is there to say? I can't tell them the system is a depressing nightmare of harsh conditionality and that I'm worried I'll be left destitute.
This repetitioin doesn't work in my favour. But again the inflexibility of the system makes it impossible to do anything else. My jobsearch, week in and week out, is almost identical. But there isn't anything else I can do. There's no other options the JC offer. Look on their database, find a bunch of stuff that isn't suitable, struggle to apply for it, get nowhere, get criticised for it.
This friday is my next signing time and I'm feeling particularly vulnerable. There is no willingness to try anything else. Why aren't the unemployed being given the option, for example, to go to university for free? Learn something! Find an opportunity. Every time it's the same process: adviser looks on that stupid database (something I myself have already done and that's also part of my JSAg so that I have to). I feel like a different shaped peg perpetually being forced into a square hole (or pick your own shapes!), over and over and getting blamed when it fails - as it will fail. There is no attempt to, er, find a different shaped hole! I think you get the picture.
Surely the DWP, in 21st century Britain, can find different ways to let people develop a career or find an income, than hand them the same stupid printouts of 'customer service officer/agent/adviser/executive' or 'admin officer/agent/adviser/executive' or 'sales officer/agent/adviser/executive'. Their database parameters are a complete mess: they have about 10 different categories for shop work. How many do you need? Sales assistant, manager/supervisor, and stockroom - if that! It's a complete and total mess and I'm convinced that, as well as cutting and pasting ads taken directly (and probably without the employer's knowledge) from other jobsearch websites, they edit and subtly change the ads that employers place with them.
Either that or they are just plain incompetent.
Saturday, 19 November 2011
Stuff from This Week
IDS appeared on a World At One broadcast (no link, the programme isn't available anymore, sorry) recently where he talked to some unemployed youth types in Hackney. Yet more propaganda for the Work Programme, which, it seems to me, is not quite the panacea the tories want it to be. However they continue to fall back on propaganda whenever the issue of youth unemployment rears it's head, as it has this week with the reported increase in the number of such people.
IDS was quizzed by an ex prisoner about the obvious difficulties of finding work. He seems, like all tories, ideologically incapable of understanding that right wing policies have bred the problems people like the prisoner have had in their lives, problems that compel people - without making excuses - into crime (no one's born a crook). We have a society with a climate of fear, division, envy and resentment - envy of the lot of the poorest in society because they don't have jobs the rest of us resent. Fear that those jobs will be taken (ostensibly by immigrants, or whatever other bogeyman the Daily Mail would like to set up).
Within that climate, as we have seen this summer, we have riots - and not for the first time (or the last, I fear) under a tory government. So what does the government do? Lock up two people for the crime of being incredibly stupid in exercising freedom of speech despite the consequence being that noone took them seriously (no riots occured from their facebook messages). These two will be facing IDS in the same way in a few years time, with the same questions about finding work. People that IDS describes as having distorted values - as though they were savage aliens! In this climate how are people such as ex-prisoners ever going to find work?
In a week where the Guardian has a simple and sublime expose on workfare, Junior WorkFuhrer Grayling (opposed - hah! - by David Miliband) appeared on Newsnight discussing youth unemployment. Again, amid the experiences of young graduates and kids out of school, the Work Programme was championed. Again the myth that it will provide one to one tailored individual support was championed. Is this even happening? Not from where I'm sitting.
Instead we are consigning graduates to menial unskilled work for no wage in places like Poundland - employers that don't even offer a wage and are all too happy to take free labour on! What a waste! Why bother even going to university (and thereby shutting down the education system which won't make any money because people won't be borrowing increased tuition fees to go). At every turn this government shows a paucity of economic knowledge that borders on the frightening. What business do these Work Programme providers have in sending people onto workfare schemes (or, as they probably call it, work experience)? They aren't therefore delivering the service they are supposed to!
When I was at school i did a week's experience at a signwriters. Boring as hell (because I couldn't get involved due to the complex machinery). But it was one week - and I was taken to every department to see what it was all about. Not the same as being made to stack shelves for 6 months! We are destroying our own futures.
In other, perhaps less exciting news, my last signing session with my 'adviser' (seriously, what do these people advise?) and I have been booked to see a 'work psychologist' in a month's time! I have no idea what such a person does, though it will probably be an attempt to brainwash me into believing that menial work is the future. Nope sorry, don't agree. I have nothing against people doping such work, just the work itself. I aspire to more than that from life, but that would require the government invest more money - money it probably needs to invest in a bigger wine cellar in the Houses of Parliament.
