Clegg's Choice

Prior to signing my soul away on the Work Programme, I was made aware of an alternative; a scheme called Work Choice (or Work Choices - I think it's the same, if not this post is a waste of time!), locally run by an outfit called Pluss. I'm bringing this up now because of this.

It seems again the government has bungled another scheme. Even though, from what I can gather, this scheme is more or less the WP by another name, and even though it's intended for people with health issues, it can't get government funding. That useless twat Clegg, the depty PM, can't even get help for those that need it the most to compete (as we must, it seems) in the job market. 

I was told that Work Choice was a scheme that runs for 6 months. If you don't find work at the end of it (and if it's anything like the WP you won't) then you go onto the WP - at least that would have been the case for me; hobson's choice. I was told they'd come out to meet me locally. This turned out not to be the case: they operate in the same manner as any local WP provider: through an office based 'nearby'.
 

Here's the Pluss webpage selling this scheme; now tell me how that's not the same spiel that WP providers dish out?

The Cost of Parking

So it seems I have been parked: that is abandoned by the WP. I have heard nothing back from them at all. I still have the forms given to me to fill in, some of which remain unanswered because the questions are stupid and I frankly can't be arsed. Is this a good example of Christian charity? But then, it seems, the Salvation Army has form in this area: they subscribe to a strict biblical morality with all the divisiveness that entails.

Thing with being parked is that you are left in limbo: the claimant still has to search for jobs to fulfil the condition for receiving JSA and show his efforts, but he gets no support from the people that the public purse is paying for that. I'm not entirely sure this is a better situation. But then I don't really want to rock the boat when I go and sign on in case I get shipped off on workfare. This is an unacceptable state of affairs, and one that goonface Grayling will doubtless deny happens. The more these experiences trickle out the harder for him it will be to keep sticking his finger in to close the cracks in the dam.

What do I do? The cold hard truth is that, at least locally, there is no help at all. I don't know if I can swithc providers - in fact I suspect that's not an option at all. Once you're with a provider, any complaints about their service have to go through them. I've heard this from JC+ staff many times while waiting to be seen. It's a convenient arrangement: see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil. Even then the other provider (JHP - via whomever they have delivering on the ground) is also operating from a religious establishment: they are hosted at the newer and more plush (but no less Christian) baptist church down the road. Perhaps god has cornered the market on the WP: after all IDS is himself a full on believer. I'd call him a zealot.

These schemes just cannot address the reality of the problems that are out there. For people like myself in rural communities, travel is a huge problem. I simply cannot afford to be travelling around because the cost of a bus ticket is £7! That's ten percent of my weekly income. There's no concessionary rate either. Why can't the government help with matters like this? They are after all quite happy for WP providers to have to find the means to refund travel expenses to appointments, but they can't recognise that the pittance amount of JSA just cannot cope with the huge and ever increasing bus fares charged by the private sector.

I don't really see any of this changing any time soon. Parking is a sign of the times: it's easier to just dismiss problems, take resources away from people (such as help and support) and focus on things that are easier to address: superficial problems that a photo op can cure. Meanwhile the rest of us are abandoned.

"It's Great!"

A current client says of their work experience: 'It’s great, it’s enabling me to improve my skills and look at other avenues. It’s making me smile again.'

 That's what the Salvation Army Employment Plus website tells me. They claim the organisation:

Works to redress the negative effects of unemployment on people’s lives – their self-esteem, overall well-being, families and wider communities, to provide jobseekers with targeted professional support through:

 

• our nationwide network of community and social work centres
• our teams of specialist employment advisers
• and our partners in employment services

 These are not negative effects caused by unemployment but by capitalism: the lack of money in a society where money is everything and the social opprobrium brought about by not being what society wants you to be: an economic drone, instead of a rounded thoughtful caring individual. That's the first point to make; don't be telling me that unemployment is the diseases when it's merely an inevitable symptom of a much greater problem. As long as we keep the system as is, there will always be unemployment - and consequently there will always be people like the Salvation Army to capitalise upon it.

A nationwide network of community and social work centres? What the hell is this? There's no such thing. Certainly not for me - unless tatty old church halls decorated like something from the 1970's are what they mean. Hardly the brunt of a progressive movement toward helping people. I don't even think they have internet access!

Specialist employment advisers? Well for a start they are SA officers (they really do like to think of themselves as some kind of army!) and they expect me to be 100% comfortable being in their Christian environment. Good job I'm absolutely an atheist - oh wait. I don't see any evidence of specialism at all. Anyone could have done what P did: print out some leaflets and tell me how little they can help. I'm not sure what partners they refer to either, I'm not sure I'd want to find out.

To be honest they are using the same kind of pseudo religious work ethic nonsense as Duncan Schmidt; but then they are both followers of the same belief system. Welfare dependency - which they want to replace with what...income dependency presumably. Wage slavery. In work or not, you are still dependent on the money you receive, that isn't being challenged.

Looks like they are seeking people in my area: Job Life Coaches (WTF?). This isn't the most well paid job in existence however, and you have to be subservient to the organisation's 'christian ethos'. Of course they don't say that you must be a Christian, but then they can't can they! 