IDS was quizzed by an ex prisoner about the obvious difficulties of finding work. He seems, like all tories, ideologically incapable of understanding that right wing policies have bred the problems people like the prisoner have had in their lives, problems that compel people - without making excuses - into crime (no one's born a crook). We have a society with a climate of fear, division, envy and resentment - envy of the lot of the poorest in society because they don't have jobs the rest of us resent. Fear that those jobs will be taken (ostensibly by immigrants, or whatever other bogeyman the Daily Mail would like to set up).
Within that climate, as we have seen this summer, we have riots - and not for the first time (or the last, I fear) under a tory government. So what does the government do? Lock up two people for the crime of being incredibly stupid in exercising freedom of speech despite the consequence being that noone took them seriously (no riots occured from their facebook messages). These two will be facing IDS in the same way in a few years time, with the same questions about finding work. People that IDS describes as having distorted values - as though they were savage aliens! In this climate how are people such as ex-prisoners ever going to find work?
In a week where the Guardian has a simple and sublime expose on workfare, Junior WorkFuhrer Grayling (opposed - hah! - by David Miliband) appeared on Newsnight discussing youth unemployment. Again, amid the experiences of young graduates and kids out of school, the Work Programme was championed. Again the myth that it will provide one to one tailored individual support was championed. Is this even happening? Not from where I'm sitting.
Instead we are consigning graduates to menial unskilled work for no wage in places like Poundland - employers that don't even offer a wage and are all too happy to take free labour on! What a waste! Why bother even going to university (and thereby shutting down the education system which won't make any money because people won't be borrowing increased tuition fees to go). At every turn this government shows a paucity of economic knowledge that borders on the frightening. What business do these Work Programme providers have in sending people onto workfare schemes (or, as they probably call it, work experience)? They aren't therefore delivering the service they are supposed to!
When I was at school i did a week's experience at a signwriters. Boring as hell (because I couldn't get involved due to the complex machinery). But it was one week - and I was taken to every department to see what it was all about. Not the same as being made to stack shelves for 6 months! We are destroying our own futures.
In other, perhaps less exciting news, my last signing session with my 'adviser' (seriously, what do these people advise?) and I have been booked to see a 'work psychologist' in a month's time! I have no idea what such a person does, though it will probably be an attempt to brainwash me into believing that menial work is the future. Nope sorry, don't agree. I have nothing against people doping such work, just the work itself. I aspire to more than that from life, but that would require the government invest more money - money it probably needs to invest in a bigger wine cellar in the Houses of Parliament.
Friday, 11 November 2011
Community Service
This is something we currently use as a punishment for certain crimes and certain criminals. It's also something the government wants to introduce for people that come out of the two year Work Programme having still found no work. In other words, it's workfare. I object to this for reasons I've already mentioned, but the guidelines for this have been linked elsewhere online. I am reposting my comments from that site here.
From the above document:
If you are going to mandate people to a 30 hour a week job then how on earth can you argue this isn't going to displace a paid position. To me this is the rotten core of the whole workfare scheme. Why can't these placements be paid work, therefore solving the problem it's ostensibly trying to fix. Of course we see that isn't what this is about; it's cheap labour for the private sector under the guise of 'giving something back' or the Big Society.
This seems to suggest that someone who is working (whether or not it's less than 30 hours a week, or whatever they deem part time) already is still not contributing sufficiently to their community, or getting the 'experience' this scheme offers! I find this extraordinary. It makes me wonder just what the people in charge are themselves contributing, or is it ok so long as people are out of work to be forced into indentured servitude.
A participant who is absent from their placement (e.g. short term sickness, domestic emergency etc), will still need to complete 30 hours work experience in that week to enable you to count this period as one of the completed weeks. If you cannot make arrangements for them to complete the hours missed you will be unable count this period towards your completion fee.
This means that providers are incentivised to compel people to complete a 30 hour a week - regardless of any personal problems that may arise in that claimant's life. If they don't they risk losing their payment. How is that fair? If someone has a bereavement or becomes ill halfway through the week, for example, how are they to complete their week? I guess workers rights don't apply, yet again, to the unemployed. Though of course people in this position will be classed as neither employed nor unemployed.
There are probably many other points of contention within that document, but these are the issues that struck me the most, the first being the most fundamental bone of contention. Where do we go from here?
From the above document:
9. CAP work experience placements must deliver a contribution to the local
community and must not displace what would otherwise be paid jobs."
If you are going to mandate people to a 30 hour a week job then how on earth can you argue this isn't going to displace a paid position. To me this is the rotten core of the whole workfare scheme. Why can't these placements be paid work, therefore solving the problem it's ostensibly trying to fix. Of course we see that isn't what this is about; it's cheap labour for the private sector under the guise of 'giving something back' or the Big Society.
12. If a participant has a part time job you will need to take this into account
when arranging the placement. However, you need to ensure that time spent on
the placement is as close to full time hours (up to 30 hours a week) as
possible. You need to take into account the time the participant spends
travelling to ensure that they can maintain their part time work.
This seems to suggest that someone who is working (whether or not it's less than 30 hours a week, or whatever they deem part time) already is still not contributing sufficiently to their community, or getting the 'experience' this scheme offers! I find this extraordinary. It makes me wonder just what the people in charge are themselves contributing, or is it ok so long as people are out of work to be forced into indentured servitude.
In addition to providing the 30 hours per week participation on a work placementSo a 30 hour a week placement becomes the full working week. This surely is going to be a logistical nightmare. It's going to be costing the taxpayer a fortune reimbursing costs between placement, home, and (possibly) provider. Not to mention the time required to travel between all three in one day.
you should maintain at least a minimum of weekly contact with each participant
and have the flexibility to deliver up to 10 hours of additional provider-led
jobsearch support each week.
A participant who is absent from their placement (e.g. short term sickness, domestic emergency etc), will still need to complete 30 hours work experience in that week to enable you to count this period as one of the completed weeks. If you cannot make arrangements for them to complete the hours missed you will be unable count this period towards your completion fee.
This means that providers are incentivised to compel people to complete a 30 hour a week - regardless of any personal problems that may arise in that claimant's life. If they don't they risk losing their payment. How is that fair? If someone has a bereavement or becomes ill halfway through the week, for example, how are they to complete their week? I guess workers rights don't apply, yet again, to the unemployed. Though of course people in this position will be classed as neither employed nor unemployed.
There are probably many other points of contention within that document, but these are the issues that struck me the most, the first being the most fundamental bone of contention. Where do we go from here?
Thursday, 10 November 2011
Overheard in the Surgery!
Ooh matron (not really).
I was waiting to see the doctor (stress and tiredness I think are inducing weird motion sickness) and listening to the local BBC station. Apparently benefit fraud is on the increase in Bristol - or at least they reported a windfall of prosecutions.
Well that's great; no one is going to defend benefit fraud, though personally I can't see it as much more than a victimless crime perpetrated by people ruled by even bigger crooks. I don't lose much sleep over it, sorry. But, as a claimant, I have to be seen to disapprove, which is fair enough I suppose. I don't condone it regardless.
I have to wonder though how much money is spent chasing these people? I'm not the first to make this point, and I won't be the last. Surely if someone's only crime is that they have claimed fraudulently, even if it's a few grand, is there any point throwing even more money in what is clearly an exercise in making an example of these people? Send a few down as a message to the masses that the capitalist system WILL break you and WILL win - but at what cost? Isn't this the absurd contradiction of capitalism? It's creating problems where none ought to or need to exist.
According to the council's benefit fraud webpage they investigated 667 allegations of benefit fraud. We prosecuted 61 people and a further 108 received warnings or were fined. So not even half of those allegations were substantiated. What does that say about our society? We know that the percentage of benefit money paid due to fraud is miniscule (the total is about a third of that lost to error, with both totalling around 5bn). How much did each investigation cost, what were the procedures used (were they too intrusive with people on ridiculous stakeouts)?. What was the cost of each prosecution, including the cost of jail time to the state etc? How much does it cost just to warn someone? It's just ridiculous; it's like the drug war - we criminalise people and then create an industry out of it so that some can profit (private security/investigators for starters). How about the cost of the freephone benefit fraud snitchline?
And where is the phoneline to shop a dodgy banker or mp? 'Report a fraudster now' - wait, you have to establish guilt first. Aren't we supposed to live in a presumed innocent society, or is that a privilege one must concede while unemployed (or even employed!)? Given the rate of prosecutions mentioned above it's a bit rich to presume guilt!