The Work Programme transforms the way in which long-term unemployed people receive help into employment. All job seekers who have been signing on for 12 months are referred for bespoke support in gaining sustainable employment. The Job Life Coach will encourage, motivate and inspire job seekers!

Yes, it's very transformative. It's magically transmuted the nation's finances into private wealth for those riding the unemployment gravy train. I can't say that P has encouraged, motivated or inspired me, especially given that he went out of his way to tell me how not-bespoke their service was. Again, I was flat out told that training, at the very least, is off the table entirely. 

Just goes to show how even the lord's soldiers can be 'economical' with the truth in order to deliver a service that, certainly in my experience, wasn't 'bespoke'. Here's the testimony of an employer (the only testimony) as to the effectiveness of employment plus:

Danielle Clark, Store Manager, British Heart Foundation, Putney.

“We started working with The Salvation Army around a year ago. During this time they have placed about 10 people with us on work placements, a couple of whom have gone forward for permanent positions.

Overall it’s been extremely successful and we’ve enjoyed working with them. For work as a Red Cap we require people with specific security certification and a strong outgoing personality. We’ve been impressed by the way The Salvation Army has understood what we are looking for and delivered the right people.”

Now it doesn't say whether those permanent positions are paid, but notice the lack of specificity - 'a couple of people' from 'about 10'. Is it me, or is this just really rather informal? Ok, fair enough I suppose, but that's not even a quarter of those placed (workfare?) as volunteers in a charity shop! Something that anyone could arrange for themselves anyway - and did the involvement of the SA displace anyone else hoping to volunteer? Did the forced labour they offered (I must assume this is workfare or synonymous with it) take priority? If this was good for the BHF, does that mean they are still involved in the iniquitous workfare programme? I hope not.

Again, from their site, the salvation army offers:

Offer a personalised service aimed at identifying and addressing any issues which may be making it hard for someone to find work and provide access to the right training and support to look for and gain the job that best suits your skills and personality.

Any issues? Well certainly not mental health issues as they, explicitly, don't have staff trained to deal with that. Had I been referred as an ESA claimant (not that it should make a difference, and they were made aware of my issues in the referral information they were sent but ignored) would it have been different. No, as point of fact, because I asked. Right training? Well that's bollocks as I've explained. The job that best suits your skills and personality: well this sounds great, but of course it can be taken to mean that, given the lack of training and opportunity to broaden your skills base or even experience base (unless shelf stacking and sorting clothes in the BHF is the way forward), this is a bit disingenuous. That's the dangerous part of all this. It's very easy to say we will help you find something to do without helping you move forward. I also don't like the personality part of that either. Sounds rather Orwellian. But even then, their service seems to amount to little more than jobsearching on rubbish facilities in an old church hall. They claim a list of specialist services, but it's the usual stuff with more claims about specialist help/training and the usual gamut of life or employability skills (these may be useful to some, which is fair enough, but this is used by providers across the board to disguise the fact that they offer very little else at all).

I have no idea what they mean by Employment Resource Centres either (this one in Hammersmith sounds about right), unless that's a euphemism for the kind of environment I've seen thus far. Perhaps they just expect you to pray to the almighty for a jobsearch.

Programmed - Parked?

I've been waiting all week for P to ring me. I was sure they'd be on my case as early as possible, and in a weird way, it might have been better had that been so. At least then I wouldn't have to wait, stressing out, as to what is supposed to be happening. It would also mean that I don't struggle to answer the JC adviser, when I sign on, when asked "how's it going on the WP?" which they ask every time now. 

So where does that leave me? Have I been parked? Will I get a call next week, next month, next year? Perhaps they've passed me back to the JC  for someone else to deal with; they clearly don't like having to deal with people that have the wit to ask questions about this awful nonsense. But in the end none of this really helps me, as if it was ever about that.

I've been filling in the forms that P printed out; the assessment forms. One of the first questions it asks is about my interest in self employment, further education, and/or training. Yet I've already been told that training, at least, is off the table. These are Jobfit forms, so it seems that the Salvation Army want to ignore the provision. Probably because they haven't the money to offer any kind of decent service; that's money they could be spending on transforming the environment into some horrible 1970's church hall and buying new old bibles.

Of course I'm not going to ring them myself. Not least of all because that's not my responsibility. But I'm annoyed that the signing process isn't as expedient as I would like. One of the few upsides I was hoping for, while on the WP, is that signing on is supposed to be more efficient. Unfortunately despite supposedly having a fixed time for my appointment (important given local transport times), they change it every time because the system is actually incapable of booking a set time beyond two weeks. I'm also supposed to see the same person (at least that's what my GP was told), this was the case until I was referred. Now i just see whomever is there and get asked the same question about how the programme is going. A waste of time really since the DWP can't do anything - and frankly I don't really want to get into it with them because it's probably going to cause more problems than it solves. So instead of being a quick in and out at the JC, it's still the usual bureaucracy, only without them doing any jobsearch (that's what the WP is for).