Of course benefit fraud is easy meat for the right wing press; it's largely impossible to defend (though I maintain that, where innocent people are not hurt, conned or manipulated I find it hard to really care). So as a sensible anti-capitalist I don't condone it. But let's have some facts and some perspective. It's easy to criticise people for making these choices, but when you're poor (and yes, not all 'fraudsters' are poor) and claiming while doing a few hours cash in hand - are you really the bogeyman?
I was waiting to see the doctor (stress and tiredness I think are inducing weird motion sickness) and listening to the local BBC station. Apparently benefit fraud is on the increase in Bristol - or at least they reported a windfall of prosecutions.
Well that's great; no one is going to defend benefit fraud, though personally I can't see it as much more than a victimless crime perpetrated by people ruled by even bigger crooks. I don't lose much sleep over it, sorry. But, as a claimant, I have to be seen to disapprove, which is fair enough I suppose. I don't condone it regardless.
I have to wonder though how much money is spent chasing these people? I'm not the first to make this point, and I won't be the last. Surely if someone's only crime is that they have claimed fraudulently, even if it's a few grand, is there any point throwing even more money in what is clearly an exercise in making an example of these people? Send a few down as a message to the masses that the capitalist system WILL break you and WILL win - but at what cost? Isn't this the absurd contradiction of capitalism? It's creating problems where none ought to or need to exist.
According to the council's benefit fraud webpage they investigated 667 allegations of benefit fraud. We prosecuted 61 people and a further 108 received warnings or were fined. So not even half of those allegations were substantiated. What does that say about our society? We know that the percentage of benefit money paid due to fraud is miniscule (the total is about a third of that lost to error, with both totalling around 5bn). How much did each investigation cost, what were the procedures used (were they too intrusive with people on ridiculous stakeouts)?. What was the cost of each prosecution, including the cost of jail time to the state etc? How much does it cost just to warn someone? It's just ridiculous; it's like the drug war - we criminalise people and then create an industry out of it so that some can profit (private security/investigators for starters). How about the cost of the freephone benefit fraud snitchline?
And where is the phoneline to shop a dodgy banker or mp? 'Report a fraudster now' - wait, you have to establish guilt first. Aren't we supposed to live in a presumed innocent society, or is that a privilege one must concede while unemployed (or even employed!)? Given the rate of prosecutions mentioned above it's a bit rich to presume guilt!
Of course benefit fraud is easy meat for the right wing press; it's largely impossible to defend (though I maintain that, where innocent people are not hurt, conned or manipulated I find it hard to really care). So as a sensible anti-capitalist I don't condone it. But let's have some facts and some perspective. It's easy to criticise people for making these choices, but when you're poor (and yes, not all 'fraudsters' are poor) and claiming while doing a few hours cash in hand - are you really the bogeyman?
Wednesday, 9 November 2011
They Don't Get It
The Tories will simply never understand the reality of unemployment.
Firstly cutting people off of benefits will only create further problems. These people will still exist as will their needs which, if not met by the welfare state, will be met by the street and by criminality. That itself will bring increased cost (and of course increased opprobrium from the right wingers) for everyone else through increased insurance premiums, retail prices (to cover the costs of shoplifting for example) and perhaps prison time. They will be alienated from society and thus more motivated to antisocial behaviour and to move against society through criminality. This is why we have a welfare state. The Tories do not understand this. To them it, and thus the poor and the weak, are only ever a burden.
The Work Programme is clearly a scam. I've said it before: the unemployment gravy train. It is obviously a money making scheme for a group of businessmen and women, some of whom may be naively idealistic. What was advertised as the antithesis of a one size fits all programme is clearly just that. Compelling people to spend time on crappy computers searching for the same jobs as everyone else while moaning about the fonts on their cv isn't helping anyone achieve anything. Why not fund these people through the education system, through university? Instead they'll be given courses in lifting cardboard boxes, counting money, and sitting on the checkout. It is the privatisation of the welfare state by the back door. I've yet to hear one positive anecdote regarding the Work Programme against a backdrop of dissatisfaction. Will the government listen? Work Overgruppenfuhrer Chris Grayling thinks that the WP is 'intensive activity' - doing what? Forcing people to learn about the world of work in a charity shop? Been there, done that. You know what, it was boring as hell even if it was for a good cause. I didn't really learn anything and no one is going to take that seriously as experience when they can employ someone with more relevant experience easily enough.
Then we come to the idea of workfare. Cameron is now proposing 6 months of 30 hour weekly unpaid work! This is just preposterous. You cannot expect people to work for nothing - well the Tories seem to. But the bottom line with this awful scheme is that if there is work for people to do why are we not offering it to them in return for a proper wage, rights and liability? Surely if these people are working you pay them! 30 hours for £65 is clearly not the minimum wage or even close to it. Is this the standard we want to lower ourselves to? It's forced prostitution - it's just slavery. What kind of quality of work will you get for this kind of treatment? People that don't want to be there aren't going to be motivated to 'help their community' - and why should they? Why should the unemployed be given the responsibility of cleaning up after everyone else? It's fine to talk about responsibilities, but they aren't the ones (or the only ones at least) making a mess. But it's ok for long term unemployed in hi-vis vests to clear up the cigar butts tossed from the Bentley's driven by posh Tory wankers on their way home? There's something deeply divisive about this allowing people to abdicate their own communal responsibilities just because they have a job and others don't.
We must fight this.
Firstly cutting people off of benefits will only create further problems. These people will still exist as will their needs which, if not met by the welfare state, will be met by the street and by criminality. That itself will bring increased cost (and of course increased opprobrium from the right wingers) for everyone else through increased insurance premiums, retail prices (to cover the costs of shoplifting for example) and perhaps prison time. They will be alienated from society and thus more motivated to antisocial behaviour and to move against society through criminality. This is why we have a welfare state. The Tories do not understand this. To them it, and thus the poor and the weak, are only ever a burden.
The Work Programme is clearly a scam. I've said it before: the unemployment gravy train. It is obviously a money making scheme for a group of businessmen and women, some of whom may be naively idealistic. What was advertised as the antithesis of a one size fits all programme is clearly just that. Compelling people to spend time on crappy computers searching for the same jobs as everyone else while moaning about the fonts on their cv isn't helping anyone achieve anything. Why not fund these people through the education system, through university? Instead they'll be given courses in lifting cardboard boxes, counting money, and sitting on the checkout. It is the privatisation of the welfare state by the back door. I've yet to hear one positive anecdote regarding the Work Programme against a backdrop of dissatisfaction. Will the government listen? Work Overgruppenfuhrer Chris Grayling thinks that the WP is 'intensive activity' - doing what? Forcing people to learn about the world of work in a charity shop? Been there, done that. You know what, it was boring as hell even if it was for a good cause. I didn't really learn anything and no one is going to take that seriously as experience when they can employ someone with more relevant experience easily enough.
Then we come to the idea of workfare. Cameron is now proposing 6 months of 30 hour weekly unpaid work! This is just preposterous. You cannot expect people to work for nothing - well the Tories seem to. But the bottom line with this awful scheme is that if there is work for people to do why are we not offering it to them in return for a proper wage, rights and liability? Surely if these people are working you pay them! 30 hours for £65 is clearly not the minimum wage or even close to it. Is this the standard we want to lower ourselves to? It's forced prostitution - it's just slavery. What kind of quality of work will you get for this kind of treatment? People that don't want to be there aren't going to be motivated to 'help their community' - and why should they? Why should the unemployed be given the responsibility of cleaning up after everyone else? It's fine to talk about responsibilities, but they aren't the ones (or the only ones at least) making a mess. But it's ok for long term unemployed in hi-vis vests to clear up the cigar butts tossed from the Bentley's driven by posh Tory wankers on their way home? There's something deeply divisive about this allowing people to abdicate their own communal responsibilities just because they have a job and others don't.
We must fight this.
Monday, 7 November 2011
A Waste of Energy
Many years ago a mate said to me that everyone should spend a turn on the dole, in order to open their eyes to the system we have in this society. I think that's a great point - not that I wish destitution and financial insecurity on people.
Society goes to such great lengths to make people feel that work is the be all and the end all that you have to wonder if there's something to hide. The phrase 'hardworking' is bandied about with almost reckless abandon, but usually by the manager class in this country. People that don't subscribe to this notion are immediately marginalised as lazy.