I wouldn't say I feel abandoned. I expected the WP to be a complete waste of time. But I just didn't think it would be so regressive: so lacking and just so backward. At least if you're in the right kind of environment - ie not a tatty musty old church hall - it would feel a bit more modern. But really it's just like a local rotary club meeting and completely unproductive.

Absolute Zero

Not our lovely Spring weather, although that isn't far off as I sit in a cold room typing this, but the implication of this, from our lord and master, Goonface Grayling. 

The implication of this would be that voluntary work experience is worth rolling out to everyone. But then wouldn't it cancel itself out? If everyone was made to work for 5 months unpaid, in order to get a 16% greater chance of finding work, surely the end result would be no one would get a benefit? These schemes do not create jobs, so where is the benefit? 

This is the case for any such statistic the DWP pulls out of its hat regarding workfare, or the Work Programme, or 'voluntary' work experience, and not just for the youth. If my chances of finding work are improved because my provider can 'magic up' a good cv then that implies that the WP can do this for everyone, which again cancels itself out. So either these sorts of statistics in fact relate to competition within the system (and the 'customer' has to hope he gets sent to the better provider - remember he has no say in the matter), or they are bullshit extrapolated desperately and spuriously to prove this scheme isn't a waste of time and taxes.

All the reports that get published that relate to the success of the WP always point to someone who found a job within a couple of months/few weeks, with the catalyst being their CV. "So and so helped me improve my cv," is what you will read. It's too simplistic to even count - and that's before considering that these might be jobs that the customer was always going to get regardless or that, statistically, there will always be some, few, that can benefit from this. The point of course is how few: it's clear that basing a policy on that few is disingenuous because it skews the perception to something that is clearly not reality. There aren't the jobs available, so if more people have their cv's polished or work for free in the dungeons of big business all that does is cancel itself out. In fact, simply giving the customer a job to apply for, without doing anything else (such as providing training, counselling, help of whatever kind...) is going to be the same: what if I was to ask my provider, upon receiving a mandatory application, "how many other people have you directed to apply for this job?"

The competition for jobs will remain, and it isn't as if these providers are even able (in some cases, in others they aren't willing) to invest in improving or diversifying skills and ability.

Dangerous Times

This is a great article, as is Izzy Koksal's blog, which I read yesterday. I think the key point made is quite simply the choice between paying for some slef help guru nonsense or paying for actual traiining:

"A4e and others seem to think it's worth spending money on this damaging nonsense but not on genuine skills training."

I've read a lot of the websites that are fighting this unholy mess and my concern all along has been that even if the claimant stands up for his rights and is correct, what's to stop the provider just making trouble for him? Quite simply nothing. I don't really have an answer for this: what else are people meant to do? But it seems that providers can just mark your card and you can get sanctioned simply for being a trouble maker by virtue of being seen not to play ball. What then? I hate to scaremonger.

What's needed is nationwide solidarity. We need the unions on side. We need as much of the media as we can muster on side. The actions against workfare are great and I fully support everything, but I fear it's not enough. This government seems to have the weight of popular (or populist) opinion on its side. So we need to mobilise en masse and fight hard; the sort of action that occurred with the pensions on 30th Nov last year. If we can't get this happening then the cause will be marginalised and people increasingly viewed as militant layabouts - just like the riots last year. This awful government is happy to sweep issues under the carpet and threaten people, including children, destroying their futures.

I would love to see a nationwide unemployment movement politically and socially progressive and motivated by equality and compassion. I wish I knew how to make that happen.

Txt Me

Can I take this opportunity to again slam the Work Programme as a money making scam for the few at the expense of the many unemployed?

Now Cleggy wants a scheme that sees the support for our growing unemployed youth to be whittled down to a text message.

I'm not a youth, but JC support is non existence, and if you re on the WP they withdraw completely - except to check your jobsearch (which the WP are meant to provide) and take a signature. I'm supposed to be seen by the same person each time, that's what the DWPs own psychologist agreed given my difficulties (issues, by the way, that the WP provider can't and seemingly won't address). But they are short staffed when I sign on because no one wants to work Fridays. This exacerbates their usual lack of coordination within a system that is byzantine, complicated and at times self defeating.

Recruitment agencies are getting swallowed up by the WP as the big names are jumping on board while the little ones are no hope anyway. It won't be long before the private sector replaces the JC+ entirely as I believe that to be the end game of the WP. It isn't just a 'hooray for work, arbeit macht frei' scheme, it's the privatisation of the benefits system. You will have to convince an untrained and unfunded and perhaps uncaring little man working for a subcontractor that's at the bottom of the food chain in order to get your payment. But of course he won't bear the responsibility for the sanction you may end up getting because those targets will be kept for the primes.

Chris Grayling is a sociopath. I wouldn't trust him to look after a ten pence piece never mind the welfare system and the well being of people on his failing schemes. IDS is a christian zealot who wouldn't know what it's like to work in a fraught economy putting in long hours for a pittance, or dealing with the insecurity of a zero hour contract. Both of these people are, objectively, completely unfit for their jobs and wouldn't have them were it not for the self interest of rural middle England and the fawning right wing media.