This is absurd. Firstly I subscribe to the Taoist ideology that simply says one should only exert the required amount of effort to perform the task at hand well. But again our society views that as the definition of sloth. This is also absurd. Whatever is the point of just frittering and wasting our time and energy - as if the time and energy of the unemployed are worth less than the 'hard' working man's own. If one wastes their energy, putting in '110%' effort (and other such stock cliches), then one is only going to run out of energy quicker.
I always find this idea of hard working people somewhat laughable: are people typing their keyboards harder or faster? Are they checking items on a till faster and faster like robots? Is that even what people want from businesses? Wasting energy is foolish and it isn't hardwork; quite the opposite.
But the phrase has become the tool of our divisive capitalist system: you are either a member of the hardworking taxpayer class, or you are a scrounger. The deserving and the undeserving. I don't want to work hard; what's the point of that? I want to spend my time doing things that give my life value. Whether they earn money really is irrelevant - except for the unfortunate fact that's how the system works. Anything that doesn't earn money is meaningless.
Why don't we have an unemployment system that firstly ensures people are financially secure. That should be a given, not a component wholly dependent on factors such as, again, effort - effort in jobseeking. What we should do then is allow the individual to contribute whatever it is he enjoys doing in life, be it writing, reporting (or blogging), creating, and then put that into the marketplace (if we must have such a thing).
Or better yet the Citizen's Wage. Do away with the the DWP almost entirely. DO away with workfare pimps, the likes of Emma Harrison, and ATOS. Save money rather than waste it. Then you have a secure bottom line - the safety net welfare is meant to be - and people can live healthier happier lives. With that people will feel better about working communally for the social good, not driven into meaningless jobs that force them to waste their energy for next to no reward with positions that alienate them from society and in some cases family.
Just a thought.
Society goes to such great lengths to make people feel that work is the be all and the end all that you have to wonder if there's something to hide. The phrase 'hardworking' is bandied about with almost reckless abandon, but usually by the manager class in this country. People that don't subscribe to this notion are immediately marginalised as lazy.
This is absurd. Firstly I subscribe to the Taoist ideology that simply says one should only exert the required amount of effort to perform the task at hand well. But again our society views that as the definition of sloth. This is also absurd. Whatever is the point of just frittering and wasting our time and energy - as if the time and energy of the unemployed are worth less than the 'hard' working man's own. If one wastes their energy, putting in '110%' effort (and other such stock cliches), then one is only going to run out of energy quicker.
I always find this idea of hard working people somewhat laughable: are people typing their keyboards harder or faster? Are they checking items on a till faster and faster like robots? Is that even what people want from businesses? Wasting energy is foolish and it isn't hardwork; quite the opposite.
But the phrase has become the tool of our divisive capitalist system: you are either a member of the hardworking taxpayer class, or you are a scrounger. The deserving and the undeserving. I don't want to work hard; what's the point of that? I want to spend my time doing things that give my life value. Whether they earn money really is irrelevant - except for the unfortunate fact that's how the system works. Anything that doesn't earn money is meaningless.
Why don't we have an unemployment system that firstly ensures people are financially secure. That should be a given, not a component wholly dependent on factors such as, again, effort - effort in jobseeking. What we should do then is allow the individual to contribute whatever it is he enjoys doing in life, be it writing, reporting (or blogging), creating, and then put that into the marketplace (if we must have such a thing).
Or better yet the Citizen's Wage. Do away with the the DWP almost entirely. DO away with workfare pimps, the likes of Emma Harrison, and ATOS. Save money rather than waste it. Then you have a secure bottom line - the safety net welfare is meant to be - and people can live healthier happier lives. With that people will feel better about working communally for the social good, not driven into meaningless jobs that force them to waste their energy for next to no reward with positions that alienate them from society and in some cases family.
Just a thought.
Thursday, 3 November 2011
Occupy
Yesterday I went to Bristol and visited the Occupy protest taking place on College Green. There is a small and hopefully growing camp of people that, rightly IMO, want a better world. I support their efforts. This isn't a grotty group of soap dodgers or scroungers and stereotypes like these are growing increasingly tiresome. I even met my old GP who has long been active in working for change. This post is to affirm my support for their efforts. This movement is for everyone because the failing system affects everyone.
I'm not entirely sure what I can do to actively help the movement (signing on and camping out isn't going to be possible). I'd like to think there's something we can all do that is practical, but I fear that really radical change is only going to come from radical action. That isn't a euphemism for violence: we can achieve our aims peacefully, as indeed we should. However I think we need concerted, nationwide (if not planet wide) civil disobedience. By that I mean downing tools, striking, resisting, and not participating in the fraud that is capitalism. We have colluded in our own downfall for too long.
However I think change is needed beyond the City and the financial sector. This is an opportunity to build a better society for all. Not just about reforming capitalism but changing it if not removing it altogether. We must consider the environmental impact (unlike reactionaries like Eric Pickles) of our actions as well as providing a progressive, compassionate and creative culture for future generations. Capitalism, it seems to me, is predicated on the idea of scarce resources and archaic notions of land ownership. These have to be challenged and changed.
I'm not entirely sure what I can do to actively help the movement (signing on and camping out isn't going to be possible). I'd like to think there's something we can all do that is practical, but I fear that really radical change is only going to come from radical action. That isn't a euphemism for violence: we can achieve our aims peacefully, as indeed we should. However I think we need concerted, nationwide (if not planet wide) civil disobedience. By that I mean downing tools, striking, resisting, and not participating in the fraud that is capitalism. We have colluded in our own downfall for too long.
However I think change is needed beyond the City and the financial sector. This is an opportunity to build a better society for all. Not just about reforming capitalism but changing it if not removing it altogether. We must consider the environmental impact (unlike reactionaries like Eric Pickles) of our actions as well as providing a progressive, compassionate and creative culture for future generations. Capitalism, it seems to me, is predicated on the idea of scarce resources and archaic notions of land ownership. These have to be challenged and changed.
Tuesday, 1 November 2011
Time is Ticking
That's the message from my adviser today. I'm not entirely sure what it means. Seems a bit silly to say to someone that you must get a job sooner rather than later if they are going to then end up spending all of that precious time in a crap-ass job. Isn't there a contradiction in there somewhere? Of course you might find a non crap-ass job, which is great and good luck to you if you do. But that isn't really very likely these days is it; certainly not through the JC whose awful systems don't really help people in that regard.
Time is ticking. I have to do something and soon. Of course the reality is that if I don't it's the Work Programme for me which, I'm sure, she can tell I'm not happy about. Hardly surprising when the process is little more than passing me off to someone else to deal with. These people can't magic up jobs and, in my experience (and certainly loads of others, it seems, even if anecdotal), aren't interested in actually helping people find something positive.
So the interview was, perhaps relatively, benign other than the impetus to get me doing something. But the problem is the system. Everything that was discussed (it's not really discussed as you have next to no say in any of it ultimately) was filtered through the DWP's perception. I have had really no feedback from employers, which most people know is now the norm these days, so that is then counted as a bad thing for me. The reality, that the economic and labour market conditions are dire, is ignored as something beyond my control or the JC.
To that end I was persuaded to change my JSAg; instead of 'General Office', which wasn't getting the right results (because of the lack of interest from employers deluged with all sorts of better applicants) to 'Customer Service' with the proviso (thankfully) of no call centre work. I really don't see the difference. I agreed to it just to appease the situation as you have to at least be seen to play the game - and it is a game really. My move, your move.
So the categorisation and storage systems used by the JC job database has put me in this position, of making me look like I'm at best struggling and at worst lazy. In either case it's my 'fault'. But the system cannot deal with the reality of what's going on out there. I don't get interviews because I have no experience and am forced to pick categories I've no interest in and because there are thousands of better suited applicants. Beyond that, as we all know, a lot of these jobs are just bollocks: scams from agencies or little more than phishing trips designed to fatten their databases with no real jobs, or zero hour contracts, or some other unsuitable and unsustainable work, at best casual. I am again encouraged to think about voluntary work (assuming that I don't of course, which shows their attitude once again because I do). Unfortunately there isn't anything suitable (I don't feel up to sitting with rape victims or caring for people with really serious problems) beyond rattling tins or working in a charity shop. That's not what I want to do, and so I just look lazy. That's the filter again, the lens through which the system views you. I tried to explain that the issues I have are 'medical' and as such I need the right kind of help: therapy, medical treatment, if you like, counselling - whatever. But because the DWP can't provide this or can only offer useless alternatives (I turned down a chat with the Disability Adviser because she's not a doctor, she can't address these issues, and I'm sick of traipsing into that place), I'm seen as not moving forward and not doing anything.
Even the subject of working from home, which I said would be agreeable, was then turned around. At first this seemed like a good idea, which the adviser even brought up (I've considered it before anyway, though finding homework is next to impossible), then she started to equivocate by saying it would leave me more isolated. Well which is it? Working from home would be a place to start surely; why should I need to work with other people for that to be considered valid? There's no guarantee other people I work with won't be people I don't want to associate with anyway, and there's nothing more lonely than being alone in a crowd. A trivial point, but it's valid nonetheless: if you're going to criticise homeworking for this then the possibility of isolating experiences in a traditional workplace are just as valid.
In the end the processes are just flawed. The system is the problem, but there is no will to change this except to make it even more so.
The appointment was pleasant enough, but the attitude of the DWP system shines through nonetheless. A system that is out of touch, inflexible and holds you in an unbalanced power relationship. Time is ticking.
Time is ticking. I have to do something and soon. Of course the reality is that if I don't it's the Work Programme for me which, I'm sure, she can tell I'm not happy about. Hardly surprising when the process is little more than passing me off to someone else to deal with. These people can't magic up jobs and, in my experience (and certainly loads of others, it seems, even if anecdotal), aren't interested in actually helping people find something positive.
So the interview was, perhaps relatively, benign other than the impetus to get me doing something. But the problem is the system. Everything that was discussed (it's not really discussed as you have next to no say in any of it ultimately) was filtered through the DWP's perception. I have had really no feedback from employers, which most people know is now the norm these days, so that is then counted as a bad thing for me. The reality, that the economic and labour market conditions are dire, is ignored as something beyond my control or the JC.
To that end I was persuaded to change my JSAg; instead of 'General Office', which wasn't getting the right results (because of the lack of interest from employers deluged with all sorts of better applicants) to 'Customer Service' with the proviso (thankfully) of no call centre work. I really don't see the difference. I agreed to it just to appease the situation as you have to at least be seen to play the game - and it is a game really. My move, your move.
So the categorisation and storage systems used by the JC job database has put me in this position, of making me look like I'm at best struggling and at worst lazy. In either case it's my 'fault'. But the system cannot deal with the reality of what's going on out there. I don't get interviews because I have no experience and am forced to pick categories I've no interest in and because there are thousands of better suited applicants. Beyond that, as we all know, a lot of these jobs are just bollocks: scams from agencies or little more than phishing trips designed to fatten their databases with no real jobs, or zero hour contracts, or some other unsuitable and unsustainable work, at best casual. I am again encouraged to think about voluntary work (assuming that I don't of course, which shows their attitude once again because I do). Unfortunately there isn't anything suitable (I don't feel up to sitting with rape victims or caring for people with really serious problems) beyond rattling tins or working in a charity shop. That's not what I want to do, and so I just look lazy. That's the filter again, the lens through which the system views you. I tried to explain that the issues I have are 'medical' and as such I need the right kind of help: therapy, medical treatment, if you like, counselling - whatever. But because the DWP can't provide this or can only offer useless alternatives (I turned down a chat with the Disability Adviser because she's not a doctor, she can't address these issues, and I'm sick of traipsing into that place), I'm seen as not moving forward and not doing anything.
Even the subject of working from home, which I said would be agreeable, was then turned around. At first this seemed like a good idea, which the adviser even brought up (I've considered it before anyway, though finding homework is next to impossible), then she started to equivocate by saying it would leave me more isolated. Well which is it? Working from home would be a place to start surely; why should I need to work with other people for that to be considered valid? There's no guarantee other people I work with won't be people I don't want to associate with anyway, and there's nothing more lonely than being alone in a crowd. A trivial point, but it's valid nonetheless: if you're going to criticise homeworking for this then the possibility of isolating experiences in a traditional workplace are just as valid.
In the end the processes are just flawed. The system is the problem, but there is no will to change this except to make it even more so.
The appointment was pleasant enough, but the attitude of the DWP system shines through nonetheless. A system that is out of touch, inflexible and holds you in an unbalanced power relationship. Time is ticking.
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“Mr. Grayling, benefits cheats in your head
Oh Mr. Grayling, get them up out of bed
Your lifestyle to me seems so tragic
With the thrill of it all
You fooled all the people with statistics
(Yeah)You waited on Duncan’s call
Mr. Grayling, won't you sign my income support?
Mr. Grayling, it's symbolic of course
Approaching a time that is classic
I hear that single mums call
Approaching a time that is drastic
Standing with their backs to the wall”